"Umm, where's the room that Sasuke's in?" A boy doused in orange asked of a hospital nurse.
The receptionist-nurse behind the desk responded quickly and calmly, as expected of someone who deals with emergencies on a daily basis, "Mr. Uchiha is not allowed any visitors at the moment."
However, the orange jumpsuit-clad boy did not accept the seemingly rational answer from the nurse, "What?! Hey, hey! What's up with that?!"
Though the boy was being loud in a place full of sick and recovering people, the desk-nurse responded with amusement at the boy's antics, "I'm sorry, those are the rules." She gave a small chuckle as she saw the boy's mouth opening again to retort.
"Why, lady, tell me why?" the boy becoming frustrated at the lack of any explanation to his question.
A man with flaming white hair and a mask that covered the majority of his face stepped out from around the corner, looking a mixture of bored and annoyed, "Naruto, this is a hospital. Keep it down."
The boy in orange turned to look at the masked man, recognizing him immediately, Naruto ran over to him and excitedly started talking, "Say! Say! I've got a favor to ask!"
The older male looked down on Naruto with frustration evident in his eye, obviously having expected this from the small boy, "You don't need to say it." He calmly regarded the boy for a moment, seeing the gleam of hope coming from the shining blue irises in the boy's eyes, "Well, I thought it would come to this so..." The elder male paused hesitantly, seeing the boy's arms outstretched with a righteous grin on his young face. Naruto obviously believed that the teacher was going to give him the answer he wanted. "I searched for someone to watch over your training."
The boy looked frustrated, yet not completely taken aback, given he'd already had experience with this teacher for the past few months, "Why?!" The boy aimed his right hand at the teacher's face, finger pointing toward his chin, "I want you to teach me, Kakashi!"
Kakashi's eyes lazily closed halfway, still looking down on the small twelve-year-old boy, "I have some other matters to take care of." Kakashi spoke in a calm, offhanded manor, "I don't have time to trouble myself with you."
Naruto's eyes squinted as he crossed his arms over his chest, thinking hard about what Kakashi had said. After a brief moment, his face turned into a solid frown and then he took on an indignant look with his eye's focused solely on Kakashi, "Oh! Aha...!" Naruto pointed his left arm at Kakashi this time, finger pointing to his eye, "You're going to train Sasuke, aren't you?!"
Kakashi looked slightly surprised at the orange ninja's revelation, and at the speed he came to the conclusion, "Well... don't say that." The older male decided it'd be best to deflect the question back to what he was talking about before, "I found a teacher who's more reliable than I am!"
Naruto seemed content with that for the moment, and let his arm down. He remained hesitant though, knowing exactly who this person in front of him is, "Well... who is it?"
"It's me!" Shouted a person that had appeared behind Naruto.
"Huh..?" Naruto turned around to look at the person who claimed that they would be his teacher for the coming month, "Huh?! You! The Closet Perv!"
The Closet Perv didn't even flinch at the insult to his dignity in a public place, only giving a small response, "Such insolence."
Naruto looked scandalized, once again pointing at the subject of his frustrations, he regarded the Closet Perv with disgust, "Why's this guy my training teacher?!" Naruto was quick to point out a flaw with the selected teacher, "In the first place, he's weaker than me!"
Kakashi looked befuddled, "What did you say?" Obviously confused by how one of such high shinobi rank could be weaker than what it essentially a green genin-rank shinobi.
"But you see! But you see!" Naruto continued to point his finger at the man behind him while looking at Kakashi, "A long time ago, with my Harem Jutsu, this guy...!"
The selected teacher looked mortified the moment he realized what Naruto was about to point out. The teacher quickly rushed to cover the boy's mouth and prevented the boy from going any further.
Yet still, Kakashi was amused, his eyes opening ever so slightly more to look at the orange boy, "Harem Jutsu?" He mocked.
The teacher preventing Naruto from speaking responded immediately, "U-uh... it's nothing!" The teacher then turned toward the young boy and whispered in his ear, "I'll treat you to and buy you whatever you want later!" The older man silently bribed. Naruto was convinced immediately, "Just be quiet about that!"
Naruto was struggling for air but managed to gasp out an affirmative response, "You better."
Kakashi seemed bored again as his eyes drooped further, "Wow, I didn't know you were acquainted." Kakashi spoke in a tone that said 'I don't actually care either way'.
Yet the Closet Perv just patted the boys head and spoke with gritted teeth, "Well, they're unsavory ties, but..." The older male seemed to flashback to the very event where the Harem Jutsu was used, his face going into a catatonic state of mortification.
Naruto just held a deadpan look as he stared at the ridiculous man patting his head, "But why this guy?" Naruto's eyes, narrowed in annoyance looked back to Kakashi, "I definitely don't want him to."
The man's immobile state ended there, immediately responding to the boy's frustration with his own childish frustration, "Same here! If it weren't for Kakashi's favor, who'd teach you at all?"
"Then don't..." Depressingly answered the small boy, looking away from both men.
Kakashi decided to end the bickering there, "Now now, both of you... Don't say that." Kakashi walked over to Naruto's side and leaned down to whisper in the boy's ear, "Naruto, Ebisu is a private tutor who teaches the elite, a Special Jonin!" Kakashi was playing on the boy's lack of knowledge at this point, "He's truly better at teaching than I am."
Naruto looked down with squinted eyes, thinking over what Kakashi said. Realizing that he'd never heard of the term 'Special Jonin' before.
"Well, Naruto, of the three kids in Squad Seven that I taught, you're the worst at the basic skills. Get taught with care this time around." Kakashi bluntly stated, making sure Naruto didn't get any ideas in his thoughtful state.
Naruto responded as Kakashi had expected, Naruto indignantly shouted out his comparative prowess to his teacher of the past months, "How the heck am I inferior compared to Sakura and Sasuke?!"
Kakashi raised his arms up in exasperation, "Naruto..." Kakashi sighed out the words, "It's fact that you don't have the fundamentals down. No matter what you do, the basic skills are important." Kakashi continued staring at the boy below him, "If you really want to become strong, just be quiet and listen to everything I say." Kakashi's authoritarian mini-speech to Naruto ended the conversation abruptly. Kakashi turned to Ebisu and spoke calmly to him, "Now then, Ebisu, I'm leaving him with you."
Ebisu nodded his understanding to the white haired man as he watched Kakashi leave with his hands in his pockets.
Naruto watched the ground as he continued thinking over what Kakashi said. It had really hurt him, leaving a noticeable depressing feeling in him, knowing that he wasn't good enough for his teacher after everything he's accomplished.
"Okay, then, let's go." Ebisu droned out.
Naruto, however, continued looking at the ground.
Ebisu put a hand on Naruto's shoulder and attempted to lead him out of the hospital, but after feeling resistance from the boy, looked back at him. "Come now Naruto, we should start training immediately."
"No." Was Naruto's immediate response, "I don't feel like getting trained by you, or Kakashi. You're weaker than me, Kakashi doesn't care for me, and I can train on my own."
Ebisu looked critically at the boy, analyzing what he must be feeling... depressed at the loss of his teacher in favor of someone with more potential, jealousy, and a mixture of rage and anger. It could be his chance to get out of chore duty... "Fine then, if you need my help then Naruto, you can always find me with Konohamaru and join in our lessons then."
Ebisu understood that someone as prideful as Naruto would never sink himself low enough to taking the same training as someone almost four years his junior. And without training, it would be a rather entertaining first match of the chunin finals.
Naruto nodded understanding for Ebisu's words, not even bothering to bring up the free meal Ebisu had promised. Naruto followed Ebisu out the door and walked home on his own.
On the way home, Naruto realized that he had no solid plans for the coming month now, and from looking at Neji's fight with Hinata, he knew that he was going to lose unless he got some specialized training to beat Neji.
Naruto couldn't get that training on his own, and he had no way to avenge Hinata without beating Neji in the finals...
"Nmfg!" Naruto grunted out as a ran into someone as he was walking.
The other person appeared almost unaffected by the collision as they were still standing upright.
Naruto looked up, finding a woman with black hair, glowing red eyes, and an outfit that was asymmetrical, with one side having a long red sleeve, and the other exposing the entire arm. Her legs were entirely exposed while her forearms, hands, and upper thighs were wrapped in bandaging. "Hey! You're Hinata's teacher!" Naruto exclaimed to the woman.
The teacher smiled at the boy, "Most would apologize about bumping into each other before making conversation."
Naruto looked confused, "But didn't you bump into me too?"
The woman looked funnily at Naruto, as he got up from the ground and dusted himself off. It was still afternoon and many people were walking around the streets, "I suppose that's true enough. I guess we were both just distracted, nobody's fault here."
Naruto smiled up at the teacher, "So how's Hinata doing?"
The red eyed woman looked sadly at the youth in front of her, "She's been better, but she's expected to recover well after a few weeks in the hospital."
"Well that's great!" Shouted the bright eyed blonde, "I'll make sure to kick Neji's ass for her at the finals!" The blonde seemed to lose a little shine though, "I just need to find someone to teach me how..." Whispered the boy.
While she didn't quiet catch what Naruto had said at the end, she had a vague idea about what he might have said. He wanted to beat Neji in the exams, but lacked a means of doing so. It was understandable, Neji was a powerhouse and the prodigy of the Hyuuga clan. Without someone like the Hokage helping Naruto, there was no possible way to overcome the gap in their strengths.
She knew it wasn't something that she should do, but she pitied the blonde and felt he might need something to raise his spirits, "Well what do you say if I treat you to lunch then? I know this amazing restaurant."
Naruto hadn't ever really been to a restaurant before, most of them being too expensive for his allowance from the Hokage. But he was more than happy to accept, "Sure, lady!"
The red eyed woman had a small laugh, "My name's Kurenai, Naruto. Come this way, I was planning a trip over here anyways."
Kurenai led Naruto over to the restaurant and diner, The Round Leaf.
"It's a restaurant that's owned by one of my students' families, so I get a fairly nice discount here. I don't think I deserve it, but they know my face already and it really helps when I need something quick and easy to eat in the day." Kurenai explained to Naruto, hoping to start up a conversation with the anxious youth.
"Wow, that must be really cool! Was it Choji's family? I know they're really nice." Naruto asked, knowing something about his fellow classmates.
"Actually yes, this restaurant is owned by the Akamichi family. How did you get to know them Naruto? Choji a school friend of yours?" Kurenai felt a bit nostalgic talking about school. She was in school right after the Hidden Leaf Villages's short war with the Hidden Cloud Village and was given military-grade training in case war broke out again. For her to hear about 'school friends' gave her a feeling of happiness about how well the new generation was growing up.
Yet, Naruto looked nervous, "Kind of, not exactly. I just saw how Choji's family was so happy after they picked him up every day and kind of assumed he had a great family." The mood dropped suddenly, Kurenai understood immediately why he would be watching Choji. That envy for other happy families that Naruto saw as he sat alone on that old swing under the tree.
The saving grace for that awkward conversation was the waiter coming to get their orders.
As they chose their meals, Kurenai couldn't help but ask a question that had been plaguing her, "So where did Kakashi go? I'd have thought he'd be training you and Sasuke for the coming month."
Naruto got a forlorn look as he looked down at the table, "He's not training me for the month, he's going to be training Sasuke exclusively. He said I need to work on the fundamentals for the month. So he tried to stick me with a Special Jonin for training. A Closet Pervert one too..."
Kurenai looked shocked, the concept seemed foreign to her. A teacher abandoning one of his students for another? When both are going against impossible odds? Abhorrent. After all these months, it seems that he hasn't been working with Naruto at all to fix the fundamental mistakes he was already making.
And yet, there wasn't anything she could do about it. He wasn't her student, and the abilities she had wouldn't help him at all for his match in the finals.
She let the conversation sink in and memorized everything about it for future prospects. For the moment though, their food arrived and both of them were hungry.
-==Break==-
After the food was gone, and Kurenai paid the bill for the food, they were about to part ways.
"I have to go get some groceries, so I wish you the best luck at the finals." Kurenai gave a small smile to Naruto as she turned to go to the store.
"Wait!" Naruto chased after Kurenai as she was walking to the store, "I can help you out with that. It's the least I can do since you treated me to such an amazing meal!" Naruto grinned up at the taller woman.
Kurenai gave a smile back at the boy, "I'd appreciate that."
At the convenience store, Naruto was busy helping Kurenai get everything that she needed, when Naruto felt a small spike of pain from his stomach.
Kurenai, being a trained shinobi, noticed the flinch immediately, "Something wrong Naruto?"
Naruto gave a huge smile, "Nothing at all! Just a stomach ache. I'll be fine!" Naruto giving two thumbs up to the red eyed woman.
Kurenai gave a concerned smile back, "It might have just been the food, maybe you ate something you weren't suppose to after eating so much ramen for so long." She gave a small chuckle.
Naruto looked aghast, "No way! That food was almost as good as ramen! Nothing that good could ever cause pain! It might just be because I'm so full of so much good stuff!"
Kurenai gave another small laugh at Naruto's active imagination. Yet she was pleased that he enjoyed the diner so much.
They finished gathering all of the groceries and rang them up. Naruto assisting Kurenai with getting all the groceries over to her apartment, unfortunately on the second floor.
"Thank you for your help Naruto. I appreciate your help with my food this late in the evening."
"No! Thank you so much for today Kurenai! I feel like I'm ready to start training to punch Neji's face in already! I can feel it, that I will win!"
Kurenai smiled at Naruto, not sure how she felt about his feeling. But she could only help him by showing him her support, "I think you can do it too Naruto. Best of luck with training, Hinata, me, and our whole team is going to be supporting you at the finals."
Naruto simply bounced off and hopped off the railing of the second floor into full sprint, "Yeah! I can do it!"
Kurenai frowned, knowing that there was no logical way he could beat Neji in the finals. But hope was always good, even if someone had no ability to achieve their hopes.
-==Break==-
Naruto got to his apartment at lightning speed. Unlocking and opening the door he was greeted with his normal setup, eaten containers of insta-ramen and spoiled milk that should have been thrown away days ago.
But Naruto didn't notice any of that, all he could see was a bed, and a destination to a future of Neji ass kicking. Naruto planned on waking up bright and early to begin his training to show Neji how wrong he is!
Naruto felt the pain in his stomach again, "Eugh, stomach ache." Naruto cringed up as he felt the burning in his gut, "Well, I don't think I'll be eating at the Round Leaf for a while." Naruto gritted out. But knew that the food was good enough there that he'll probably want to go back there sometime in the future. Affordable or not.
It was just a stomach ache, he'd gotten those in the past and they always disappeared after some sleep. He knew that meant it was just that much more important to get some quality sleep tonight.
After a quick bathroom trip, Naruto was laying in bed. He slept through the pain that night.
-==Break==-
"Well aren't you in a good mood today." Rumbled a voice, rousing Naruto from his sleep. "I suppose you should be, the woman was quite beautiful. For a hairless monkey of course."
Naruto's eyes cracked open, noticing he was in some kind of dank and dark place. There was water on his back and some rustling sounds coming from his right.
A voice gave a mighty harrumph and spoke victoriously, "And to think that sly bastard thought he could contain the mighty Kyuubi with a human-made seal! Ridiculous."
At the sound of the name of the mightiest of the demon spirits that walked the earth, Naruto shot up from his downed position in the water, and faced toward a set of bars with the word 'seal' printed on a paper in the middle of it.
"And he wakes from his slumber!" The voice joked, as a mighty fox seemed to materialize from the shadows behind the cage, a giant grin on its maw, "And I thought I took long naps." It laughed amused.
Naruto back pedaled slightly, tripping over his feet and landing on his butt as he worked to shuffle away from the cage. "You're the Kyuubi. The thing sealed inside of me as a baby?"
Kyuubi lost some of its smile, "Yes I am, I am the Nine Tailed Fox, sealed into you all those years ago."
Naruto looked up at the fox, perplexed as for where to go from here, "So... what now?"
The fox looked just as confused now, "I suppose I should start with the reason I brought you in here." The giant fox began, "I have been watching you since you were a child, disgusted at the life you've lived and the actions of those around you. I've been disinterested in you the moment you had the desire to protect this village and train to be a shinobi. I've been shocked at how surprisingly naive and stupid you've been up to this point, and perplexed at how you've managed to live this long even with me healing you all this time."
Frustrated, Naruto was getting angry at all the insults, "Hey! Shut up! I haven't had much to go off of! What does any of this have to do with why you brought me into here?"
The fox grumbled, "If you'd let me finish... But yes, I've become frustrated with you, Naruto. I've become truly sickened by how pathetic you are. Your failures in Wave country, your failures in every chunin test, your failure to call your teacher out on his crap, your failure to use that special jonin for training, and your failure to ask that other jonin for help when you know you need it!"
Naruto looked glumly at the ground, knowing it was true. He needed help and he couldn't get any, "And so what are you going to do about it!? I doubt you can teach me anything, I doubt anyone wants to teach me! I don't even know the basics of how to be a shinobi." Naruto dejected.
The fox smiled, "No, but that's where I come in. Allow me to give you a bit of history on the tale of the tailed beasts." The fox in a box noticed Naruto's skepticism, but continued, "Not many know of this, but once we tailed beasts were all united, as one singular being. Known as the Shinju Tree. That tree, which was the origin for all tailed beasts, has existed for longer than you can comprehend. That tree has seen sights that no living creature could understand."
Naruto looked troubled, the orange coated vulpine creature was telling quite the story here, and he didn't understand how any of this worked. How did a tree spawn the tailed beasts and all of their destructive abilities?
"I won't go into very many details here, simply because they aren't important. What is important, is that you understand that I still hold many of these memories from the original Shinju Tree." Kyuubi paused and let that small bit sink in, "This Shinju Tree was all-seeing, the equivalent of a god while it existed. In the face of catastrophe, only it would remain, as life regrew from it. It could see everything, and it memorized everything. I can show you the memories of the Shinju Tree, and have you learn techniques long forgotten by showing them to you from its point of view."
Naruto looked bug eyed upon the great fox demon, the thing that caused disaster upon his village, and it was helping him to become stronger. "Why are you doing this? What do you have to gain?"
Kyuubi looked smug, knowing it had made an offer that the orange shinobi could never refuse, "I simply want the satisfaction of knowing that the one dominating me and containing me is the strongest in the world, not some lowly scumbag who's going to die in a month. I am immortal, never dying, and all powerful. I have been sealed for almost a full century now, I feel the need for something special."
Naruto looked at the Kyuubi with hope in his eyes. Never before had anyone ever helped him like this before. "Okay. I'll do it."
"Then I'll take you to my own mindscape, that is where I can show you the past." The nine-tails closed his eyes, "I will need you to come inside of the bars, that will be the only way I can take you there. You will have to trust me."
Naruto looked skeptical, if he had to step through those bars... No, that was too convoluted of a plan. And while it would be ingenious, there were better ways, and faster ones if Kyuubi wanted to kill him. He would trust the fox that made him this deal.
Stepping inside the bars; instantly there was a brief flash.
He arrived at an evening meadow, a peaceful grassland that stretched beyond the horizon. Trees seemed scarce and the only animals he could see were small foxes that were running around the edges of his vision. The scene seemed, almost beautiful in a way.
Not a single soul or person in sight, not even Kyuubi looked to be here yet.
"Foxes have become extinct in your world." Spoke a calm voice from behind Naruto.
Naruto turned around and found an average sized red fox with multiple tails behind it, and from the sound of the voice, it probably has nine tails.
"Or at least nearly so, they've been hunted to extinction because of the torment I've caused. Humans have killed them for sport and maimed them in revenge. Now if there are any left, they're not anywhere close to human settlements." The Kyuubi mourned.
"Why are you..." Naruto was confused as to why the Kyuubi would tell him this.
"I thought it would be best to start off by explaining why I hate humans so much. Because maybe then you might be able to trust me a little more, since we'll be spending some amount of time together for training." The nine-tailed fox hesitated, "The humans have created various ways over the years to control us tailed beasts, by sealing us, controlling us, or just enraging us. And when we cause destruction because of those methods, we get blamed for everything. Can you really blame us completely for hating humans so much?"
Naruto stared at the small fox in empathy, "I guess I can understand that."
"Well, I suppose I'm just a sap for good-natured people like you who try their hardest but get stopped at every turn. Don't think too much into it." Kyuubi walked a small distance away and put a paw up, pointing toward some invisible point in space in front of him, there a small ripple appeared. That ripple expanded to form a sort of bluish portal that led to something unknown. "This should take you to a time that I believe you have the best chance of learning something. Specifically, I want you to look at two people, Tatsuya Shiba and Masaki Ichijou. But if you have any extra time, try learning more from the people around them."
Naruto nodded his head and slowly walked forward to the portal, until he was completely engulfed by walking through it.
-==Break==-
Kyuubi watched as Naruto emerged from the portal again, obviously still exhausted from all the practicing in previous segments, "Have you completely memorized it this time?"
Naruto nodded, "Y-yeah, I think I have. I should be good." Naruto got ready, but the Nine-Tailed Fox stopped him by raising a paw.
"No, you're running completely out of energy, that means it's time to eat and get some real rest with actual dreams. I'm going to send you back out into the real world again. If you want to come back in here, just hold your hand over your seal and push chakra into it, that should allow us to communicate and allow me to get you in here much faster."
Naruto nodded, understanding everything.
Naruto was then immediately shoved into his actual body. He had a mission; toilet and shower first, eat second, sunlight third, and sleep last. After he'd wake up from eight hours of solid sleep, he'd go back into the seal for further training.
He would need to repeat this process every other day, to make sure his body didn't completely die out on him. Kyuubi could enhance his body to reflect changes inside his mind, just as Kyuubi could supplement some foods for him; but not only was liquid a challenge, but getting rid of it was a problem too. Other issues existed too, which would only be solved by going out into his body to fix them. So they found the limit for this process to be every other day.
There was only one large issue that existed for Naruto with this training, and that was the lack of any response from others to this change. Nobody had noticed his disappearance, nobody had questioned his location. It was terrifying knowing that nobody cared for where you were after a whole week of never leaving your home. But that only made him try harder, he would make them want to care! He would make them notice!
-==Break==-
"Naruto, I have one last gift for you before the exam." Kyuubi was just wrapping up the last day of training before the exam. Naruto was going to get one day off to completely recover from the training done, and to help Naruto get accustomed to reality again. "I want you to sign my summoning contract, for the foxes."
Contract? "But, Kyuubi, I thought you said foxes were basically extinct?" Questioned Naruto.
"Yes, normal foxes are extinct on your world, but in a different land, a different place, there's special foxes that can speak and know the shinobi arts. They are 'summons' or beings that shinobi use to assist them in their duties."
"Oh, well that's cool! How do I sign?!" Naruto shouted excitedly.
The fox began heaving heavily, as it worked to get something out of its body. Naruto immediately understood what was going on and got a disgusted look on his face.
The Kyuubi finally got the scroll out of his stomach and passed it over to Naruto, "Don't worry, I told you before, I'm a construct of Chakra. I don't need to eat, and I don't digest things. It's just a safe place to keep that scroll, since it's so important to our kind."
Naruto opened the scroll and noticed that there was only one other name in it, Hagoromo Ootsutsuki. "Who's this guy?"
The Kyuubi knew immediately who Naruto was talking about, the only human the Kyuubi thought he'd ever allow to sign the scroll, "I've told you about him, but by a different name. He's the Sage of Six Paths, the originator of the shinobi. The foxes were his personal summons, though he rarely had use in summoning us."
Naruto looked shocked at the scroll, "And I sign in blood, right?"
"How else would you sign a scroll as important as that." Smiled the Fox.
Naruto quickly signed his name in blood and bloodied his fingers to put down his fingerprints on the scroll as well. After which the Kyuubi gave additional information.
"It would be to your benefit to allow me to summon the foxes for you. I'll preform the hand-signs in your mind, so if you ever need a summon, just slice a finger and place it on the ground, I'll do the rest." The Kyuubi was a real benefit to a shinobi, in both teaching and in short-cutting techniques completely. "That will be all for today, rest up for the rest of tonight, and take it easy for your recovery day tomorrow."
-==Break==-
The day of the finals came quickly.
Naruto secured himself an early breakfast and made sure that he was going to the exam area fully equipped.
Traveling to the arena, nothing called out to him as odd or suspicious. Sun's shining. Partly cloudy. Overall, a perfect day for the chunin exam finale.
The chunin exam area looked to be an open-topped oval-shaped structure. It had seats for spectators at the top in sectioned areas.
In the largest seating area, there existed a second floor to it where the most important spectators would be sitting, that including the Hokage and Kazekage.
The arena itself was plain and almost barren, favoring those who could win all-out battles. It's enclosed space, lack of hidden areas, and places of strategic importance made factors like speed, hand-to-hand combat, and other short-range techniques valuable assets. Long-range techniques, ambush tactics, and any abilities that could not be used quickly were conversely useless.
The area even lacked any sort of water, so water based techniques became near impossible.
It's an arena truly favoring people of specific talents. People with talents like his.
All of these thoughts and more passed through Naruto's head as he walked into the arena after verifying his identity with the registrars at the gate of the exam area.
In the middle of the exam area stood another seven people already waiting, it seemed that even arriving this early wasn't early enough. Beside the proctor for the finals, the rest were all contestants.
The first is Temari, a blonde haired girl who specialized in wind techniques. Her abilities are quick and long ranged, with a wide area of effect. She herself lacks speeds and physical strength.
The second is her brother Kankuro, with his normal puppet wrapped on his back. A puppet user, techniques requiring no hand-signs at all, with quick and efficient killing techniques built in throughout the puppet. Yet Kankuro himself, like his sister, is physically weak and immobile.
The third person he noticed is Gaara, the third sibling of the group. He's completely immobile and hardly ever moves from a single spot, relying entirely on his sand to defend and attack for him. Though the sand seems to be an impervious defense to all physical attacks.
All of those three siblings seemed nearly perfect for this competition, almost like they were hand selected for this type of battle arena.
The next person lined up is Neji, the prodigy of the Hyuuga clan. Neji specializes in close range hand-to-hand combat, and because of that he is favored in his matches. His speed and technique are nearly flawless, and his mastery of the Jyuuken style of the Hyuuga is said to rival masters of the clan.
The fifth person lined up in the finals is Shikamaru. He's a tactician, plain and simple. He plans out fights beforehand and creates a strategy to win. The arena is heavily apposing him, with no time to plan out anything if the opponent has an ace in their sleeve.
The last of the contestants lined up is Shino. A contestant that relies primarily on using his personal hive that exists throughout his body. The bugs feed on his chakra and serve to protect him through various techniques that the bugs can preform.
Various contestants had yet to arrive, like Sasuke and Dosu, but otherwise, these would be his opponents for the exam.
"Hey, you over there. Don't be so restless." Called out the proctor, shocking Naruto from his analytical studying, "Throw out your chest and show your face to the spectators."
Naruto nodded in the direction of the proctor and joined the line up of competitors.
He and Neji were the first fight. No time to waste, he would show everyone his capability!
