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Towards the end of the invasion of Leaf by Sound and Sand, Shibi helped his son's body counter the effects of the poison that Kankurou had used to affect him.

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Shino participated in the Chuunin Exam taking place in Konoha Village. By passing he would attain the Ninja rank of Chuunin. He and his team passed the first and second tests. Shino then fights in the preliminaries for the third exam test and defeats Zaku from Hidden Sound, advancing him to the third and final round.

In the third and final round Shino was matched against Kankurou from Hidden Sand, when it came time for their match Kankurou gave up before the match could begin. Kankurou and his siblings were on a mission to help capture Uchiha Sasuke and his being missing for his own match forced Kankurou to panic and throw his match. This surprised Shino and caused him to tail Kankurou when the invasion formally began. Catching up to Uchiha Sasuke who had earlier fled in pursuit of the siblings, Shino told Sasuke to continue on after Gaara and Temari while he himself would take on Kankurou. Kankurou used his puppet to poison Shino, but not before Shino managed to send his bugs along the chakra puppet strings to attack the hidden Kankurou and defeat him. The poison knocked Shino out, but his father Shibi later found his son and used his own insects to remove the poison from Shino's body.

Shino would later go on a mission with his father and miss an opportunity to go on the mission to retrieve Sasuke. When his teammate Kiba later returned from this mission, he demanded that Kiba tell him everything that happened because he wanted to know all the details. Kiba surmised Shino was annoyed he missed out on such a dangerous mission.

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When Inari went looking for assistance to fight Gatô, Agari's husband Giichi was reluctant to help. However, she told him how much Inari reminded her of his father Kaiza. This spurred Giichi to help. With Giichi deciding to help Inari, the other citizens decided to help out as well.

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Akadou Yoroi has the ability to leach the chakra out of an opponent by placing his hand near their body. When Yoroi and his team make it to the third round preliminaries, it is revealed he and his team are actually Hidden Sound spies acting under the direction of Orochimaru. Yoroi is matched against Sasuke and manages to surprise Sasuke with his unique powers. However Sasuke is able to make a come back and defeat Yoroi with his new Lion Combo. He was then taken away by the medical team.

Shortly afterwards both Yoroi and his teammate Misumi left the Fire Country behind and headed south for the Sea Country to assist Orochimaru's former scientist Amachi. There the two former Sound spies began attacking gold boats destined for the Water Country. In the guise of a dangerous sea monster, the two ninja were able to steal the gold. When ninja from Konoha were sent to investigate, Yoroi and Misumi did battle with them. Yoroi squared off against Shino several times, with the bug user finally defeating Yoroi in the end. The two did battle on the ocean and Shino's bugs sucked out Yoroi's chakra. Yoroi then sunk into the depths below.

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Akahoshi is cognizant of the fact his village is not worthy of the "kage" title, but he felt the chakra enhancing meteor would make them powerful enough to rival the Five Great Shinobi Countries. When the Third Hoshikage forbid the training, Akahoshi and his minions actually killed him. He then assumed leadership of the village and started the training again. Natsuhi, a former kunoichi who had passed the training alongside her husband returned to the village to steal the star. Years before she and her husband had attempted to stop the training by stealing the star but they were stopped by the Third Hoshikage who promised to end it. Akahoshi managed to use Natsuhi's son Sumaru as bait and get the star back. He then killed Natushi.

When the young trainees came before Akahoshi telling of the star's bad side effects, Akahoshi ignored their warnings. The village ninja began to turn against but he would hear nothing of it. Proclaiming himself Fourth Hoshikage, he embedded the star in his chest and flooded himself with the Kujaku Myouhou power. A former remnant of Natushi remained behind in a sealing mark and she assisted Naruto in destroying the meteor for good. Akahoshi then faced punishment by his village.

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Chouji participated in the Chuunin Exam taking place in Konoha Village. By passing he would attain the Ninja rank of Chuunin. He and his team were able to pass the first and second tests. Chouji then fought in the preliminaries for the third exam test, but he ends up losing to Kinata Dosu from Hidden Sound.

Chouji spends the following weeks cheering for his friend Shikamaru during his match in the third test of the Exam. During this period Chouji was neglecting training as hard as he could, preferring to spend most of his time eating. When Chouji was asked by Shikamaru to help retrieve Sasuke he joined along. During their tracking of the Sound Four, they were trapped by Sound ninja Jiroubou. Chouji took Jiroubou's insults to his weight and to his friend Shikamaru's leadership abilities to heart. He demanded his friends continue on while he fought Jiroubou alone. Chouji managed to force Jiroubou into his level two cursed seal form. On his last legs, Chouji ingest the third and final of the secret Akimichi soldier ration pill. The pill boosted the ingester's chakra immensely but put a huge price on the person's life. The power gave Chouji the ability to defeat Jiroubou, but he passed out afterwards from all the pain.

Leaf medical ninja were able to find Chouji's body shortly afterwards and rush him back to Konoha for treatment. It was only the high medical training of the Hokage Tsunade that countered the affects of the pill and saved Chouji's life. Afterwards Chouji felt he had wasted his time before in not training properly. So he demanded his Jounin sensei Asuma train him to make up for lost time.

Chouji later served on a brief mission to apprehend the Stupid Brothers, Fuujin and Raijin, escapees from a ninja correctional facility. His training had now given him the ability to use Bubun Baika no Jutsu (Partial Multi-Size) without the use of his pills.

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Chouza and the Ino Shika Cho group get back together to help Hidden Leaf turn back the Sound and Sand invasion.

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Amachi abducted citizens from the country, especially those who came near the Kikaijima island laboratory. One such citizen was a young girl named Isaribi, who served as a working prototype for Amachi's ambitions. He would later perfect the experiments on his very own body. Amachi's evil designs were brought to an end by Naruto and he was taken back to Konoha to face justice.

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The night before Naruto is to participate in the third round, he goes to Ichiraku Ramen to buy some dinner. He is about to order when Ayame presents him with a big expensive meal. Naruto is surprised at first, but Teuchi says it's on the house, a reward for one of their favorite customers.