In the end, Omoi won the match as he had a significant advantage because his lightning-clad sword was capable of severing Kankuro’s chakra threads.

But it was close, and at the end of the match, Kankuro sported several gashes and was severely electrocuted while Omoi was heavily poisoned by the few lucky shots of Kankuro’s hidden weaponry that did hit him and needed to be carted off to the medics, half-dead, the second the match ended. The boy was going to require at least a two-week stay in the hospital to recover.

Hinata was a bit pouty at the result because she wanted to have a showdown of her Mr. Doom versus Kankuro’s puppetry, but there was nothing to it now since the boy was out of the contest.

The following match was quickly decided and announced, and Kiba excitedly jumped into the arena, followed by Naruto, who also couldn’t wait for his own turn.

“I am going to kick your sorry ass so much that Akamaru will dump you and become my ninken, dog breath!” Naruto teasingly shouted, his exuberant over-eagerness overflowing from him.

Sadly, his words instantly pissed Kiba off. “The hell you are! You couldn’t take care of a pet rock without having it die on your watch, loser! If you think you could take care of a dog, you are deluded!”

“What did you say!?” Naruto returned, a tick mark appearing on his forehead.

“You heard me! Or what? You already forgot what happened to Mr. Hardy?” Kiba taunted, causing Naruto to gasp.

“Draggin’ Mr. Hardy into this is a low blow, Kiba! I told you about him in confidence as a friend!”

“Oi, bastard! You spew shit about taking Akamaru from me, I reveal that you lost your pet rock. Sounds fair to me. Ha!?” Kiba threw Naruto a menacing look, making Naruto speechlessly cringe in embarrassment.

“…”

That would have been the end of it, but Naruto and Kiba really were not all that different, so Kiba got the bright idea to mock Naruto some more now that he was ahead in their argument.

“How the heck do you even lose a pet rock anyway?”

“He just disappeared, okay!” Naruto flushed in anger, all his embarrassment turning into fury.

“Sure, he did.” Kiba derisively said, “Grew legs and swaggered his way right outta door, didn’t he?” He snorted at Naruto, who narrowed his eyes and glared at Kiba while his clenched fists shook.

That pet rock was his first friend!

This was not going to be tolerated. Naruto wanted to be nice and decided to face Kiba like a ninja. But it seems the dog-breath wanted to experience his Ultimate Technique!

“Boys…” Hayate coughed and said, but noticing that neither Kiba nor Naruto paid him any attention, he too got a bit irked. “BOYS!” He shouted, finally making the two hot-heads stop glaring at each other. “Could you please stop arguing so I can finally start the match?” He asked with a sigh.

He expected to be obeyed. But that was just him not knowing Naruto well enough.

“What are ya waiting for then, old man?” Naruto asked with a ‘duh’ expression, “Just get on with it so I can beat the hell out of him!” He jabbed his pointing finger at Kiba, not noticing how Hayate’s lips twitched at being called ‘old man’.

He coughed and opened his mouth…

Only to be interrupted by the grumpy voice of Kiba. “What the idiot said, old man. Just get on with it.”

“I am not an idiot! You are the idiot here!” Naruto glared at Kiba, causing Hayate to look toward the ceiling, fed up.

“No, you are the idiot! Akamaru, tell him!” Kiba countered perfectly with impeccable logic.

“Arf! Arf! Arf!”

“Akamaru!?” Naruto’s jaw dropped, and Ren wondered if the boy truly understood the dog or if he was just pretending. “This is a betrayal of our friendship! You betrayed our canine bro code!”

“Grrr?” The small Akamaru, who sat in Kiba’s hood, tilted his head and looked at Naruto as if he were an idiot.

“Ah, whatever. Begin.” Hayate clicked his tongue and waved his arm before he jumped back, muttering, “Do whatever. See if I care, brats. Cough.”

Up on the balcony, Ren noticed how Hinata’s right eyebrow was slightly twitching as she watched Kiba make a complete ass out of himself in front of other Konoha and foreign genin.

He grinned and nudged her. “Konoha’s cream of the crop, eh?”

“Don’t even joke about it…” Hinata discontentedly muttered, her expression darkening.

She considered Kiba a person she had trained, and his performance was not exactly a shining example of competency so far. That reflected quite badly on her teaching skills.

‘And the mutt did this in front of Ren!’ Hinata inwardly groaned. If there was one person she wanted to show off the fruits of her labor in helping to train her teammates, it was her boyfriend!

Ren wryly smiled and felt a bit of pity for Kiba. He recognized the look Hinata was shooting at the Inuzuka boy, and he would not want to be in his place once she got her hands on him after this part of the Exams.

He heard even Kurenai stifle a long, suffering sigh, having the same problem as Hinata. As his Jonin Instructor, his actions reflect on her and this… well. She wouldn’t be winning any Sensei of the Year award for this. That was for sure.

He imagined Kurenai was not a very happy camper right now.

Down in the arena, the two boys were still locked in a heated debate about which of them was a bigger idiot, much to the Hokage’s obviously growing amusement.

“See? Even Akamaru agrees!” Kiba smugly declared, and Naruto reeled back as if burned.

“Your dog sucks, dog breath!” He angrily shouted. “Is this how you treat a comrad-!?”

“JUST FIGHT ALREADY! YOU BOTH ARE IDIOTS, DAMMIT!” Karui’s loud yell resonated throughout the room and interrupted their banter, her patience coming to an end.

Seriously! These Konoha chumps were simply ridiculous! If she let them, they would continue to bicker until tomorrow.

With a huff, she gave the two boys her trademark glare that sent quite a few of her opponents packing during her ninja career.

An awkward silence spread through the arena while Kiba and Naruto exchanged uncomfortable looks.

“Ah, the match.” Kiba embarrassedly spoke, as if he had just remembered, his cheeks flushing self-consciously.

“Umm, right.” Naruto also grumbled, feeling mortified.

For a moment, the two boys averted their eyes, but then they looked at each other again. A beat of silence passed. Then…

“GATSUGA!”

“MULTI-SHADOW CLONE JUTSU!”

Kiba’s gatsuga tore through the air, heading directly toward Naruto, whose position was briefly engulfed in white smoke. The spinning Inuzuka barrelled straight into the smoke, just as several Naruto clones jumped out of it, skidding on the ground to a halt.

The smoke was blown away because of Kiba’s attack, revealing the Inuzuka boy crouching on a slightly cracked stone floor, sniffing and looking around for the original Naruto, only to growl when he realized he couldn’t locate him via smell.

The Narutos grinned.

A small piece of debris behind Kiba suddenly transformed into Naruto, showing that he used the transformation technique to hide when Kiba attacked, and grabbed the Inuzuka boy in a hold from behind, his arm around Kiba’s armpits, locking the boy’s arms from doing anything.

The clones were already moving forward, each of them holding a kunai as they pounced on the restrained Kiba…

Realizing his situation, Kiba hit Naruto, the one who held him, with his rear, strongly enough to cause his feet to lift from the ground. He then pushed against the ground, powerfully jumping into the air a second before the other five Naruto clones arrived at his location.

They stopped underneath Kiba, raising their heads toward him while he was still mid-jump in the air with one Naruto hanging off of his back. Their eyes widened as they prepared to attack, and Kiba smirked.

From the side, Akamaru suddenly appeared in Gatsuga, tearing through the clones that grouped up, sending them smashing onto the ground before they started popping out of existence with smoke.

Headbutting the Naruto behind him with the back of his head, Kiba heard him pop and grinned.

“Eas-!” He exclaimed.

Only to eat a haymaker to the jaw a second later because the popping sound was not Naruto’s clone ceasing to exist, but Naruto substituting with a clone.

“Right back at you, dog bre-!” Naruto started, but Akamaru almost hit him head-on with another Gatsuga. He only barely noticed it in time to jump to the side, yet he was still grazed by it and was sent rocketing back until he hit the ground.

“Ow. Stupid dog.” Naruto groaned before he quickly jumped back on his feet, noticing that Kiba, rubbing his jaw with a small scowl, also stood up while Akamaru was in between them, prepared to pounce at Naruto again.

Their gazes briefly locked, but Kiba instantly became a flurry of action as he pulled out purple balls and threw them at Naruto. Naruto instinctively tensed and prepared to block with his kunai, only for the balls to turn out to be smoke bombs when they exploded into thick purple smoke before even reaching Naruto.

The smoke covered the entirety of the inner side of the arena, causing the spectators to stare like idiots, as many of them did not have a way to tell what was going on inside.

Thankfully, Naruto solved that problem quickly, making five more shadow clones, and all of them aimed their palms toward the epicenter of the smoke.

“Wind Release: Gale Palm!”

Sharp wind swirled around their hands before it was propelled forward in five streams, shredding the smokescreen in a matter of seconds.

But Kiba was nowhere to be found.

Naruto quickly checked in front of him, behind him, before he looked to the left and right. His eyebrows furrowed as he looked down, briefly wondering if Kiba was… then his eyes widened as his head whipped up because of a small noise.

He felt a familiar pull and let one of his shadow clones substitute with him, just before a Gatsuga crashed into his previous location, flattening the poor clone that saved him.

Naruto threw a kunai at Kiba the second the Inuzuka landed on the ground on all four, forcing him to move slightly to the right to evade it. His clones had a similar idea, and Kiba found himself under a barrage of kunai, unable to go back into Gatsuga, as from what Naruto observed so far, that required a small ramp-up time.

While three clones and the original Naruto kept the barrage of kunais going, one clone sneaked near Kiba.

Naruto grinned and swapped with his clone. Kiba’s eyes widened as he noticed the attack. Naruto swung a kunai, aiming to knife Kiba in the shoulder.

Only for Kiba to suddenly transform into Akamaru, causing Naruto’s kunai to harmlessly pass through the air, missing its target under Naruto’s shocked, open-mouthed gaze.

“Dynamic marking!” Naruto heard Kiba’s gleeful voice from his left side, and Akamaru rolled in the air, raising his hind leg.

Before Naruto could react, Akamaru’s pissing hit him straight in the face.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep