A/N: Hello, please review! And does anyone know a site where I can find a list of jutsus with Japanese names?
And I probably won't ever call shinobi ninjas. They don't wear guis or black, their idea of an "assassination technique" is to slowly make a blob of brightly colored energy around their hand, loudly call out the technique's name as it makes rather loud noises on its own, and then shove it through a person's chest. Those who attack from behind (no honor!) and actually use the tricks of the trade to try and kill people are "dishonorable bad ninjas." Yeah. What are they, samurai? Honor? Pssh. Ninjas are ninjas. And one of their strongest wears a FREAKIN' ORANGE JUMPSUIT!
I don't own Naruto. Seriously. Who told you I did?
Uzumaki Naruto found himself in a small village in the south of Fire Country, doing odd jobs and steadily journeying west. His map showed it to be the nearest shinobi nation and Suna was supposed to be allied to Konoha, which made it not a betrayal in Naruto's weird little mind.
As he continued on his meandering path, he trained almost every day to become stronger, with kage bunshins running up trees and trying to balance on water and the original body did push-ups and sit-ups in the quiet moonlight. He had put on a good bit of muscle since Wave Country; constant exercise and eating food other than ramen- well, when he could get food- and fighting off the occasional bandit kept him in good shape. His hitai-ate was long since stashed away; it wouldn't do to be immediately recognized as a Leaf-nin. He had discarded the orange jacket, shredded from one too many fights; but the swirl patterns on the shoulders he had kept, as something deep down inside him knew that they were special. He had found something to cover up those whisker marks on his cheeks, and altogether Uzumaki Naruto, wandering orphan, was an almost completely different person from Uzumaki Naruto, future Hokage-to-be of Konohagakure, the Ninja Village Hidden in the Leaves.
The man he was taking a job for, a retired shinobi, kept giving him strange looks as he organized the massive pile of shiny pointy weaponry into crates and boxes for sale. Kunai over here, shuriken over here, windmill shuriken farther over there, massive unknown object in the "unknowns"
bin, la de da...
After several hours of the man staring strangely at the young boy (somewhere in a hidden underground lair, Orochimaru sneezed) while he sorted weapons, Naruto became fed up with the staring.
"Okay, what are you staring at?"
"Hm? Oh, it talks. You remind of a student Jiraiya-sama once brought through here on a training trip. His hair was the same color as yours, and the same facial structure, too. His name was Minato something. Just thinking, he'd be about old enough to be your mother- I mean father. Whoops. Henge techniques + boys with girly hair = screw me up. What's your father's name, kid?"
"I don't know who my father is. I'm an orphan, remember?"
"Oh yeah, no one with a family takes my jobs. Whoops. Well it seems you're done, so here are your ryo." The strange man handed Naruto a wad of cash and a scroll. Naruto gave the man a strange look. "What's the scroll for?"
"Inside this little scroll is a suitcase of clothes for you. Before you ask how it could possibly fit, it is a shinobi art called sealing..." and as the old man prattled on with his eyes closed and his finger in the air, Naruto easily unsealed the suitcase and was looking through the clothes, isolated phrases of the lecture being given to him floating through but mainly being blocked out. "chakra is the force which..." "handsigns allow you to mould chakra by..." Finally Naruto, having looked through all the clothes, raised a question. "Mister, why did you give me desert clothes?" The ex-shinobi stopped lecturing and opened his eyes to see Naruto having unsealed the suitcase and seen all its contents, judging by how half of them were hanging out of suitcase or were on the floor.
"Whoops." he said, his finger still in the air from his forgotten lecture. Then an almost predatory glint came into his eyes as he looked at Naruto. "You can use chakra?"
"Umm... yeah?"
"Where did you learn? Where where where?"
"Umm.." Naruto thought furiously at this point. "I was helping a genin team that passed through and their sensei showed me! Believe it!"
This appeared to satisfy him for a second, but then he fished around in his vest until he pulled out a square of paper. "This paper... is chakra paper. It is grown from specially treated trees and is used to detect elemental affinities. Before you ask, I shall enlighten you. There are five elements. Fire, Wind, Water, Earth, and Lightning, and a person has a main affinity to one of these elements which makes it easier to use that kind of jutsus." He handed the paper to Naruto, who looked at the man quizzically.
"Go on, go on! Put your chakra in it!"
"Okay mister..." Naruto channeled his chakra into the offending piece of paper, which immediately split cleanly in two. Naruto grinned. That paper had deserved it.
"A Wind type? Most rare, most rare, a gem in these parts." Suddenly the man was on his knees before him clasping Naruto's hands and looking at him with starry eyes.
"Become my apprentice! I shall teach you the way of the shinobi!"
Naruto hurriedly removed his hands from the strange man's grasp and politely but forcefully refused, having to do this several times before he got his point across.
"If you cannot become my apprentice, at least take these scrolls. They contain tips on chakra control and several wind jutsus."
"Okaythanksbye!"
Naruto sprinted away from the very strange man with his wad of cash in one hand and three scrolls in the other hand.
"What the hell was that?"
Sasuke threw a handful of shuriken before charging in. Sakura, his sparring partner, blocked the three with a kunai before engaging Sasuke in a taijutsu match. Uppercut- blocked. Sakura's roundhouse kick was caught and Sasuke threw her over his shoulder and as Sakura turned upon landing she saw him weaving handsigns. Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu! (Fire Release:Great Fireball Technique!) Sasuke spewed out a massive fireball. Sakura, knowing little but the Academy jutsus, kawarimi'ed with a convenient log. Sasuke, landing and seeing a merrily burning log, started developing a twitch. Where do all these convenient logs come from? Do they pull them out of trees or something? His thoughts were cut short by a Sakura jumping out of a tree with a kunai. Sasuke blurred up underneath her and punched her in the stomach, effectively ending the spar.
"Good job Sakura. You've gotten a lot stronger since Wave."
"I still have a long way to go to catch up to you and Naruto. We need to get stronger so we can bring him back."
"Hn."
Kakashi watched from his hiding-place in a tree, eye-smiling as he watched his two remaining pupils.