The noise came from the direction opposite of where the tree fell and the 3 Genin assume a defensive position, everyone being back to back.
Alisa tries to rally everyone to stick together and not allow themselves to get separated. Dargon ignores Alisa and taunts Hakai into fighting them head on, like a man, which causes Zato to panic and tell Dargon to stop taunting Hakai, because his techniques require time to prepare.
“You bastards are going to die, if you can’t dodge this” shouted Hakai as he threw a rock which gets logged inside another tree’s trunk.
The 3 Genin looked in horror, at the sight of a regular rock being trusted deep within a tree’s bark, leaving a crater mark on it’s surface.
“Incoming” shouted Alisa with fear in her voice, as she notices Hakai, jumping high in the air. In response to Alisa, Hakai then shouts:
“Fire Style, Fireball Jutsu” as he launched from his mouth, a big smoldering orb of fire, aimed to crash on top of his 3 Genin.
The 3 Genin, brake their defensive formation as they dodged Hakai’s fireball and are now separated.
Taking advantage of this momentum, Hakai lands quickly and charges towards the most problematic of the 3 – Zato – by delivering a jump kick to the left side of his face.
Zato hits the ground hard and gets knocked out cold.
‘Wait, that was it? This kid went down to easy’ thought Hakai to himself as he noted Zato is incredibly weak as a melee combatant, despite knowing from his student file, that he was able to defeat 2 senior students, in hand to hand combat while blinded by the Jagan.
Meanwhile, Dargon tries to push away Hakai from Zato by using the Water Style - Water Stream jutsu.
Hakai immediately backs off, out of fear that Dargon can enhance that technique with his Lighting Style ninjutsu to stun him.
Dargon continues to force Hakai to move away from Zato, while Alisa, who created 3 mirror images, tries to distract Hakai, by shifting the focus of the fight towards her.
“Over here, teacher” shouted Alisa while she and her mirror images launch waves of shuriken at Hakai.
Initially Hakai thought nothing of this, as he silently activated the Yang Style: Enhanced Strength jutsu to increase how far up he can jump and land safely. Then by simply jumping high into the air, Hakai is able to dodge Alisa’s attacks and then throw a few shuriken at Alisa while being midair.
This was to no effect however, as she used the Wind Style: Wind Barrier ninjutsu to stop the shuriken from hitting her.
Hakai felt disapointed in Alisa because her attack patterns are very bland, from his point of view, as it appears she doesn’t seem to understand the importance of the Territory Creation jutsu, another staple technique taught to all ninja at the Academy. With it, ninjas, who can use elemental techniques, can manipulate their favored element freely, without using either hand signs or incantations, while within the territory they created.
Had Alisa used the Territory Creation jutsu, she could have used the wind to accelerate the speed of her projectiles, making them harder to dodge, while removing the need to physically cast the Wind Barrier jutsu later on.
Hakai on the other hand, had created an elemental territory, before engaging with the Genin and has prepared a few fire techniques in advance, to support the mirror image he has hidden in the woods, awaiting the mental order to attack Alisa from behind.
As Hakai lands, he notices Dargon charging to attack him instead of getting Zato to safety.
‘You can’t be serious. The designated ranged combatant is charging me?‘ thought Hakai to himself as he rushes toward Dargon, while commanding his mirror image to charge at Alisa.
As Dargon charges Hakai, he notices another Hakai running towards Alisa.
Dargon quickly shouted to Alisa and warned her of the danger. This, in turn, prompted Hakai to silently activate a fire style technique he prepared, to make his mirror image appear to be able to deal damage.
Alisa turns around and notices another Hakai, creating fiery whips from nothing and using them to attack her. As she dodges those attacks, it is revealed to her that the whips are made of real fire, as they leave trails of burnt grass on the ground.
Meanwhile, Dargon activates the Thunder Gauntlet technique, a Lighting Style ninjutsu, which creates a coating of lighting on the arm of his choice, making his punches deal additional lighting damage, while protecting his arm from lighting damage.
Hakai scoffs, after realizing Dargon had activated the Thunder Gauntlet jutsu, feeling insulted that a lowly Genin thinks he can take him on in a brawl.
In preparation to defend himself against Dargon’s technique, Hakai activates the Yang Style: Enhanced Agility on himself, increasing the speed at which he reacts to movement and his mental ability to process information.
Dargon lunges towards Hakai, trying to land a cross using his right hand, the one on which he had cast the Thunder Gauntlet jutsu, however Hakai counters by moving to Dargon’s left and kicks him hard in the stomach, causing Dargon’s to go hard on the ground as the thunder gauntlet dissipates.
As Hakai tries to knock out Dargon, he instinctively dodges Zato, who appeared out of nowhere in his line of sight, hurling a giant scythe toward his neck.
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Convinced that Zato is actively weaving illusions into the battlefield, Hakai attempts to retreat, however, but his retreat path is cut off as 7 more copies of Zato block his path.
Dargon is left in amazement, never seeing a Genin produce that many mirror images, but Hakai remains unimpressed as he destroyed them with the Yang Style: Dispel Jutsu. Noticing Zato was not among the illusions had disappointed Hakai, without surprising him.
Dargon, after reapplying the Thunder Gauntlet on his right hand, reenters melee combat with Hakai, this time applying significant pressure by launching a volley of right handed jabs from a southpaw stance.
Hakai thought to himself that Dargon deserves to be praised for using his jutsus more cautiously, by fighting defensively while looking for either a flaw to exploit or a window of opportunity to deal as much damage as possible.
Meanwhile, Alisa realizes she is fighting a mirror image after some of her shuriken went past, what should have been Hakai's body, causing her to run in frustration towards Dargon and the real Hakai, hoping they can still win this fight.
Alisa failed to disengage the mirror image however, as the fiery whips used by it were still very real and began to move separately from the fading mirror image, while transforming into large fiery snakes.
Aware of his surroundings, Hakai deduced that he needs to retreat, else he gets overwhelmed. In order to escape Dargon, Hakai breathes fire on to Dargon, as he continues his volley of jabs, obscuring his vision. Afterwards, Hakai delivers a powerful kick to Dargon’s stomach, knocking him down.
Zato tried to hamper Hakai’s moves with more illusions of himself using various weapons, but to no avail, as Hakai once again used Yang style ninjutsu to invalidate all of Zato’s illusions – thus making a clean exit.
As Hakai was retreating, he thought the Genin were terrible combatants, despite the fact he gave them a handicap by wasting spiritual energy on maintaining a Mirror Image, which is an illusory technique that drains Hakai considerably, due to his aversion towards all illusory type techniques.
Dargon severely overestimated his abilities as a front line fighter, while Alisa was incredibly naive, due to the fact that she allowed a mirror image and a pair of fiery whips to trick her into wasting time during combat.
Zato was the biggest disappointment – he was expecting him to be able to put more of a fight in a melee combat scenario, but went down hard, from one surprise attack.
However, Hakai soon realized something important about Zato.
As soon as he regained consciousness he was able to deploy an advanced illusory technique, such as the Phantom Garden jutsu, which allows the caster to project illusions to all living entities within the technique’s area of effect, while hiding from opponents if need be.
The Phantom Garden jutsu is the most complex illusory technique taught at the Ninja Academy and while it allows the projection of illusions in order to provide combat support, the main purpose of this technique is to exhaust and harass opponents by denying them opportunities to rest during prolonged periods of combat, while allies rest and recuperate.
That is not something most Genin are able to do, after just graduating from the academy! And it’s not something that could have realistically happened, unless Dargon covered for him by acting as a bait in melee combat.
Had Dargon, engaged in ranged combat as well, then Hakai’s field of vision would have been wide enough to reasonably account for Dargon, Alisa and Zato. Then, as soon as Hakai would notice Zato getting up, he would knock him back down.
That meant for Hakai, he might have two potentially gifted Genin – Zato, a prodigy in illusory techniques, thanks in part due to his Jagan, while Dargon has fantastic combat instincts, which allows him to arrive at reasonable conclusions, despite having a bad decision making process.
Hakai grins in excitement, as it means he has Genin capable of providing him a certain level of entertainment, while he decides if he is going to try to sabotage their chances of passing the exam or, if he is going to actually go through with Labor’s demands and train a batch of Genin for Saiga – Genin that will be raised by mostly, HIS standards.
Meanwhile Alisa and Zato help Dargon get up, who was exhausted by fighting Hakai in melee by himself. As he is gasping for air, Dargon, mumbles in frustration, about how they were overpowered as a team.
Not only was Hakai a deadly combatant in melee range, but his ability to dominate while controlling two remote techniques, while fighting multiple opponents seemed unreal.
After the 3 recovered they decided to check to see if the rock was still lodged in the tree. After doing so, Dargon and Alisa came to the conclusion that Hakai used an Earth Style technique on the rock to make it deal as much damage as it did to the tree.
However, Zato, who doesn’t agree with the theory that Hakai is an Earth Style user shyly interjects:
“It somehow doesn’t make sense for him to be an Earth Style user, because he could have simply hidden some stones inside the mirror image to mimic it’s ability to deal physical damage like the original, instead of revealing his proficiency in fire style ninjutsu. Afterwards, he could then have us believe he is an illusionist who entrapped us inside a technique where illusions are capable of dealing actual damage.”
“He’s obviously not taking us seriously and thinks we can't defeat him. He doesn't need over-complicated tactics, like combining illusory and earth style techniques, when he can beat us to a pulp”, Dargon angrily retorted.
Before Dargon can say anything else Alisa shifts the focus of the conversation, with a somber look on her face.
“Has anyone noticed the fact that the teacher wasn’t carrying the alarm clock with him,” asked Alisa in a serious tone.
“Now that you mention it, I don’t remember seeing him have it” answered Zato in earnest.
“What are you trying to say, Alisa?” asked Dargon, visibly annoyed by that question.
“Since this exam started, I’m worried this bastard is trying to force us to fail” replied Alisa with an angry tone.
Both the boys stare at Alisa with a blank expression their face - the realization that Hakai had no intention of ever taking them seriously struck an unexpected blow to their ego.
Meanwhile Alisa, who was looking at the ground – her worst fears regarding their situation, finally being said aloud to her team mates.
“I think this bastard was messing with us from the start - we barely had any chances of asking additional questions about this....this fucking FARCE! What if we find him only to realise he hid the alarm clock elsewhere and then we simply don’t find it? “her eyes starting to water in annoyance at the situation.
“That would have been your fault as ninja, for going with the flow and not raising concerns or asking me more questions” retorted Hakai from a nearby tree.
The 3 Genin look in horror – realizing Hakai had already returned and that they haven't even made a new battle plan, let alone finish tending to their wounds.
"Honestly, Alisa, I am disappointed in you the most right now. You say you want to be a medical ninja, yet you don't even know the basic rules of how a medical ninja should act on the battlefield - like, never EVER start performing medical care, until you have confirmed the enemy is ACTUALLY LEAVING!" added Hakai in a condescending tone.
"You bastard ! What the fuck are you actually trying to pull here ?! Why don't you have an alarm clock on you" asked Dargon in frustration, while trying to figure out why Hakai’s true intentions.
"I am trying to gauge your competency levels. Based on how you acted so far – I can say with confidence that the 3 of you suck. As for why I don't have the alarm clock - that's for you to try and figure out where I hid it before playing with you lot." responded Hakai calmly.
"How the heck is this supposed to be a fair test - you rushed us into this mess and never explained things properly to us !" shouted Alisa in frustration.
Amused, Hakai answers while pointing his finger at Alisa:
“Listen brat, if you weren’t happy about how things were developing, you should have spoken up about it. You should have confronted me about anything that made you uneasy, before this whole sham started. Instead you followed the boys like a sheep.”
"How the heck are we supposed to pass then ?!" asked Dargon in frustration
While laughing, Hakai responds with a degrading tone:
"In your current situation, do you guys honestly think you have a shot at passing ? You don't know the exam site very well and you don't stand a chance in ever defeating me !"
"This is bullshit ! How is any of this supposed to be fair ?!" shouted Alisa in frustration, her eyes tearing up in rage.
"We are Genin, yes we might still be learning, but we earned our chance at becoming a ninja by graduating. We have official Genin documentation, damn it all !" added Alisa, while the tears in her eyes continue to build up.
In reaction to this, Hakai coldly states “I’m thinking that, they don’t teach you much about how to think for yourselves at the academy these days. The world of shinobi is one of darkness and deceit - if you can’t tell when a ninja proctor is testing you, in order to evaluate your critical thinking skills, then you are not fit for the strife of the actual ninja world."