The Beast Within {Discontinued ~ Mori no Ko)

Chapter Thirteen: Part Two

[Third Person POV]

Enter, the Chuunin Exams: Phase Two---the Forest of Death!

Each team of Genin had entered the forest nearly ten minutes ago and Squad 11 had paused in their stride to formulate on the ground. Midori slipped the straps of her black backpack off of her shoulders and sat it on the ground then knelt down in front of it. She grabbed both zippers and guided them down opposite sides of the bag and reached in.

Aoi raised an intrigued eyebrow at the blonde as she pulled out a few kunai and some trip wire. Traps, she thought, smirking slightly, smart thinking, blondie.

"I didn't live nearly eight years in the middle of a forest learning to do nothing," said Midori, as she strung out the trip wire and tied it through the hole of each kunai and into a sturdy knot. "Aki taught me to do a ton of things and many of them involved killing some game for our meals."

Ken sweat dropped and dead panned. "Shouldn't that make you a hunter, rather than a ninja?" he asked.

The blonde's nose twitched in annoyance as she stood up and held out the kunai in the palm of her hand to him. "Here," she said. "I don't care how much you scrutinize me about doing this . . . because it's a useful survival technique that's going to help us get our Heaven Scroll and make it out of here alive."

Ken took the kunai from her hand and examined it for a moment, taking in the way she'd made precise twists and turns with the wire around its handle.

Midori knelt back down and pulled out some fresh tags---paper bombs. "We'll tie these to the end of each kunai," she paused and did so, "and if anyone happens across this, it'll ignite the tag and blow them into smithereens."

She looked over at Aoi and nodded her head toward the wire-wrapped kunai on the ground. "I want you to stab that into the lowest part of that tree over there," she said, pointing an index finger to the tree to their far right. Midori reached into her bag and pulled out another paper bomb, then held it up to Aoi. "Be sure to wrap this around it as well."

"This trap doesn't seem too reassuring," said the ravenette as she followed Midori's instructions, "but I guess we can't argue if you think it will." Aoi trudged back over to her two teammates and propped herself against one of the mossy trees, ignoring the fact that it was a bit damp and seeping through the short black sleeve of her shirt.

Midori sighed and lazily pointed to Aoi's bow strapped upon her back. "Don't forget to utilize that nifty weapon either, Aoi. To have a better chance at getting our Heaven Scroll, I think it'd be best for you to hide in the trees, while Ken and I stay on the ground. You think you could do that?"

Aoi waved dismissively. "Pfft, I could do that in my sleep, blondes." She leapt into the cover of the leaves above and steadied herself on a thick branch, then glanced down at Midori, hidden perfectly within the dense greenery. "How's this?" she asked.

Midori stared upward and nodded subtly. "Perfect," she said with a smile, "as long as you can see us, then we're fin--."

"Wouldn't it be more useful if we just used clones to confuse any oncoming enemies?" asked Ken as he carried his golden gaze from Aoi to Midori, a bored expression on his face.

Midori raised an inquiring eyebrow before saying, in a rather sarcastic manner, "What kind of clones could possibly take a hit without disappearing in a cloud of smoke?"

Ken smirked slightly. "A Mokuton (Wood-Style) one, that's what."

Aoi nearly slipped from the branch as she noticed the boy's words weren't a retort or complaint of any sort, rather an actual answer with a bit of a rhetorical sense behind it. Had the girl not latched onto the branch with her fingernails and steadied herself, she probably would have fallen.