Shooting Straight

Chapter 26

Arrow stretched his arms above his head as he entered the tower, taking note of the high ceiling and balconies above him. It was empty, with only a small bulletin board on the far wall. He looked around, scanning for any traces of other people being near and not finding anything. Arrow pondered the thought of it being another trap, as a grande finale to the forest of death. One last thing that could wipe them out. 

 "Hey... I don't really understand. What are we supposed to do now?" Naruto looked around the room for anything that could give them a clue on what happened next. 

"Hold on, look at this." Sakura pointed to the bulletin and took a couple of steps towards it, trying to decipher the words that seemed to be written on it. Arrow looked to where she was pointing, and read over the words himself.

"If Heaven does not exist, enrich your knowledge and prepare for the chance. If Earth does not exist, run the fields in search of an advantage. Open the series of Heaven and Earth, and the perilous way shall be redressed. This namely the secret of the one that guides." He recited the words almost perfectly, skipping over a missing word. Sakura's brow scrunched together in thought as she took in the brunette's words.

"I think it could be referring to the scrolls. Heaven and Earth." She hummed, turning over the words in her mind as she examined them thoroughly. "I believe this is telling us we're supposed to open them." Her voice was confident, although truly she wasn't sure she was interpreting correctly and feared that she could be wrong and cost them all the exam. 

Without allowing for time to second guess, Arrow took the heaven scroll from his pocket and peeled it open as Naruto did the same for the Earth. Arrow looked over the contents and frowned, tossing the scroll a couple of feet from him as it began to bubble and billow thick smoke.

"This is a summoning jutsu," Sasuke exclaimed as he watched a figure appear as the smoke faded out to nothing. "It's you..."

Standing where they'd thrown the scrolls stood Iruka Umino, the one who had taught them in the academy. He looked at them with his arms crossed across his chest, appraising them. Arrow shifted uncomfortably and kept his gaze on the ground in front of him. 

"It's been a while," Iruka smiled at them. "Looks like you've been through a lot in this test. At the end of the second exam, we chunin are expected to welcome back the test takers." He checked his watch, "Looks like you guys made it just in time too. Congratulations on surviving the second exam." He was quiet for a second as the four genin absorbed the information. "Now, I'd love to treat you all to some Ichiraku ramen..."

That was all it took for Naruto to jump up, eyes wide with excitement at tasting his favourite food again. "Right now! Let's go!" the blonde continued spewing nonsense from his mouth, ignoring the fact that Iruka was trying to interrupt him to finish what he'd been talking about. 

Arrow, getting quite annoyed at the Uzumaki's loudness and inability to listen to anyone but himself, turned to his teammate and roughly grabbed him by the shoulder to pull him off their previous teacher. 

"Will you shut up? He'd trying to tell us something, so just close your mouth and listen." Arrow snapped, eyes narrowing at the now-startled blonde. Naruto nodded as Arrow released his grip, and the Uzumaki quickly scurried away. 

"Now I see," Sasuke hummed, looking as if he'd just discovered something that he was rather proud to realize. "if we had looked at the scroll in the middle of the exam, what would you have done, Iruka-sensei?" Arrow turned his head to look at his academy teacher, whose smile fell from his face. 

"As usual, you're a sharp one Sasuke." Iruka picked up the scroll at his feet and held it up for the four genin to view, "you've guessed right, the rules of this exam were to test your conclusive mission execution ability. To put it simply, in the case of the scrolls being opened contrary to the rules, we were ordered to knock out the test takers who opened it until the end of the exam."