Chapter 2: On the road to greatness.

talking

thinking

biju talking

biju thinking

Justu

"Again Naruto, you have to keep practicing if you want to get stronger." Mira said as she crossed her arms and looked down at the panting form of her son.

Three years had past since she had found Naruto in that back alleyway and they had left the village in order to train Naruto so he could become stronger and a proper Shinobi and much had changed in the years that had followed.

Though on paper his name was Tenzo Mira never called him that unless they were around other people, He understood why since they didn't want a leaf shinobi finding out about him and taking him back to the leaf village when he didn't want to but when they were in private she always referred to him as Naruto. To also be safe she had taught him a special Henge Jutsu that could only be preformed by those of the dragon summons that allowed the user to change certain physical traits of his appearance as long as he was bonded with a dragon familiar which he was.

Naruto looked up at his mom and panted with a smile on his face, overall he had gotten some looks from the last three years of training. He now stood at a respectable 5'3 which was good for someone of his age and he had gained a decent amount of muscle tone. His skin still had the tan only now it was a touch darker from all the traveling they did. His face had changed the most due to the Henge although he only had it on when they were in public, When he did he no longer had his whisker birthmarks and one of his eyes was now a light amber similar to his mother as a small connection to her and his hair was half black and half blond.

Currently the mother and son were in the woods of the land of fire having left a small town a day ago and decided to stop and do some training, with Naruto still somewhat to you to preform justus past the three basic academy Jutsu's she had shown him they mainly focused on his Taijutsu and Kenjutsu.

Mira made a point to teach him her style of fighting known as the dragon knight style, it combined a mix of high speed martial arts used to strike at key spots quickly and accurately similar to the Hyugas gentle fist style but with no chakra and added heavy and devastating swordsman style for facing any kind of opponent.

"Sure thing mom." Naruto said jumping back to his feet with a determined look on his face, he had started calling her mom full time two years ago.

"Now then remember what i showed you, you have to be quick on your feet and never let your opponent know where your going to be coming from next." Mira said dropping into the basic stance of the style, Naruto nodded and copied her before he rushed forward.

His speed had increased leaps and bounds due to the runs and exercises his mother made him do so he had the momentum and stamina for the style, he blurred forward striking low to her stomach only for her to block with her fist and send a jab to his shoulder. He bent away from it and sent another strike for her stomach trying to stagger her and knock her off her feet, the blow connected making her grunt and using what small advantage he had Naruto got around behind her and slammed an elbow into her back to send her staggering forward.

Mira smirked a bit as she rightened herself and turned to face her son only to see he wasn't there, confused she looked around until she heard the sound of leafs shuttering an looked up. Naruto fell from the tree he had raced up quickly and dropped down slamming a foot into her head and knocking her to the ground.

Naruto panted for a second before grinning widely and laughed."I got you mom, i finally got you admit it." He said doing a small victory dance.

Mira laughed a bit as she pulled herself out of the dirt and smiled at him."Yes you did Naruto and i am very proud of you." She said smiling."But remember, just because you beat me does not mean you have the style mastered. You are indeed getting better with the basic stances meaning it will soon become time for you to move onto the intermediate and i promise you that will be a whole lot tougher." She said in a firm voice.

He nodded and smile."Im ready mom, i made a promise to get stronger and nothing is gonna stop me from doing it you just watch." He cheered in his usual hyperactive tone that made her laugh whenever he did.

"Alright mister, go get yourself cleaned up and then come back so we can have lunch. Well continue training after that alright." She said.

"Sure thing mom." He said before jogging off a bit deeper into the woods to a stream they had made there camp by.

He stripped out of his training clothes leaving him in just his shorts before jumping into the water and settled into the stream, it wasn't a hot bath at a hotel or anything but he and his mother rarely stayed fully in towns since they had a love for camping out in the wild. His mom said that it was because they were free spirits and didn't like to be in one place for so long plus that also helped them avoid any leaf shinobi incase they were looking for him.

As Naruto played against the bank of the river he couldn't help but stop and think about how much his life had changed, since his mom had come into his life so many amazing things had happened with her helping him get stronger and some of the adventures the two of them had over the course of the years of training.

He smiled with his eyes shut until he heard a noise, his eyes snapped open as he looked around and heard a high pitched scream coming from close by that sounded slightly feminine.

His eyes turned a bit hard as he jumped out of the water and threw the spare clothes he had brought with him on before racing towards where the scream had come from.

Pushing past branches and shrubs he soon came across a clearing and saw a group of people in it, not wanting to risk it he stopped and hid in a nearby bush. Quickly he flashed through a set of three hand signs."Dragon persona transformation justu." He whispered as he used the jutsu that changed his appearance to his more publicly known self and peaked out to see what was going on.

In the clearing a group of large men holding weapons were surrounding a small figure with looks that disgusted him, he had seen looks like that before on some of the bandits that had tried to attack him and his mom but what truly caught his attention was the figure in between them.

In the middle of the group was a small girl no older then maybe twelve or thirteen, Her hair was a violet purplish color that was short but messy kind of similar to his own and was tied up almost like the stem of a pineapple in the back. Her eyes were a darkish brown color and were filled with fear of them men, she didn't seem to have much as far as clothing just a brown over shirt and tan skirt. She didn't look the healthiest either, she was thin and her body looked like she had taken a beating.

A burning rage appeared inside Naruto as he saw the group, he despised people like the men who only hurt others and did it for their own sick pleasure. Taking a breath he calmed himself before closing his eyes.

'Taka, i need you to send a message to mom. I found a group of bandits not to far from camp who are hurting someone and plan to keep them busy until she gets here.' He mentally said.

'Don't worry Naruto I'm on it.' A small voice replied, that was Taka Naruto's dragon familiar which his mom had summoned from Jigokuyama(1) the great home of the dragons to keep himself and allow him to use the dragon persona Jutsu.

With that done Naruto took a breath and stepped out of the bushes.

"Hey leave her alone!" He shouted at the bandits making them look at him and smirk.

"Well what do we got here, a little punk trying to play here." One of them sneered as the others laughed.

"What should we do with him jikobo." Another asked.

"I say we gut him quick and then take the girl back to the boss." The third said and the others laughed and nodded in agreement.

"Well kid looks like it's your unlucky day." The leader of the group said and advanced on the kid.

Naruto growled and instinctively dropped into the opening kata for the dragon knight style before rushing forward and slamming a fist into the advancing bandits stomach making him cough and spit up some bile before falling back. Not giving his attackers a chance retaliate he rushed forward and drove his fists in a series of punches into the second largest stomach before using him as a spring board and kicked the other in the face surprisingly hard enough to knock him cold.

'You little SHIT!" One yelled trying to cut him with his sword, naruto moved out of the way of each slash and round house kicked him in the face before turning his sights to the last one still standing.

The bandit looked terrified and turned to run away only to be slashed in half by Mira with odachi in hand."Nice work sweetie, you handled that quite well." She said.

He smiled big again before remembering the girl and ran over to her.

"Hey are you ok." He asked stopping in-front of her.

The girl didn't know what to say, one minute she had been scared for her life at what the bandits prepared to do to her when the next thing she known this black haired boy had come out of no where and faced down the bandits bringing them down one by one and saving her. She looked into his mismatched eyes and felt a small stir in her chest that she couldn't identify.

"Yeah, yeah I'm ok just some scrapes and bruises." She told him before noticing the lady walk over to them.

"It's dangerous to be out here all by yourself, your parents must be worried sick." Mira said making the girl look down sadly.

"I don't have any parents, they died when i was a baby." She told her sadly.

Unable to stop Mira crouched down and gave the girl a much needed hug which she returned.

"What's your name sweetie." Mira asked in her mother voice that seemed to ease the girl.

"Anko, my name is Anko Mitarashi." Anko told Mira.

"So what is it that your doing out here." Mira asked.

Anko looked down again and began to tell them the tale of her sensei Orochimaru and how he had abandoned her after using her in an experiment for his cursed seal of heaven. By the end of it Mira was fuming with the urge to find the pale bastard and make herself a pair of snake skin boot. Calming herself she looked at anko and smiled again.

"Come on anko, why don't you come back to camp with us and have something to eat." Mira said, anko looked up at her hopefully and nodded.

"Oh and before i forget, my name is Mira kuroitori and this is my son naruto." Mira said and Naruto smiled and dropped the henge shocking Anko but decided to wait till they were safe to ask questions, with that done the trio left back for the camp.

Later on in the day as the sun began to grow lower in the sky Naruto, Mira and Anko all sat around a fire having just finished lunch and Naruto told his story to the purple haired girl. To say she was shocked and outraged was an understatement as Anko ranted about it for a good ten minutes afterwards.

"So what do we do now." Anko asked looking at the mother and son.

"Well there are a few options regarding what you want to do, the first and simple is we can drop you off at a town that is not to far from here with some money so you can get some supplies and head back to the hidden leaf village." Mira said, Anko had told them she was a genin under orochimaru and the only reason she hadn't been able to fight today was because her chakra reserves were still exhausted from the curse mark she had received only two days prior but now were slowly recharging.

"What's the other options." Anko asked, she didn't feel like going back to the village yet.

"You can come with us." Naruto said happily confusing her.

"My son and i are on a training trip and have been for the last three years, if you want we still plan to stay out here for another three and we have enough supplies that if a third wanted to join us we wouldn't have much trouble." Mira offered.

Anko was stunned by the various generous offer that Mira was giving her and for a moment she was tempted to say yes, however her past with Orochimaru saying the same thing tainted these sort of offers for her and made her narrow her eyes a bit.

"And how do i know you won't just use me like that damn white snake did." She said in a tone with a slight edge to it.

"don't worry Anko my mom is really nice, she saved me from being alone and she could do the same for you." Naruto said placing a hand on her shoulder and made her look at him, she could see the truth in his eyes and after hearing his story about what she did for him Anko had no doubt the same treatment would be given to her.

"Ok but, is it alright if i train with you as well." She asked curiously, she wanted to get stronger and eventually kill Orochimaru and she was hoping that Mira could make her strong like she was doing with Naruto.

"Of course i can, you won't be able to sign the dragon contract however as you already have a contract with the snakes however the two species get along decently well so we shouldn't have any problems." Mira said making Anko almost jump for joy when she heard she could get trained like Naruto.

"Thank you so much, i promise i won't let you down." Anko said.

"Alright now you to lunch is over, its time to get back to work." Mira said standing.

"Right!" They both yelled jumping to their feet ready to begin.

Hours later after the sun had left the sky and the moon had come out Naruto, Anko and Mira were asleep around a small campfire warming them in the night.

The rest of the day had been hard for the two children of the group seeing how Naruto had begun using the weight training needed to move his Dragon Fist style up to the next level as well as begin to train with his elemental affinity which they had found out was a strong wind type so she had also given him the beginning exercise to hone wind elemental chakra.

Anko was fairing no better throughout the day as Mira made her show her all the jutsu's and Taijutsu stances that she could preform to get a grasp on the younger girl's power level. Once that was done like Naruto they had discovered her affinity for fire which made sense as during the training Anko's normal slightly sadistic personality had begun to return which Mira found slightly amusing and Naruto scary, once it was discovered she gave her the basic fire exercise.

Naruto rolled over in his sleep bag and gave a yawn as he slowly woke up, the call of nature was yelling in his ears as he sat up to go to the bathroom. Getting out of his sleeping bag he went to a nearby tree and did his business before hearing some rustles in the bushes.

"Who's there." He said semi loud not wanting to wake up his mom and Anko incase it was a simple squirrel, still he did slip into the dragon stances once again.

The rustles stopped and he looked around nervous like he was being watched and the air hung silent making him all the more tense.

Then everything burst to life as a loud series of yells was heard waking the girls, out of the bushes and trees came a whole horde of bandits that quickly surrounded them and wore victorious looks on their faces.

"Well look who it is." A bandit said which Naruto recognized as one of the bandits from earlier.

"That's them boss." Another yelled as a large man wearing fancy robes and fatter then a hippo stepped forward with a smug look.

"So your the trio who roughed up my boys earlier, well i can't be having that." The boss said making the others laugh as the he stepped forward and grabbed anko's chin.

"Why don't you punks make this easy on yourselves and just give up, well take you two women and put you to good use." He said making Anko growl and the bandits laugh harder, however that laugh slowly got smaller as the area around them was slowly building with killer intent.

The boss stumbled away from Anko as he was knocked away by Mira who had a deadly look in her eye and her odachi already drawn.

"You come into my camp, Threaten my son and his friend, wake my up from my sleep, and then have the balls to demand i give myself to you." She said in a slow even tone as the killer intent increased.

"Naruto, Anko the two of you stay here, I'm gonna have a chat with this trash." She said before flashing forward faster they anyone could see and sliced the boss in half with one swing.

After a stunned few moments the flood gates opened as every bandit moved to attack them, Mira danced through the ranks, hacking of limbs and heads and piercing anyone else with her sword.

Some of the bandits thought it would be smart to attack Anko and Naruto to try and get a bargaining chip on the lady that was cutting down their ranks like wheat, however this proved better on paper then in practice as the two defended themselves quite well with Anko using her striking shadow snakes and senbon needles which Naruto became a blur of fists of fury as he pushed his Taijutsu style to its limits and the limits of his body.

As the number dwindled down Naruto began to grow confident they would all make it out of this when he saw something out of the corner of his eye, Anko had her backed turned as she took down a bandit with her snakes and a second one was creeping up behind her with the intent to spear her through the gut with his sword. He didn't think he just reacted as he whipped a kunai out of his holster and threw it before he had time to think and blood flew through the air, he stood their choked as he saw the bandit choke with the kunai jammed in his neck and looked eyes with him for a second before he fell limp to the ground dead.

The last of the bandits had been cleaned up by his mother who turned and saw the scene, Naruto remained frozen for a few more seconds before his stomach churned and he rushed to the nearest bush and threw up. Mira appeared by his side and rubbed his back as he continued to throw up and tears leaked from his eyes.

"I killed him, i killed him and i did it in cold blood." Naruto said starting to break down before his mom pulled him into a tight hug.

"Look at me Naruto look at me." She said gently making him into her eyes."Yes you killed him but you did not do it in cold blood, it you hadn't then he would have killed Anko and then possibly you. I know it is a bad thing but we are shinobi Naruto and that means that there will be times when we have to kill. But, there is a reason we kill to protect are home, are friends, and are family and make sure people like them." She said pointing to the bandits."Don't not get a chance to hurt others." She said

He sniffed and seemed to calm down at her words, he knew being a shinobi meant he had to take a life at some point but he never figured it would be like this. Still his mother's words have stopped him from breaking down and made him calm down. He gave her a nod before resting his head on her shoulder.

"Anko are you ok." Naruto asked her just to be safe, he didn't want to see her hurt.

"Im fine Naruto i promise." she told him looking only a bit shaken from the attack, She had taken bandit lives before during her training with Orochimaru so something like this did't bug her as much.

"Come on you two lets pack up are things, well find a new camping spot for the night." Mira said having them roll up their sleeping bags, once everything was pack they set out on a quick run away from the scene of death.

The ran for twenty or so minutes until they found another small clearing and set up camp again, once everything was done they went back to sleep however for the rest of the night Naruto stayed closed to Anko as she slept, determined to keep his new friend safe from any harm that came at them on the road ahead.

Authors note.

Well here it is everyone next chapter.

I would like to give a big shout to to Bigjo21 who came up with the idea of Naruto being with a younger Anko for a crush and personally i like it since it's different.

Now two things i want to address, 1 i know in the show anko is in her Twenties and all that however this is my story so don't complain about that. 2 Naruto will be using that Henge jutsu to hide his looks, yes people have commented this may make him look OC but need i remind you he is the HOKAGE'S SON. if leaf shinobi see him like he normally is then they are going to bring him back in a heartbeat so in public he is Tenzo with the henge i just won't reply with tenzo when he talks.

Now a heads up i don't want to go straight back to konoha right after the last chapter so most likely there will be two or three more chapters of them out in the woods and training before we return, i promise these will not be boring since maybe we will be running into some familiar faces.

Till next time we meet like and review, PEACE.