Some days before the exams previous teachers of the exam applicants started inspecting the strength and growth of these genins to make sure they are ready for whatever will come up in the future.
The genins are tested one-by-one at random times and without notification to see if they can handle problematic situations fast and efficiently. Dix quickly got rid of the attacker, same as Sasuke, and even Sakura managed to pass her test, namely she has seen trough a genjutsu that fooled her the last time. Well the last one isn't too impressive actually.
After that, right before the exams there were some problems with elite Sunagakure genins, the well known siblings of the sand, Temari with the four pig-tails in her hair, Kankuro the puppeteer, and Gaara that is the jinchuuriki of the One Tailed Beast, which nobody knows about yet. Kankuro picked a fight with some kids on the street, but Dix quickly intercepted it, while Sakura was also around and Sasuke arrived not much later. In the end the terrifying Gaara killed the party and ordered his two siblings to retreat.
On the day of the exam Team 7 met up in front of the Academy, where the first part will be held, and walked in the front door together. The first test was a concealed one. Even though their application was handed in once and was approved, they only got a 'ticket' and were told to apply with it a few days before the actual exam starts, claiming its for 'giving them more time to make sure they all want to sign up for real' or something. Actually they were supposed to pass a mini-test to see if they are capable of the basics.
The three of them were supposed to go to the 301st room, which, by the number itself points to the third floor, but on the second there was a huge crowd gathering. There was a sign with 301 above one of the doors on the second floor and two young man were standing in it, blocking access from everyone. The genins of Team Guy, namely Tenten, Rock Lee and Hyuga Neji was trying to get trough the kids, who were actually disguised jonins.
It seemed like everyone missed the point, but when Team 7 arrived every one of them managed to see trough the bullshitting right away. Sasuke looked at Dix questioningly, who nodded towards the door. Sasuke also nodded, and moved in to show the others why they are retarded. Sasuke said that the room number had a genjutsu on it, proving it by pointing out the fact that they were on the second floor.
It seemed to be enough and the two 'kids' reversed the genjutsu right away, but wanted to bully the others some more, so one of them moved to land an over-the-head kick on Sasuke, who was ready to counter it with his own kick. For some reason Lee dropped his act of being a weakling and went to intercept the fight. He managed to catch both feet, at which everyone marveled a bit. Right after that Lee wanted to pick up Sakura, which was simply disgusting, and was shot down right away. Neji confronted Sasuke for a few words, then everyone went their way.
After getting their application properly done Team 7 wanted to leave the premises, as they had no business there anymore, but they were stopped by the taijutsu-crazy Lee who wore some disgusting green whole-body suit. He wanted to challenge Sasuke as it was known that he was the one Sakura loved.
Sasuke wanted to step forward to take on the kid with no style sense, but Dix stopped him with a hand on the shoulder.
"Even though you are quite capable, he is a year above us and is a deviant. You can't take him on, not without causing much collateral damage in the process. I'll stall him until his teacher arrives." he said, but right after they heard Lee's shouts.
"So! Are you willing to come forward now?! I want to see the difference between myself and the best of the new batch!"
"You are being a bit unreasonable here, aren't you? There is a year difference between the two of you and while he already has his sharingan, he didn't train solely in taijutsu, unlike you. If he were to fight with other then taijutsu the surrounding would get damaged too, and that's not something we want, right?"
"That... That is his problem! I want to fight him anyway. Is he going to chicken out or will fight me fair and square?" Lee said with a bit of hesitation.
"Well, if you really want to fight the best of the new batch then you have to fight me."
"I... yes I heard about you, but I want to fight the Uchiha. There is no other way."
"Well you have to get trough me first. I won't just stand aside and watch my team member get bullied."
"If that is your wish." Lee finished the conversation and rushed towards Dix, who already took a few steps forward. In the anime it wasn't very conspicuous, but as Lee was running toward Dix he felt how heavy his steps were. The fight was opened with a kick from Lee, which rammed into Dix's block like a truck. He wasn't fazed of it whatsoever, but a normal genin would get his bones shattered with one hit.
This was because of Lee's training method. He had many many pounds of weight on his legs, which were hidden by some leg-warmer clothing. In the anime no one seemed to mention or notice this, but because he had these equipped at all times he was considerably slower than his top speed, but his kicks were still fast and at the same time lethally strong.
Lee himself seemed to be surprised when his enemy took his kick without moving, as he was sure to cause quite some damage. That's what he was used to at least. He threw another kick, which was blocked once again, then he tried to shuffle his techniques a bit, threw a straight punch, that was once again blocked, then he used his momentum to sidestep Dix and try to land a roundhouse kick from his right. The last one was blocked by stepping closer while dodging away from the kick and blocking at the knee. This technique completely dissipated the force that it carried and caused some damage to Lee at the same time.
Dix never attacked proactively, but whittled down Lee's strength and caused small damaged by simply blocking. In a few minutes Lee was already in a somewhat bad shape and had to step back when Might Guy, his teacher showed up.
Only a loud shout was audible calling Lee's name, then Guy appeared out of nowhere and hit Lee in the head so hard that anyone else would've been KO-d right away. Both Guy and Lee gave their 'apologies' to Team 7, or the best they could do that counts as one. Then they kept on blabbering about youth and training, boasted a bit about Guy's strength and rivalry with Kakashi, then they moved out.
That was all for the day, so the team could go their separate ways and would have to meet up at the actual start of the written part of the test. Before entering they met Kakashi who informed them that if any of them were to be missing, then the other two wouldn't have been able to enter the exam, even though before he said its an individual decision. It was all good though, because Sakura was the only unstable element, but she was also there.
When they entered they found themselves in a huge room, which was packed full with genins. Most of them looked like serial killers or veteran hitmans, or just simply highwayman, but none of them had the innocent look of a typical kid.
Other than unknown genins, also the two other teams were there that they previously were all classmates with. They were namely Team 10, the famous Ino-Shika-Cho, under Asuma's leadership, and Team 8, its members being Hinata, Kiba and Shino, under the leadership of Kurenai. Their relationships weren't too good in the anime, but this time around Dix worked a lot to pull together a good circle of friends that were bound by more than just village and teams. He was seriously hoping it was worth the extra effort and suffering.
Hinata was the first one to rush over and jump around Dix a bit. In the anime when she showed up here she looked like she is about to piss herself, but now she simply looked happy. It was probably a change for the better, but Dix was getting annoyed by all the attention that was drawn to them.
Shikamaru and Kiba properly greeted them and even had some brofists with Dix. He made sure to beat into the kids the importance of friendship, and they seem to get it by now. They had some good talk before Kabuto showed up, who would later turn out to be Orochimaru's spy. Dix had a sudden feeling that he could easily take him out right away, but killing a random 'Konoha genin' without any reason was bound to get every kind of trouble on his neck, so he decided to wait.
Kabuto came to tell them to keep it down, because they are the '9 rookies' and would make a target out of themselves by continuing with the circus. Right after he gave them some free info of other people, then he was picked on by genins sent by the Hidden Sound village, that is Orochimaru's village. So technically he was assaulted by his own men. Nobody really cared though.
Right after the exam staff showed up, together with the exam leader, Ibiki, who was supposed to be a cold blooded interrogator, which is a fun attribute when you are appointed to make exams for kids. He sounded like any typical drill sergeant from military films. His arrival declared the start of the real first exam.
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