Chapter 18: Officially Genin
Baki was waiting patiently, standing in the empty patch of the ground. He eyes scanned his surroundings for his students cautiously, his hopes high.
Rustle...
The wind behind him suddenly rustled and Baki's eyes shot wide as he turned around and blocked an impending punch that was heading straight for him. Akemi realized that her punch had failed and she continued attacking by delivering a kick, that was aiming for his liver.
But to Baki, an experienced Jounin, it was relatively easy to dodge. He jumped back a few steps and immediately Akemi began making hand signs and she struck her hand on the ground, "Earth Style: earth spikes."
Immediately, the ground in a radius of two meters around Baki changed, forcing him to jump up into the air to dodge the spikes.
He then felt a presence behind him and found that there was suddenly a bunch of sand above him and in the corner of his eyes he saw Hitori standing there with a hand up as he controlled the sand.
A smirk appeared on his face as he dragged his hand down and the sand encased Baki into a small sphere of sand which then fell towards the spikes.
Boom!
The ball of sand and the sphere met together and there was a resounding boom as the heavy sand fell on the spike.
"Did we do it?" Asaka's voice suddenly sounded as she appeared behind Akemi with a hand on her shoulders as she injected chakra into her to help her recover.
Hitori was on the other side of the spikes and he stared at the sand ball which was impaled with an excited expression. He released the sand manipulation jutsu and immediately the sand crumbled and it revealed only an empty place with spikes.
"We didn't get him! Watch out!" Hitori shouted with a panicked yet cautious expression on his face. But suddenly, the ground underneath him suddenly cracked up and Baki jumped out and sent a punch aiming straight to his gut.
'Crap!' Hitori quickly side-stepped the punch and retaliated with a punch aiming straight for Baki's head.
Baki, seeing this punch, tried to raise his hand up to block but he found that his hand was not able to move. A small pillar of sand had grown out of the ground and covered his hand, immobilizing his hand.
"That a win for me, sensei," Hitori spoke with a smile as he landed a strong punch onto Baki's face.
"Crap!" he shouted as he felt that what he had just punched was not human flesh and instead a clone. The body of Baki began crumbling into sand as it lost colour and disappeared.
"Watch out! It was a clone!" Hitori warned the girls but suddenly, the ground behind Asaka cracked and broke up and Baki leapt up from the lifeless ground, reaching his hand towards Asaka and Akemi. Hitori immediately dashed forward trying to reach them as fast a possible.
Akemi and Asaka nodded as Asaka turned her body around and made some hand seals and took in a deep breath of air while Akemi dashed into a shadow and seemingly disappeared.
"Wind style: Air bullets!"
A series of strong condensed shots of air shot out from Asaka's mouth which placed Baki in a situation where he could only shift to the left or right to dodge as the bullets were shot in a horizontal direction.
But as Baki turned to his sides to side-step the bullets, a barrage of ninja tools appeared out of nowhere from both sides.
Baki was caught in a tight situation as he had attacks coming on all four sides.
A small smile appeared on his face as he spoke, "Nicely executed. I'm impressed but it not good enough to accomplish your mission, which is to retrieve the bells."
He then made a few hand seals and then slammed it down on the ground, "Earth tyle: Mud wall!"
(A/N: Okay, I checked and found that Baki was only known to have Wind release but I don't think with just one nature, he would be able to become a Jounin so I gave him Earth as well. Don't complain)
The ground around him began rumbling as a circle of soil began to be rise to a towering fifteen meters, blocking all the shurikens and kunais along with the air bullets.
Suddenly in the small dome that Baki was in, all the light seemed to disappear. Baki looked up and saw Hitori with a smile on his face as he looked down on the horizontal tunnel of earth.
"Have a taste of my self-learned jutsus!" Hitori shouted as he made a few hand seals and then breathed out, "Fire style: Fireball!"
Immediately, a small fireball about the same size of the hole of the tunnel was formed and it flew downwards.
'Crap,' Baki thought as a smile crept upon his face, 'They were able to bring me to force me to attack with at least thirty per cent of my strength. What monstrous teamwork...'
He then also made a series of hand seals and then replied with his own jutsu, "Wind Style: Big Air Bullet."
A big ball of air shot out to meet the equally sized fireball and a loud boom sounded again as the mud wall also crumbled, leaving Baki back into plain sight.
But much to his misfortune, Baki was not given much of a chance as a big layer of sand appeared above him as Hitori waved his hands around, "Custom move: Super Sand Umbrella!"
The layer of sand suddenly spread around ten meters in all directions from directly underneath Baki, forming almost no place for him to retreat.
'How annoying!' Baki thought as he brought his hand down and raised his hand.
"Earth style: Mud dome!"
A loud rumble sounded as Hitori's large sand umbrella fell on the mud dome.
"Akemi! I leave it all to you now!" Hitori called out and saw a thin outline of a black shadow dashed out from the shadows of the rocks.
Usually, a shadow dashing around in plain sight would be easily detected but in this case, Hitori's sand umbrella had covered the sun's rays in the area and this caused a perfect situation for Akemi to creep in without getting spotted.
The situation was made even better for them when Baki created a whole mud dome. This meant that there was no light inside along with the unique ability of the Nekoma family that they were able to get into anything as long as it was dark outside and dark inside.
About thirty seconds later, the sand that was covering the dome was finally dissipating and it had disappeared in the next few seconds.
Feeling that the weight on the dome was gone, Baki stopped injecting chakra into the dome and it quickly crumbled to dust. As the light once again returned his view, he was greeted with Hitori, Asaka, and Akemi standing on a rock with a very cliche naruto-like pose with Hitori in the middle.
"What are you guys doing over there?" Baki asked curiously as he stared at the trio with a confused expression.
"Haha! Sensei, are we officially genin now?" Hitori spoke with a smile as Akemi brought her hand forward and revealed two bells that were intertwined in her hand.
A slightly shocked expression appeared on Baki's face as he stared at the bells on her hand. And a sudden jolt of realization struck him as his body froze.
"I see... So that's what happened," he spoke as he nodded his head and a smile escaped his face. While he was spending his time trying to hold the dome up, Akemi had crept in and taken the bells. All the odds were in her favour, as inside the dome was pitch black so he could not see.
"I am proud of all of you. You guys have officially passed," he spoke happily as he walked towards them and they all enjoyed lunch together.
"Training will start from tomorrow, we will begin our missions the day after that. We will begin with three D-rank missions a week," he spoke as his face then once again regained its serious attitude.
(A/N: Plan change!! I have to apologize. No chapter tomorrow, I have to go travelling. I will just add an extra day to the two chapters per day promise. Apologies. I can't believe I got today's chapter done. I didn't have much hope as I had spent the whole day outside today...)
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone