Ninja Battle Royale

The Third Hokage left.

He left everyone else behind to continue the meeting.

"Minato, you really got me in trouble this time," Kyōichi sighed.

"But isn't this a good thing? An A-rank mission with a good reward!" Minato said apologetically.

But the results were good, right? Minato was originally worried about Kakashi's situation, but Kyōichi had perfectly resolved it.

Scrambling the teams...why didn't he think of that himself!

The only problem was that with this arrangement, Obito likely wouldn't make Chunin this year.

Obito's issue wasn't lack of ability. In terms of skill, he felt Obito was quite good among the Genin. But like Kyōichi said, the boy was reckless and lacked focus...

He lacked a brain.

"Alright then."

Kyōichi resigned himself.

The Chunin Exams were pointless to expend effort on without any system rewards, he had no interest in being responsible for them. He just wanted his subordinates to participate and mess around.

With the coming war, everyone could become Chunin quickly anyway.

However...

He didn't expect Minato to push this on him!

"Minato, since you pushed this on me, don't think about running away!"

Kyōichi's gaze was full of menace.

Minato coughed lightly and said, "Don't worry, I'll help however I can. Let's discuss your plans here while everyone is present."

"Fine," Kyōichi sat down with the other Jōnin encircling him.

He thought for a moment and outlined his basic plan.

"For the theory exam, do as you wish. For the second phase, we'll first set up an arena filled with soldier pills, kunai, shuriken and other food and weapons..."

Kyōichi laid out his ideas.

In short, it was a ninja battle royale.

The Jōnin would sweep in periodically from the outskirts, driving examinees towards the center.

Everyone was stunned hearing this.

...The exams could be played this way?

"You mean in the second phase, we'll confiscate everything from the examinees, forcing them to scavenge for supplies themselves. But what about clans like the Inuzuka with ninja dogs?" Minato raised his concerns.

"Ninja hounds are part of their strength," Kyōichi replied.

Though the Inuzuka dogs were powerful, they weren't invincible.

The other Jōnin nodded along.

That's right. The Inuzuka had their dogs, but other ninja had summon beasts too! It was the same thing.

"We'll show all examinees a map of the supply points before starting," Kyōichi continued.

"This tests their information gathering."

"Right. We can also periodically drop specially made weapons, soldier pills and explosive tags, marked by signal flares."

"Team battles."

The Jōnin all understood Kyōichi's goal with these rules.

In the end...

Hayama Shirakumo pondered for a while before reluctantly saying, "The rules are good, but I'm worried the difficulty may be too high?"

"Indeed, with reorganized teams and fighting over supplies, it's much harder than previous Chunin Exams," another agreed.

The Chunin Exams? These rules were more fitting for the Jōnin Exams! Using them to test Genin was ridiculously difficult!

But...

"Everyone, Our village may go to war again anytime. As commanders, promoting useless Genin to Chunin would be irresponsible of us, no?" Kyōichi said righteously.

Though he proposed these rules in part because it seemed interesting, testing the Genin comprehensively like this was indeed better than just stealing some scrolls. Information gathering, teamwork, leadership - all were indispensable.

The others pondered at length but couldn't find any objections. Kyōichi had thought of everything already.

Compared to the past...

What was that? Stealing scrolls? How primitive! Tradition wasn't necessarily right.

Minato sighed inwardly at the realization.

"Kyōichi, I think these exams can become the norm. Please write up a detailed proposal," said Nara Shikaku.

As a non-team leader, he rarely spoke up. But Kyōichi's plan was clearly far superior to the previous scroll battles.

After some thought, he asked, "What ideas do you have for the third phase then?"

"One-on-one battles, what else could there be? At most, just fit the individual battles into the same model, with individuals instead of teams," Kyōichi said.

Shikaku pondered deeply before his eyes lit up in understanding.

He grasped the advantage of this model - the past exams had always been arena matches.

But war wasn't fought on some arena. Ninja battled in the wilderness, with ambushes, sneak attacks and assassinations. Examining students in this way would produce ninja more suited for real war.

He nodded. "Please be sure to write up the plan Kyōichi. I will ask the Third Hokage to increase your reward."

"Then we have a deal!" Kyōichi laughed.

As a strategist, Shikaku wouldn't make idle promises. Since he said this, the increased reward was virtually guaranteed.

A-rank mission rewards generally ranged from 150,000 to 1 million ryō, leaving ample room to negotiate. He had funding for new weapons now!

With the plan settled, all that remained was to write it up and polish it.

Everyone dispersed.

Outside the building, Kyōichi stopped Minato.

"Minato, you said you would help however needed, right?"

"Yes."

"Well, I'm a bit busy recently, so I'll trouble you to write up the proposal."

"Huh? That's not..."

Minato was about to object but saw Kyōichi fading away, replaced by an afterimage.

The improved Body Flicker!

Minato was speechless.

This guy...!

Busy? As if he'd believe that!

After some thought, Minato softly shook his head.

Oh well. It wasn't a big deal, Kyōichi had explained the plan clearly already. It would only take a day or so to write up. No problem!

As for Kyōichi himself...

After slipping away, he went to check on his three disciples. The trio were conscientiously running laps around the village. Full of vigor! Kyōichi didn't disturb them, instead finding a restaurant to buy food and start reading.

With Tsunade's huge pile of books, he had to make the most of his time.