Mikoshi

Mikoshi keeps his brown hair short and spiky and sports round black glasses, with his forehead protector worn across the top of his head. A zipped jacket in light yellow and dark blue tops trousers of blue and pale grey, and he finishes the look with black shinobi sandals, black fingerless gloves, and a light violet sash draped over his right shoulder.

Sincere to a fault, Mikoshi treats each stage of the Chunin Exams with the utmost seriousness, quite unlike his teammate Yukata. Their antics irritate him at times, yet he stays warmly loyal to them, and he learned to work around Yukata's cluelessness even when the two sat for the written test in separate rooms. He usually behaves with maturity, though he is not above throwing himself into a scuffle among the genin just before the second stage, and he clings stubbornly to being right even as quicksand swallows him.

Mikoshi and his squad enter the combined Chunin Exams that Konoha and Suna co-sponsor. The opening phase separates the teammates into different rooms, where Shikamaru Nara lays out the rule that each of them answers only a single question, yet the trio's scores together have to total precisely one hundred to advance. A surprise final question asks which member they would abandon; leaving it unanswered, Mikoshi's team clears the round. A culling race to Suna follows, open only to the first thirty squads, and they scrape in. Temari then opens the second test inside the Demon Desert. Low on time, Mikoshi proposes ambushing a rival team to seize a needed scroll, but a sandstorm engulfs them and he sinks into quicksand; Matsuri grabs him, though the whole group is dragged under before Fu pulls them free.

When Fu offers her own scroll, they turn it down, choosing to persevere as Gaara once did. Hoichi soon traps the genin, and Gaara returns to free them, only for Hoichi to bind him with chakra chains and start drawing out his tailed beast. Ordered to flee, the genin instead seek aid; when Yukata collapses, she and Mikoshi stay put while Matsuri presses on, and Asuma Sarutobi, Kurenai Yuhi, and Might Guy of the Leaf soon come upon the two and hear their account. The exams end prematurely amid controversy, and Gaara rules that each entrant's report will go to their village leader to weigh promotion.