Naruto the Rise of a Titan

Author's Note: As with all stories there must be a beginning. Finding the proper place to begin is often one of the hardest facets of being a writer. As such I propose that we begin this fiction in the office of the Hokage one late night in the company of 5 truly great men (3 of whom are perverts).

Chapter 1

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A strong, confident young man gazed through a window which overlooked Konohagakure no sato. From his office he could see almost the entire village. He always found it peaceful to watch the limbs of the giant trees within Konoha's walls sway with the autumn breeze as the village slept in peace. After a few moments, he heard the door to his office open as several people quickly shuffled into the room. "Thank you all for coming on such short notice" he stated before turning to look at them with a broad smile gracing his face. The man had long unruly golden blond hair and deep crystal blue eyes which held the power that could only be seen in the eyes of a battle hardened ninja.

"Minato-kun there is no need to apologize I am sure this will not be a waste of time." came the calm response of the Third Hokage, the Professor. "Anyways, you are well within your rights as Hokage to wake up ninja in the middle of the night if they are needed" he pointed out with a soft chuckle.

"Minato, as good as it is to see you can we get on with this meeting I have research to do which requires a good night's sleep as you know. I am sure we would all like to know why you have asked us here tonight. Am I right Hiashi?" said a man in his early 40s with pure white hair.

"Yes Jiraiya-sensei, after all, much like you Minato, I too have a pregnant wife waiting for me at home."

Minato nodded his head silently. "Okay, I won't sugar coat anything and this will only take a few minutes I hope. I just needed all of your opinions about something." The assembled ninja quietly waited for their Hokage to continue.

"As I get closer and closer to the day my wife is supposed to have our baby, I find myself thinking about the future more and more." After a short pause he continued, "Gentlemen, our village is in danger. Every generation has seen the rise of a powerful Shinobi squad since our village was established by the Shodai and Nidaime. Sarutobi, your squad fought and protected this village since you were a young man and the three of you continue to protect everyone with your wisdom. Jiraiya, in regards to power, your team remains Konoha's single greatest achievement. Next came our team Hiashi, together with Kengi we made the enemies of the leaf know true fear. And our most recent success was your team Kakashi…" a sad frown appeared on the blonde's face as he recalled the loss of two of his students during the war with Iwa.

Pushing his emotions to the side he continued to voice his concerns. "Along with the successes of each generation have come hardships and failures that threaten to overwhelm the leaf if we do not do anything about them. The first and second "great" Shinobi wars rocked the elemental Nations to their very foundations and although we came out on top it lead to many of our enemies hating us even more. Barely a generation later we were forced into another round of confrontations in the form of the Third "Great" Shinobi war. As the war raged on we lost more and more Shinobi. Shortly afterwards, Orochimaru officially cut ties with the village and now we are weaker than we have been since the conclusion of the First Shinobi war which cost us the life of the Nidaime." At this point Minato took a short pause to allow everyone present to process what he had said so far.

"As a result," Minato continued, "Kumogakure is organizing their troops and appear to be preparing for batt…"

"WHAT… that makes no sense. Why would Kumo attack us." Declared Kakashi.

"Kakashi, is makes perfect sense. Do you remember the lessons that I gave your team the first week after you left the academy?"

Umm… not really." came a rather sheepish reply.

"That first week I taught you all about the tactics that make a successful commander. The lessons came from a Chinese general named Sun Tzu. He wrote: 'When you engage in actual fighting, if victory is long in coming, then men's weapons will grow dull and their ardor will be damped. If you lay siege to a town, you will exhaust your strength. Again, if the campaign is protracted, the resources of the State will not be equal to the strain. Now, when your weapons are dulled, your ardor damped, your strength exhausted and your treasure spent, other chieftains will spring up to take advantage of your extremity. Then no man, however wise, will be able to avert the consequences that must ensue.'"

"Hmmm, Minato I must say I agree with you" said Jiraiya. "My network has been picking up on increased activity in Lightning Country but it appears as thought we will have at least two more years to prepare until they are ready to attack."

"Well there goes the short meeting; I guess we should begin planning how we will deal with this." said Hiashi.

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Hours later the five assembled Shinobi finished their planning for the evening. As they prepared to depart Minato looked over to his sensei with a twinkle in his eyes. "You know Ero-sensei this is not a pleasure trip, it is an S ranked mission. I expect you to return with Tsunade as soon as possible."

With a slightly indignant look on his face the old pervert vanished in a swirl of wind and leaves. The others began to leave when Minato called out to Hiashi. "Hiashi please give my apologies to Hana for keeping you for so long tonight." After Hiashi nodded in reply, Minato left in a yellow flash to see his balloon shaped wife.