Soon, only the scratching of pens and the occasional heavy breathing remained in the classroom.
Ibiki and the group of proctors behind him stood on the podium and by the windows like stone statues. Their eyes slowly swept across the entire room at an extremely low frequency, capturing every subtle flaw.
Suddenly, a Genin in the back left row let out a scream, and was then dragged up from his seat by two proctors and hauled out, along with his two teammates, who were also escorted out of the exam hall.
In less than ten minutes, several groups were dragged out one after another.
After watching this spectacle, Naruto withdrew his gaze and looked at Hinata on his right.
Hinata was bowing her head, staring intently at the exam paper in front of her, her hand holding a pen as she wrote down the answers neatly.
To a Genin, these questions were like a foreign language, but to the young lady of the Hyuga Clan, they were probably just moderately difficult homework.
Hinata was being raised by her clan as the heir to the main branch, and the educational resources and depth of instruction of the Hyuga Clan were incomparable to the average Ninja Academy.
Not to mention cryptography and Chakra attribute analysis, even the completion of explosive tag runes was something Hinata had practiced at least dozens of times at the clan training grounds.
Naruto leaned slightly toward Hinata and lowered his voice. "Hinata."
Upon hearing Naruto's voice, Hinata's hand holding the pen paused slightly, and she lifted her head to turn toward Naruto. The moment she met Naruto's eyes, her face flushed red once again in a flash.
Naruto glanced at Hinata's exam paper, then pushed his own blank answer sheet forward by half an inch, gesturing toward his paper with his chin.
The gesture was simple and clear: Could I copy off you?
Hinata's face turned even redder. 'Naruto-kun is looking at my exam paper, he wants me to help him. I'm helping Naruto-kun!'
Without any hesitation, she moved her exam paper a good distance toward Naruto. The movement was so large that Kiba, who was sitting in the row behind her, saw it.
Kiba opened his mouth wide, while Akamaru lay on the desk and covered his eyes with his two front paws.
Naruto's lips twitched. "Hinata, I'm very touched by your intentions, but that movement of sliding the exam paper was way too obvious. Ibiki-sensei's eyes are scanning from the podium, you know."
However, Ibiki didn't seem to be looking in this direction. Or rather, he saw it but didn't react at all.
Naruto turned his attention to Hinata's exam paper, his pen quickly writing on his own sheet.
As he wrote, he had a brand-new experience regarding cheating on homework.
In his past life, he had at least been a college student, and now, having a twelve-year-old girl let him copy her homework, the feeling was a little subtle, to say the least.
The exam time ticked away, second by second, amidst silent pressure.
When the timer hit forty-five minutes, Ibiki's voice rang out right on time.
"Stop writing. Put down your pens, and everyone look up at me."
After the last examinee put down their pen, he spoke, "Enough have been eliminated. Now, I will announce the tenth question."
The atmosphere in the classroom suddenly tightened to the extreme.
All the examinees who had luckily passed the first nine questions held their breath, waiting for Ibiki to state the question.
"But before I announce the tenth question..."
The corners of Ibiki's lips curved up. "I want to add an extra condition."
Watching the expressions of the sixty-plus examinees below stiffen, he continued, "For the tenth question, you may choose to answer, or you may choose not to."
"If you choose not to answer, you are eliminated on the spot, and all three members of your team must leave the exam hall."
"But if you choose to answer and get it wrong, then you will be permanently stripped of your eligibility to take the Chunin Exams."
"Not this year, not next year, but for the rest of your life."
"Those who choose to answer and get it wrong will never be able to become a Chunin."
"Wait... what kind of bullshit rule is this!"
A burly Genin from Amegakure at the back of the classroom slammed his hand onto his desk with a loud bang as he stood up abruptly.
"If you get it wrong, doesn't that ruin your whole life? Some people here have taken the Chunin Exams several times. By what right do you get to make the rules?"
Ibiki grinned, his smile looking particularly sinister on his scarred face. "You can only blame your bad luck, the proctor for this year's first exam is me. The rules I set are the rules."
"All examinees under my supervision have only two choices: obey or be eliminated."
"If you don't like it, try your luck with a different proctor in the next exam."
"You still have the right to choose not to answer."
"Think of the tenth question as a threshold. If you aren't confident in crossing it, then leave it outside. Whether to step forward or not, the choice is in your hands now. I will not say this a second time."
"Starting now, those who want to give up, raise your hands. Those who raise their hands, along with their entire team, will be eliminated."
Some stared at the exam paper in front of them with pale faces, some braced their elbows on the desk with their hands clasped so tightly their knuckles turned white, and some were exchanging intense glances with their teammates.
All this information was running at high speed through the brains of the examinees.
Giving up meant this year was a wasted trip, but there was still next year, and the year after that. But it also meant your teammates would have to give up along with you.
And if you chose to answer and got it wrong, the door to becoming a Chunin would be closed forever.