AN: So… third chapter, I probably said I'd be taking some time off, but I lied. Without further ado
"Normal" Spoken word
"Italics" Thoughts/writing
"Bold" Non human speech
"Bold italics" Non human thoughts
"Bold underline" Colossi
Slaying Mountains
He awoke with a terrible feeling in the pit of his stomach, realizing somehow that he'd been returned to the shrine. Ninja senses, not at all dulled from the loss of chakra, he noticed a figure standing over him. Pulling out a kunai as he rolled over, he looked his would-be foe in the face.
"What the!?"
Naruto exclaimed sluggishly, still tired from his earlier experience. The figure standing over him just… fell.
It fell into his stomach, he was going to freak out when he felt a rumble, the first statue glowed from an inner light and just imploded.
He walked over to the altar to and looking at Yoi strengthened his resolve.
"Thy next foe is in the seaside cave. It moves slowly… Raise thy courage to defeat it"
"This might work after all." He thought, completely forgetting about the events with the black figure.
However, his body was strange to him, he shook, and when he climbed into the saddle, his fingers fumbled and lost their grip, it wasn't until he felt the warmth of daylight beating down upon him that he noticed that he was outside. Shaking his head in a vain effort to rouse himself from his stupor, he raised his sword to the sky, and took off riding where the light took him.
While Naruto was off on his great journey of acceptance, loss and trial. Sakura was training. She didn't want to look at anyone's back anymore.
But currently she was blocked; she'd reached a 'plateau' of sorts, she just wasn't advancing in her training, and after nearly three weeks, it had started to worry her.
Tsunade-sama told her, that it occasionally happened to all shinobi, and that she had to either wait it out, or diversify herself in hopes of advancing somewhere else.
She was also worried about Naruto, one year had come and gone, but there was still no sign of Konoha's number one surprising ninja. She sighed, and decided to once again try to pass the trial that was the door to Naruto's apartment.
About three days after his departure, she'd tried to enter Naruto's apartment. Sakura had gone to the building where she knew he lived, and asked his landlord which apartment was his. The elderly man had smiled kindly at her, and led her up three flights of stairs to a wall with the numbers "313" carved into it and the Konoha leaf symbol below the room number.
There was no door, and the landlord had said, that the whole apartment had just disappeared. The windows weren't even on the outside of the apartment anymore.
He'd left he staring confusedly at the wall trying to figure out, what underneath the underneath meant to Naruto.
After figuring out the obvious solution to the puzzle, if you could call it that, The pink haired girl had pressed Naruto's discarded headband, metal side facing her, against the door. She hadn't really expected anything to happen; she hadn't expected the door to reappear in a puff of smoke. Dark mahogany with a slight covering of red chakra, Naruto's door cut an imposing figure in the bland hallway. She tried to push open the door, but when she placed her hand on the door-knob, in her head she heard Naruto's voice and a foreign one superimposed on top of each other "you're not ready" and the door, was gone.
Since that day, she hadn't been back to that place; she tried to avoid the building if at all possible.
But today, she was returning to that dreadful hallway that filled her with so much anxiety, to challenge that imposing door that, while imposing, filled her with so much familiar warmth.
So there she stood. Gathering her courage, Sakura reached into the supply pouch that rested on her right hip to pull forth the worn headband that had protected two foreheads, one an experienced Chunin and one a Genin that had been through so much more that many full fledged ninja before him. It had sat, lonely and unused in drawer since that dreadful fateful day almost a year and a half ago.
The Hokage's apprentice placed the hitai-ate, metal facing her, on the wall, triggering once again the appearance of that despised door that had caused her advance so far in her training.
Sakura took a deep breath, and placed her hand on the doorknob…
And felt no resistance she turned it, and stepped into what seemed to be Naruto's apartment with no furniture or amenities at all. It was, for lack of a better word, strange. The whole apartment, if you could call it such, seemed to be buzzing with chakra. The room was completely bare save for the picture of team 7 taken so long ago, still in its frame, sitting on the floor in the center of the apartment.
Puzzled, Sakura walked several steps to the picture, keeping the headband that was a key in her hand.
When the bubblegum haired girl reached for the photograph, her hand phased through it as it disappeared, leaving the Konoha symbol once again, this time glowing faintly and as through a mirror.
She grinned and placed the headband down on the floor so that the symbols matched up.
Nothing happened
Her face fell
"Underneath the underneath huh?"
Sakura decided to pump some chakra through the hitai-ate
Almost before she did it, a giant sealing array bloomed from beneath her hands. Glowing with purple chakra and made up of spirals, the whole thing screamed 'Naruto'… well if only it was orange.
Looking around, she felt her eyes drawn to the ceiling, where writing started to appear
"Sakura-chan, I'm glad you made it. In a few moments you should hear a sound, sort of like a door being unlocked, after that we should be able to speak freely."
Sakura hunkered down to wait.
Slaying Mountains
After about five hours of running on Kinaga's part, and jostling contemplation on Naruto's, the blond wanderer felt a tugging sensation on his mind.
His eyes widened when he realized what was going on.
"Break time kinaga, I'm being paged"
The horse 'said' "Sure kid, try to pull yourself together" and slowed down so that Naruto could dismount.
Naruto settled down, pressing his back against a tree and unzipping his jacket. With his eyes closed, he prepared to enter his head.
Minutes later, the mountain slayer was subjected to that unfamiliar yet expected feeling of submersion.
Calmer this time around, he noticed something behind him. A white light and a feeling of… Anguish?
Resolving to check on it later, he headed the opposite direction to find a ladder leading to a trap door in the ceiling, he opened it and swam upward to that room.
Slaying Mountains
Sakura hadn't been waiting long, about five minutes, when she heard a loud "click" like a key being turned in a lock. The room started to glow white with more and more intensity until the walls, floor and ceiling were all indistinguishable, just white that seemed to go on forever, she would have thought it did, except for the sealing array was still there and gave her an impression of the dimensions of the room.
She felt another presence and looked up just in time to hear
"Hey… Sakura-chan"
AN: Really short this time. yeah so this is part one of a two part update, the next one might be out tomorrow, depends on inspiration. Quick note, I'm kind of sick of not getting any reviews and what not, it drains my creativity when I don't get any you know?
Another note, you'll probably see more of Sakura later, since she'll be important, but don't worry, she's by no means the main character. Oh yeah, has anyone figured out what's wrong with Naruto yet? I tried to make the problem there without laying it on too thick; do you think I did alright with it? Oh if you do notice something wrong with him, review and tell me what you think it is, it's probably not what you think.