Genma headed for ANBU Restricted Training Area One. It wasn’t easy terrain — swampy, overgrown, pitted with hidden sinkholes, and home to sucking, tarry mud buried under leaf litter, that acted as a natural trap for animals that blundered into it. Venomous snakes and nasty stinging insects lurked in the shadows. As did more than a few unsprung traps set by ANBU teams over the years.

Because it was restricted to ANBU use only, it was unfamiliar ground for the vast majority of Konoha’s ninja population; that made it perfect for use during ANBU trials. The spring trials that had given Kakashi and Ryouma their rookie places on Team Six had been held farther from Konoha’s center. Autumn trials the previous year, though, had been held in RTA One. Raidou had been there as one of the lieutenants responsible for actually vetting the candidates. Genma’s role as Hajime’s trusted veteran had been simpler: set traps, free the candidates who got caught in them, and provide first aid for any participant who needed it.

What that meant, in practical terms, was that Genma and Raidou both knew where the pitfalls and traps lay, while Kakashi and his dogs did not. It was an excellent place to evade Kakashi’s pursuit. That was why he’d told Raidou to meet him there.

Now it was going to be an excellent place to confound Kakashi instead.

He held up a hand to catch Kakashi’s attention as they neared the fenced border. “This area’s restricted. Our ANBU sparks will let us through. Your dogs might have a problem.”

As if to prove his point, the golden shepherd and the wolfish dog both came circling towards them from opposite directions. The shepherd’s tail was low, her posture dejected; the wolfish dog looked just as unhappy, but its ears were back and its lips pulled up in a snarl. It was hard to tell for certain, but if Genma had to guess, the wolf’s shaggy fur was singed.

Genma came to a halt at the fence and waited.

The big dog at Kakashi’s shoulder stopped, too, while the talkative little one, who’d been riding the big dog, scrambled up the big dog’s shoulders to get a better look at the obstacle.

Ryouma came to stand at Genma’s left. “Seals,” he said, pointing down the line of the fence to one of the many posts. “Like the Forest of Death.”

Kakashi crouched down to examine the fence, studying the wire where it met the ground. He shoved his hitai-ate up, exposing the red Sharingan, drinking in whatever information that gave him about the chakra construction of the barrier. After a moment he sighed, covered his eye, stood, and patted the big dog on the shoulder. He made a low, throaty noise, and all four dogs turned their attention on him. The little one sighed, too, sounding more like a tired, middle-aged man than the lap dog he resembled.

Kakashi flicked three quick seals, and all four dogs vanished, unsummoned with little ceremony. “Should we expect giant centipedes, too?” Kakashi asked.

Genma shrugged. “It’s a restricted training site in Konoha. Centipedes are the least of your worries. It’s the little red spiders that are the real bastards. They’re chakra-sensitive. Probably related to summoned spiders somehow. If you get one on you and it bites— Actually, just don’t get one on you.”

Ryouma shuddered, clapping a hand to the back of his neck as if he’d felt the brush of eight legs on his bared skin.

“Helpful,” Kakashi said, giving Genma a flat, unimpressed look. He vaulted over the fence, with Genma at his heels.

Ryouma gave the trees overhead an apprehensive look before he followed.

Well, damn, Genma’d scared the wrong rookie. Of course.

Those spiders really were little bastards, though.