Left 4 Survival was designed to be a pure adrenaline-pumping combat game. While it had a few insane difficulty challenge modes, Uchiha Kei didn't include those in the demo.
So, this special Shinobi World Edition of Left 4 Survival was immersive but not particularly hard.
Even the other three teams—composed mostly of civilian players—managed to adjust quickly to the zombie hordes and breezed through the game while slaying to their heart's content.
As for the gore and horror? It didn't quite affect the players the way it might in the real world.
That wasn't due to a lack of realism. Rather, the game offered a degree of mental protection: players, especially civilians or the mentally unsteady, experienced a kind of immersive psychological buffer. Once inside, they instinctively assumed their roles—battle-hardened survivors who'd long since gotten used to mountains of corpses and seas of blood. A few jump scares weren't enough to throw them off.
This, in fact, was a new function developed after upgrading the system's control over the spiritual network—thanks largely to Uchiha Naori and his Three-Tomoe Sharingan, which allowed the addition of features akin to subconscious suggestion.
The Sharingan truly was an eye of endless potential.
There was a reason people jokingly called pre-Boruto Naruto the "Colored Contact Lens Legend."
Naturally, the match for Minato's team was a bit different. Uchiha Kei had quietly made some tweaks.
The changes were inspired by the delightful bickering between Kakashi and Obito. They weren't major—just slightly increased monster spawn rates and the activation of... friendly fire.
Yes, the game was normally set to disable friendly fire—any attack aimed at a teammate would pass through harmlessly. But for Minato's team, Uchiha Kei secretly enabled it.
This was part of what he had ordered earlier.
Additionally, all players were isolated from the outside world while in-game. No external sounds would interfere with their immersion.
As the battles raged on, players became completely absorbed in the game and forgot about the real world.
For most teams, that wasn't an issue. But for Minato's team, with friendly fire active, things... escalated.
"Dead-last, you did that on purpose, didn't you?"
On a bridge in-game, fresh from fighting off a zombie wave, Kakashi stared coldly at Uchiha Obito with his usual dead fish eyes. In his hand was a bloodstained kunai, and there was a wound on his left shoulder still oozing blood.
Clearly, the injury came from that kunai.
Of course, since this was a game with health bars, it wasn't as bad as it looked. The wound reduced Kakashi's HP by around 2%.
Faced with the accusation, Obito's eyes darted. "Who would hurt a teammate on purpose?! I—I just missed my throw, that's all."
Kakashi squinted. "Missed?"
"Yes! It was an accident!" Obito insisted stubbornly.
Kakashi glanced at him, then said nothing and moved on.
Obito sighed in relief, thinking he'd gotten away with it. Then he smirked quietly to himself.
Seeing they didn't start bickering like usual, Rin blinked in surprise but let it go.
Only Minato, their sensei, hesitated. He seemed like he wanted to speak up, but in the end, said nothing.
After all, this was just a game. Even if someone died, they'd respawn.
So rather than suppress it, better to let them vent here than have them break into a real fight during a mission.
Not long after, during another zombie encounter, Obito suddenly screamed and jumped while clutching his backside.
Furious and in pain, he pulled out a bloodied kunai. Maybe it was his imagination, but it even smelled like fertilizer.
He whipped around and glared at the culprit—Kakashi, who raised his left hand apologetically. "Oops. Slipped."
Obito (皿╬)!
"Kakashi! What do you mean 'slipped'? You totally did that on purpose!"
Kakashi: "It really was an accident."
With that, he turned to walk away.
The blatant lie made Obito laugh from rage. He flailed his arms, exaggerated a stumble, and yelled, "Ahh\~ I fell!"
And launched three kunai.
Kakashi dodged instantly—but their game avatars were older and less nimble. He couldn't fully evade, and one kunai hit him square in the rear.
Obito cracked up on the spot. He hadn't aimed at anything specific—he just threw them randomly. It was pure luck that Kakashi's dodge ended with his butt getting skewered. The comedy was too real.
Instantly, Kakashi's temper boiled over. The burning pain ignited his fury. He drew his own kunai and hurled it. "Dead-last! You picking a fight?!"
Obito screamed as a kunai lodged in his knee, then furiously stood and threw back. "Bastard Kakashi! Bring it on!"
Kakashi: "You started this, you moron!"
And so the two began hurling kunai at each other across the map.
Because their avatars were older and slower, neither could dodge effectively. They quickly ended up looking like human pincushions.
Thankfully, due to game mechanics, it was just mild pain and a steadily dropping health bar.
Their ridiculous antics—arguing and throwing kunai mid-zombie apocalypse—cranked the comedy up to maximum. Viewers in the real world were in stitches. These two were pure entertainment gold.
Rin had been nervous at first, watching them exchange kunai. But when she realized they weren't actually getting hurt, she could only laugh helplessly and try to talk sense into the two buffoons.
Minato, who had seen this coming, crossed his arms and watched with a mix of amusement and exasperation. In the end, all he could do was shrug.
In the real world, Uchiha Kei clapped and smiled with genuine satisfaction.
Kakashi and Obito—his chaotic duo—had not let him down. Give them just a little "special treatment," and sure enough, they put on a spectacular show.
This was the kind of content he wanted. It wasn't some serious strategy stream—it was pure, chaotic fun.
And Uchiha Kei's delighted reaction didn't go unnoticed.
In the shadows, Uchiha guards observed. Uchiha Naori's eyes lit up, and he summoned a subordinate to pass on Kei's sentiment.
"Lord Kei is very pleased with Obito's performance. This might help our clan's image in the village."
This unspoken implication spread quickly. When the Uchiha elders heard, they began to ponder.
Maybe being the butt of the joke now and then wasn't a bad thing.
After all, every famous clan had its own quirks. The more beloved clans often had 'relatable' or 'down-to-earth' members—even if they were a bit embarrassing.
So Obito... might just be that person for the Uchiha.
In that case, let's drop the idea of punishing him.
Pass it along: No one is to hassle Uchiha Obito again. This is the shared will of the elders and Lord Kei.
Thus, word quietly spread through the Uchiha—Obito wouldn't face any clan backlash for his public embarrassment.
When Obito found out later, he exhaled in relief. That had been close.
And he felt a surge of gratitude toward Uchiha Kei. The whole clan said it was thanks to Kei's protection that he wasn't disciplined.
...Uchiha Kei, of course, had no idea any of that had happened.
Of course, that was all later.
For now, Left 4 Survival had proven both fun and meaningful. Watching the four teams play, the Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi, officially designated it a required genjutsu training game for future graduating genin squads.