Chapter 442: You're the Challenger

Obito, who had entered the Flame Breathing Chakra Mode, gave Meicun Yejuan a very unusual feeling.

Before entering the Flame Breathing Chakra Mode, Obito's performance was still genius-like, but still within Meicun Yejuan's tolerance.

After Obito activated the Flame Breathing Chakra Mode, Meicun Yejuan had the illusion that he was the examinee and Obito was the examiner.

No wonder Meicun Yejuan had such an absurd thought; it was simply that the methods Obito displayed exceeded his understanding.

Releasing Phoenix Fire without hand seals while having the spare energy to use shuriken to seal off his evasive space, Obito could even attach flames to his body and use a Fire Release ninja body technique that Meicun Yejuan had never seen.

"Fire Release: Flame Fist!"

Under Meicun Yejuan's confused gaze, Obito charged forward with a large amount of flames erupting from his fist, then punched the large tree beside Meicun Yejuan, shattering it.

At this point, Meicun Yejuan was completely unable to use Fire Release to cancel out Obito's Fire Release.

Both released a fireball, but Obito's fireball swallowed Meicun Yejuan's fireball with irresistible force and continued to slam toward Meicun Yejuan, who, having lost the clash, could only dodge awkwardly.

"What's going on? Was he not using his full strength before?" Meicun Yejuan was completely confused.

Just a moment ago their Fire Releases had been evenly matched, but Obito's Fire Release had suddenly become stronger.

"My chakra is running low; I'll have to use my full strength next." Seeing that Meicun Yejuan could still tenaciously resist, Obito decided to use a Fire Release at his maximum power.

After all, Meicun Yejuan was not one of those ordinary jonin; if they kept on like this, he would really lose combat capability due to insufficient chakra.

"Old man, be careful next; I'm going to use my ultimate move." Before striking, Obito kindly reminded him.

He wasn't very proficient with this move either, unable to control it like the Fire Dragon Flame Bullet.

Meicun Yejuan's expression suddenly changed: if this strong wasn't full strength, then who was the chunin and who was the examinee?

"Fire Release: Great Flame Ring - Flame Emperor!"

Obito burst out all his chakra and raised his hands; ring after ring of flames appeared at his feet, rapidly forming a spiral sea of fire.

Immediately, the flames from the sea of fire on the ground surged toward Obito's hands, forming a fireball. The fireball kept expanding and growing, eventually becoming a super-massive fireball over ten meters tall, looking extremely terrifying.

Obito would call the Great Flame Ring - Flame Emperor the "Super Great Fireball Great Fireball Max"; this Fire Release had nothing else—just enough firepower and tremendous power.

The dazzling firelight emitted by the enormous fireball illuminated the entire exam area, turning everything fiery red. Meicun Yejuan and the watching ninja all stared at the imposing and terrifying fireball with shocked expressions.

"How could one train to reach such a level of nature transformation in such a short time?" Bantian Yuan'er felt an immensely strong sense of defeat in his heart.

Compared with Obito like this, his ninjutsu that he had trained for over ten years seemed like a joke.

"Such a powerful Fire Release ninjutsu; if it were me, I'd probably be burned to death directly." Hyuga Qingyu imagined himself fighting Obito and found that he had no chance of winning at all.

It could only be said that there were gaps between examinees as well; some examinees were being examined by the examiner, while some examinees were examining the examiner.

"It all comes down to this one ninjutsu." Kakashi stared at the battlefield.

After releasing Flame Emperor, Obito's chakra was basically almost completely depleted. If he couldn't defeat Meicun Yejuan, Obito would end the battle in the same way he had lost combat capability fifteen minutes earlier.

"No wonder he told me to be careful." Looking at that absurdly huge super fireball, cold sweat dripped from Meicun Yejuan's forehead.

The scalding heat waves that came wave after wave like the ocean seemed to silently convey that this fireball was not just a larger Great Fireball.

"Earth Release: Earth-Style Wall!"

Meicun Yejuan first gathered a large amount of chakra to perform Earth nature transformation, controlling the ground and creating a tall, thick earth wall.

Immediately after, Meicun Yejuan rapidly retreated. He had no confidence in his Earth-Style Wall and didn't think that a mere Earth-Style Wall could stop this terrifying enormous fireball.

Even though Meicun Yejuan tried his best to overestimate the power of Flame Emperor, when the enormous fireball came, he found that he had still underestimated it somewhat.

Boom!!

The moment the fireball touched the Earth-Style Wall, a violent explosion and flash of light occurred, then a booming sound rang out; for a moment, mud and rocks flew and dust fog filled the air.

Meicun Yejuan had never thought that a single Earth-Style Wall could block the attack, but he also hadn't expected that his full-power Earth-Style Wall would shatter on contact, as fragile as a piece of tofu crushed into pieces.

Meicun Yejuan's expression turned very ugly; the fireball that had broken through the Earth-Style Wall was still continuing to hurtle toward him.

Given the size of Flame Emperor, Meicun Yejuan could know without careful calculation that he absolutely could not escape the attack range of Flame Emperor.

"Jonin Hiashi, it's time for us to intervene, or Yejuan might be seriously injured." The proctor jonin said to Hyuga Hiashi while gathering his chakra.

As it was, Konoha didn't have many jonin; if a jonin were to be severely injured because of an exam, that would be really bad.

Hiashi Hyuga nodded. He assumed a stance, extending both hands as he prepared to execute the Eight Trigrams Vacuum Wall Palm.

"Water Release: Water Formation Wall!"

The referee Jonin formed hand seals and spat out a stream of water to weaken the terrifying flames of the Flame Emperor.

"Earth Release: Earth-Style Wall!"

Kakashi saw the situation and also stepped in to help, gathering chakra to raise an earth wall to block the fireball.

With the combined efforts of the three, Mimura Harumaki successfully escaped danger, avoiding the fate of being severely wounded by the Flame Emperor.

After unleashing the Flame Emperor, Obito was panting heavily. With his current chakra, he could only use the Flame Emperor once; coupled with the chakra he had consumed earlier, he was essentially drained.

"Huff, huff, old man, how are we going to tally this? You don't mean we still have to keep fighting for a full fifteen minutes, do you?" Obito adjusted his breathing and asked Mimura Harumaki.

Obito really couldn't go on now. If they continued fighting, he could only lie down and let Mimura Harumaki see.

"The battle ends early. You win." Mimura Harumaki sighed and said with a melancholy expression.

Even the other examiners and the referee had intervened in the battle. There was no way they could continue fighting. Mimura Harumaki wasn't that thick-skinned.

Having been defeated by a ten-year-old Chunin candidate while in the capacity of an examiner, Mimura Harumaki felt very conflicted at the moment.

Fortunately, the Jonin Exam wasn't like the Chunin Exams with a crowd of onlookers; otherwise, he would really lose face in the ninja community.

"Yeah! So can we go back now?" Obito pumped his fist excitedly. The operation was a great success; he had taken a big step forward on his path to becoming a Jonin.

"Yes, you can all go back. Just come back for the written exam at two o'clock in the afternoon." Mimura Harumaki nodded.

Hearing Mimura Harumaki's affirmative answer, Obito dashed home to begin his review session.

"Starting to worry now is too late." Kakashi watched Obito's sprinting figure, somewhat speechless.

Although he had never participated in the Jonin Exam, Kakashi didn't need to think to know that its difficulty absolutely could not be compared to the written exam of the Chunin Exams.

The answer was simple: a Jonin and a Chunin were completely different concepts. The gap between a Chunin and a Jonin was several times larger than that between a ninja academy student and a Chunin.

Normally, a ninja academy student could become a Chunin within eight years after graduation, but most Chunin couldn't become Jonin even after eighteen years, not even Special Jonin.

"Even if I don't successfully pass the exam, it's not a loss. I've seen the real strength of a true genius." Sakata Genji thought to himself.

Obito and Kakashi were so talented that he couldn't even muster the heart to catch up. He was almost a full twelve years older than them, yet the gap in strength was so huge. How could he ever catch up?

"If only I could learn Rotation and the Eight Trigrams Vacuum Palm." Ao Hyuga recalled the battle between Kakashi and Hiashi Hyuga, a look of longing in his eyes.

Although the Gentle Fist was effective at severing chakra, lacking a long-range attack in battle was a disadvantage. Moreover, because the branch family had the Caged Bird seal, their Byakugan actually had a very small blind spot. The absolute defense of Rotation could largely compensate for this deficiency.

After returning home, Obito shut himself in his room and immersed himself in reading.

Of course, Obito couldn't truly immerse himself; he was just forcing himself to read and memorize.

For him, reading was not a good thing; it was a boring and tedious process that required great patience to endure.

The only kind of book Obito could immerse himself in was ninja novels. He especially liked those where the protagonist was an ordinary person or a loser with no ninja talent who rose from the bottom to become the savior of the ninja world.

Those had many classic plot points, such as finding an ancient secret technique in the library that others couldn't discover, picking up a worn-out ninja tool from a ninja tool shop that turned out to be the legendary tool of the Sage of Six Paths, and finally, the indispensable defeat of the villain and rescue of the princess.

"But rescuing the princess is usually in the middle part; next comes saving the world. By the way, I've also rescued a princess myself. When will it be my turn to save the world? The world feels like a giant ninja novel." As Obito read, his thoughts drifted to ninja novels.

"No, I'm supposed to be reviewing and studying." Coming back to his senses, Obito grabbed his hair with both hands.

Obito couldn't even understand himself. How could his mind wander to ninja novels while reading "Ninja Tactics"?

Obito shook his head, as if trying to shake all distracting thoughts out of his mind, and then devoted himself entirely to reviewing.

When the alarm clock Obito had set went off, he stood up with a confident look. After several hours of study, he was now terrifyingly confident.

"Obito, do your best on the exam." Grandma said with a smile to Obito as he was about to leave.

"I'll pass." Obito patted his chest and answered confidently.

With his Sharingan and having reviewed as well, it couldn't be more secure.

"After the exam, you can spend more time with Rin. You need to balance training and studying. My body is getting weaker. I wonder if I can see you have your own child before I pass away." After saying that, Grandma sighed.

Obito's face instantly turned red. To have a child, he would have to do that sort of thing with Rin. It was really too tempting—oh no, it was really too improper.

"Grandma, you're overthinking it. I'm only ten years old. Besides, Grandma, you'll definitely live to be a hundred." Obito replied with a blush.

"Grandma, I've got to go now. I'm going to take the exam."

Afraid that his grandma might say something else that would make him blush, Obito fled.

The written test was also held at the morning training ground, but not outdoors—it was inside a seemingly ordinary wooden house.

"Next, those whose names are called will follow their respective examiners. The written test will be conducted separately; each of you will take the exam in a different individual room." The examiner said after they entered the wooden house.

"Huh?" After hearing the rules, Obito was dumbfounded. Each person gets their own room? That means his Sharingan is useless.

In the past, Obito thought the Sharingan far surpassed the Byakugan, but now he wished he had a pair of Byakugan, because the Byakugan could see through things.

"Uchiha Obito, do you have any questions?" The examiner asked, seeing Obito's puzzled expression.

"No, I'm just a bit surprised. One person per room seems like a waste of space." Obito thought for a moment and replied.

"Alright, Hatake Kakashi, step forward." The examiner said, looking at the list in his hand.

Upon hearing his name, Kakashi followed the examiner to his designated exam room.

"Hyūga Ao."

"Uchiha Obito."

The other examiners also called out the names of the students they were to assess and led them to the corresponding exam rooms.

"Good thing I reviewed at home. If I had only relied on the Sharingan, I definitely wouldn't have passed this time." Obito felt relieved that he had put in some effort today.

When Obito saw the test paper in his hands, he couldn't help but sweat. The difficulty was quite high.

【You are a jōnin leading a team on a classified S-rank mission. Although you successfully obtained the classified documents required for the mission, you are now surrounded by enemies. Based on the map in Example 1, plan the best route of action and breakthrough tactics, and explain your reasoning.】

Obito glanced at the example and pondered for a while without writing anything. The map was too complicated; he couldn't quite understand it.

"Forget it, Muyue-sensei said to skip what you can't do first. Can't waste time." Recalling Muyue's words, Obito gave up on the first question and moved to the second.

【There are two missions, A and B, to be completed by two ninja squads, a and b, respectively. On sunny days, squad a can complete the mission in 12 days, squad b in 15 days. On rainy days, squad a's efficiency drops by 50%, and squad b's efficiency drops by 25%. The two squads start and finish their missions simultaneously. How many sunny days were there during the period of completing the missions?】

Seeing the second question, Obito's vision blurred. This was his weakest subject—math. If it came to a fight, he could probably beat a jōnin, but no matter how anxious he got, he couldn't solve math problems.

Obito decisively skipped to the next question and instantly felt numb. Compared to the others, the second question was actually the easiest math problem.

After skipping five questions in a row and seeing the sixth question, which was a history question, Obito looked excited. This was something he was really good at.

Obito had never felt that history questions could be so adorable. He wished the entire test paper were history questions.

Happy times are always short. After finishing the history questions, Obito's heart sank as he looked at the remaining questions. This exam was going to be tough.

"Muyue-sensei, please grant me the supreme wisdom to solve these problems." Obito closed his eyes, put his hands together, and prayed devoutly.

"Examinee, please don't make strange actions. Take the exam seriously." The examiner knocked on the table to interrupt the prayer.