-1 month later -
It had already been a month since Ryu and Sakumo had went on to the land of rivers to train for the finals of the chunin exams being held in suna. During the past month Ryu had been training vigorously under Sakumo's guidance and had improved his elemental control and had been mostly training to prepare his new trump card which was still in its developing stages and hence caused him huge chakra drain and injuries whenever used.
When Sakumo and Ryu had arrived at the land of rivers borders they had met up with the leader of the village who had absolutely no problem with the two leaf shinobis training on his lands and had also offered them a large training ground on the outskirts of the village knowing that it was better to stay in the good graces of the hidden leaf village which was often referred to as the strongest of all five major hidden villages.
If Ryu was being honest, he quite liked the land of rivers since it's weather was neither too hot nor too cold, just perfect to train and practice his new jutsu. In the past month the teacher student duo had been living in a nearby hotel and had been ordering thier dinner from one of the famous restaurants of the land of rivers, so they didn't feel any discomfort in the past month.
Ryu was pretty excited for the upcoming chunin exams finals since he would most probably be facing the sanbi Jinchuriki, and keeping in mind that the jinchurikis are also known as the ultimate weapons of the villages, he couldn't help but be eager to face such a strong opponent and measure his own capabilities in which he was confident enough to beat the jinchuriki.
From what Ryu had learned there are 9 tailed beasts, with suna having 1 tail, kumo having 2 and 8 tail, iwa having 4 and 5 tail, Kiri having 3 and 6 tail and konoha having the 9 tail while interestingly the 7 tail resides in the village hidden by waterfall which was a minor village. This did raise some questions in his head, that since konoha had been the sole benefactor in distributing the tailed beasts which were captured by the 1st hokage- Hashirama Senju, why didn't have two tail beasts like kumo, iwa and Kiri.
In his opinion konoha shouldn't have given the 5 tailed beast to the minor village of hidden waterfall, but he wasn't going to dwell on that because he didn't knew everything that had happened in the early days of konoha so he wasn't in a position to judge the infamous 1st hokage's descision.
As of right now Ryu and Sakumo were preparing to leave the land of rivers to head to suna since the the finals was about to start in a couple of hours, the head of the village had came and had greeted us a safe journey back to suna. As Ryu and Sakumo finished packing their stuff, both immediately exited the borders of land of rivers and started to run through the blazing hot desert towards sunagakure at low jonin level speeds so as not miss the finals. After half an hour of running they reached the gates of sunagakure where both quickly handed over their identification cards to the gate gaurds who after checking the cards let the two in the village.
Seeing that there was another one hour for the finals to start, Ryu and Sakumo decided to find a good hotel first. After getting a room in a decent hotel both of them got freshened up since running through the desert had made them sweaty and dirty withsand granules all in their hair and clothes. After freshening up, Ryu changed into a new shinobi gear and checked his supplies before looking over at Sakumo who was cleaning his tanto and said,
"We should leave now Sakumo sensei, I don't want to be late and get disqualified from the exams"
Hearing this Sakumo just gave a small chuckle and replied smilling at him,
"Dont worry too much Ryu you'll get your chance to fight the jinchuriki, but you're right let's leave now"
As Ryu just nodded, both put on their shinobi shoes and paid their bills at the hotel before heading towards the main arena in the centre of the village. As Ryu and Sakumo walked through the streets of sunagakure both noticed that many people were very enthusiastic about the finals and the buisness were already closing down their shops and were heading towards the arena to see the chunin exams finals.
In the village almost all the people were moving to gather at the arena to witness the finals since it wasn't everyday that civilians got to see the battle of two fully trained shinobis. The arena was pretty big but a little smaller than the one in the hidden leaf village and as they entered the arena, Sakumo said with a serious expression,
"Ryu don't waste your chakra on your other opponents and finish them as quickly as possible, focus on the mission and subdue the jinchuriki"
"Hai, Sakumo sensei"
As Sakumo just smiled and thought to himself,
'With his current strength it won't be too difficult to subdue the jinchuriki'
As both of them reached inside the arena, Sakumo went to the spectator stands after saying good luck to him, while Ryu just went on to the middle of the arena to stand beside the other finalists.
Upon closer notice, he saw that among the eight finalist there, there was one kumo genin, two suna genin, the sanbi Jinchuriki and an iwa genin along with Fugaku and the hyuga standing beside him. The arena was bustling with people mostly from suna but he could also spot some people from all the other hidden villages noticing their unique attire. At the top of the arena right in front of him were two vip boxes, one in which the the daimyo from different hidden villages were sitting and most probably making bets and in the other one, the five kages of the hidden villages were sitting. Upon noticing the hokage and making eye contact, the village leader gave him a subtle nod which he returned respectfully and then started to gauge the strength of the genins standing beside him.
After carefully looking at the other finalists and observing their chakra he was sure that no one except for the jinchuriki will be able to give any kind of trouble and that was only because the jinchuriki was a wild card to him since he had never fought with one before, but he was going to take Sakumo's advice and quickly go through his other opponents without any mercy. Just then a suna jounin walked in front of them while the third kazekage stood up silencing everyone in the arena and gave a 'boring' speech after which the proctor said,
"Congratulations on making to the finals of the chunin exams, the roster had been randomly picked for the sequence of the fights, based upon your performance the supervisors and kages will decide if you're to be promoted to chunin, now everyone except Inazuma from suna and Fugaku uchiha from konoha please go to the contenders box"
Seeing that the first match was not his, he along with the remaining five contestant went to the contenders box to see the upcoming fight.
As the proctor announced the commencement of the chunin exams finals, the crowd started to cheer loudly very much excited. As the proctor started the fight Fugaku and Inazuma rushed at each other and engaged in a taijutsu battle while he leaned against the wall and observed the ongoing battle as it would help him finish either of them faster if he meets them in the later stages of finals. After 10 minutes of taijutsu and ninjutsu being thrown around, Fugaku had reported to sharingan genjutsu to distract Inazuma and land the final kick to the suna genin's face who went unconscious and the proctor announced the slightly tired uchiha as the victor of the first round of the chunin exams.
Meanwhile as Fugaku walked back upto the contenders box and Inazuma was being carried to the hospital quickly by the suna medic nins, Ryu had noted a couple things about Fugaku from the first match, such as fugaku was pretty proficient in ninjutsu having fire and earth nature but the elder uchiha's most powerful component was genjustu which was casted by Fugaku's two tomoe sharingan all in all Ryu had determined that as of now Fugaku was a low chunin shinobi perhaps a mid chunin level if he had a few trump cards he had saved for the later stages of the exams.
As fugaku returned to the contenders box, the elder uchiha looked directly at him with the sharingan still active making him a little confused and just returned a stoic gaze to Fugaku without a hint of emotion on his face as Fugaku just frowned before moving to a seperated corner of the contenders box. Seeing Fugaku's behaviour, Ryu was pretty confused and somewhat irritated as he just didn't like the look that Fugaku had given him as if he was some kid playing games he shouldn't be playing, and so he made up his mind to humiliate the elder uchiha in front of the crowd just so Fugaku could learn his place in the pecking order and as for the anger of the uchiha elder, he seriously didn't care about some old bag of bones who sits of all day and only runs his mouth.
As he looked down to the arena where the proctor had already started to announce the contestants for the second match of the chunin exams finals gathering the crowds attention as the proctor announced loudly,
"Now for the second match of the chunin exams finals could..."