Kimimaru couldn't believe what he was hearing. Here he was at death's door and his opponent, who he had been sent to kill by the way, was offering him the chance to live. The bone user looked up at Hell Naruto and stuttered out, "Why? Why are you offering this to me?"

Hell Naruto's eyes softened and he said, "I know that deep, dark pit you're in right now. I've been there before and I don't want anyone to have to be in that pit. Your eyes show me that you're a good person that I would love to call my friend. Don't let the fact that so far we've been enemies bother you. I don't take it personally since it was just business."

It was the absolute honesty and sincerity in Naruto's face that made up Kimimaru's mind. With his last breath before falling into a coma, the bone user whispered out, "I'll join you." Instantly, a blue astral figure jumped out of Hell Naruto and into Kimimaru. Hell Naruto fell to the ground next to Kimimaru as his ice mirrors shattered on the roof.

Naturally, all of the ninjas who had been anxiously watching the fight immediately moved in when they saw the ice mirrors shatter. They didn't know what had happened inside the ice dome. All they knew was that the mirrors had shattered and two people were lying on the roof tops. Deva Naruto quickly spotted the approaching ninjas and jumped in front of his other two bodies. He then shouted out, "Easy there. The situation has been taken care of."

Sarutobi quickly signaled for everyone to stay put and he then asked, "What do you mean that everything has been taken care of Naruto? Is the enemy dead?"

Naruto shook his head and replied, "Didn't need to kill him since the cold was going to do him in. He and I had a little chat inside the ice mirrors and now I've gained my human realm. Could you just take my bodies to a safe place where we can sleep off the effects of the merger? Assimilating Kimimaru's memories and removing that damn cursed seal of Orochimaru's at the same time is really exhausting."

The old Hokage was shocked to hear Naruto mention Orochimaru. After all, it had been years since anyone had mentioned Sarutobi's treasonous student by name in his presence. Deva Naruto then collapsed from exhaustion into Sarutobi's arms. All the Jonins watched as Sarutobi gently held Naruto close and started giving directions. "Pick up both boys and follow me to the hospital! Someone go get Naruto's doctor and tell her to get to the hospital ASAP. "

One of the Jonins blinked his eyes and questioningly said, "Uh sir? Why aren't we taking these two into custody? The prison has enough medical care to watch out for these two. We shouldn't endanger our people by letting unknowns into the hospital."

Sarutobi sent a withering glare at the Jonin and said, "Those unknowns are Naruto Uzumaki just as much as the person in my arms is Naruto Uzumaki. It's part of his bloodline. Now follow my orders and Yahiko, your on report for questioning my orders on this." Gai and Kakashi quickly moved in and picked up Naruto's human and hell bodies. They then followed the Hokage towards the hospital.


Deva Naruto opened his eyes about an hour after arriving at the hospital. He immeidatly looked around his room and spotted Sarutobi, Kakashi, and Doctor Mizuno waiting in the room. Doctor Mizuno walked up to Deva Naruto's bed, gave him a friendly smile, and said, "How are you feeling Naruto?"

The blonde smiled at the doctor and said, "I've got a bit of a headache, but otherwise I'm doing alright." As soon as he said that, Naruto woke up his other realms. Both of them were in beds perpendicular to the head of his bed. Naruto had both his Hell and Human bodies stretch. Human Naruto then said, "Man, the fusion really helps out. It feels so great to no longer have that damn illness."

Doctor Mizuno quickly put her stethoscope to Human Naruto's chest and carefully listened. After a few moments she withdrew the stethoscope and said, "Your breathing sounds fine and I can't detect anything more than a few dead viruses remaining in your lungs. However, I want you to keep this body here for overnight observation. You've never fused with an ill body that had also been under that cursed seal. Who knows what kinds of effects this might have with your bloodline."

Naturally, all three Narutos' started to whine. "But Miz, I'm fine. In fact, I'm three times healthier than any other ninja could possibly be!"

This wisecrack only earned Human Naruto a gentle bop on the head from Doctor Mizuno who replied, "You're also three times more likely to get ill Naruto. Now don't pout on me mister. I've got a little girl back home who's a whole lot cuter than you'll ever get to be and her pouts don't work. Just be grateful that I'm willing to consider the possibility of letting your other two bodies out tonight." Naruto almost immediately calmed down as he tried to be on his best behavior to get out of the hospital.

Sarutobi chose this time to approach Deva Naruto and the wise old man said, "Good job tonight Naruto. I can see that you have been training very hard. However, I would like to know who exactly your new realm was. Also, I would like to know why he was fighting you and how he got into the village. This is a serious breach of security that only can help us fix."

Deva Naruto frowned as he recalled Kimimaru's memories and then he spoke. "His name was Kimimaru Kaguya. He survived the Kaguya's assault on Kiri and that snake bastard Orochimaru found. After that, Kimimaru was raise as Orochimaru's right hand man. The snake sent him to kill me because the bastard wants the Rinnegan destroyed. A spy by the name of Kabuto Yakushi slipped Kimimaru through the village's defenses."

Instantly, Sarutobi was in full battle mode. There was a traitor in Konoha and if there was one thing that the old man had come to hate, it was traitors. Sarutobi snapped his fingers and almost instantly an ANBU appeared. The Hokage calmly said, "I want all available squads to capture Kabuto Yakushi. Also, bring the boy's parents in for questioning and have the Yakushi house search. If his parents are innocent, let them go. If they are part of this, press them for as much information as possible and then kill them."

Once the ANBU member had disappeared, Sarutobi turned around and saw the shocked looks in all of Naruto's faces. The old leader sighed and said, "I'm sorry you had to see that Naruto. Being Hokage is not nearly as great as it may seem. The position of Hokage means that you have to insure that the village is defended and things like what you just witness will come up. It is regrettable, but sometimes iron discipline is needed to protect everyone. The key when one has to use it is to remember to always hate it. That way, you will only use it when necessary."

Hell Naruto nodded his head showing that he understood what the Old Man was trying to tell him. Naruto didn't like what he had just seen Sarutobi do, since it was so at odds with the kind persona he was used to. However, the young ninja could understand the regrettable necessity. Suddenly a thought came to Naruto's mind and Human Naruto nervously said, "Uh Old Man? Is anything going to happen to me for merging with Kimimaru?"

Sarutobi put a comforting hand on Deva Naruto's shoulder and replied, "You've got nothing to worry about Naruto. As a Konoha ninja who was defending himself, all you have to do is write a report of everything you've learned from the encounter. Due to the intelligence wind all, you'll probably have to spend several days writing out everything Kimimaru knew about Orochimaru and other points of interest. It's not going to be fun, but consider it a taste of what I have to do everyday as Hokage."

The Hokage's voice then grew more solemn as he continued on. "Unfortunately, we will no longer be able to keep a lid on your abilities to add realms. The whole situation was simply too public to keep everything quiet. Tomorrow, I'm going to make a village wide announcement about your bloodline and explain the abilities it grants you. I won't go into too much detail because we don't really know too much about the Rinnegan. People will just know enough so that they don't go into a panic. Trust me; I've gotten a lot better with public relations over the past few years. The fact that the Rinnegan was originally wielded by the Rukodou Sennin will also help you out. Now get some rest Naruto, you've got a long day ahead of you."


Pandemonium was the one word could be used to describe Konoha the next day after the attempt at Naruto's life. There was some panic over the fact that the Rinnegan allowed Naruto to have several bodies. Luckily, the fact that this was the bloodline of the Rukodou Sennin was enough to calm people down so that Sarutobi could explain the special requirements that were needed in order for Naruto to fuse with someone. There were still a few people who reacted negatively to this aspect of Naruto's bloodline. However, most of the villagers adopted a more neutral stance due to the prestige Naruto would bring and having heard of weird bloodlines before.

As Sarutobi had been announcing this to the village, almost every ANBU in the village was busy cleaning out Sound's spies in Konoha. There weren't too many spies, but a lot of them were in critical points that allowed Orochimaru to know all he needed to know about Konoha. Also, concrete proof that ROOT was still in existence allowed Sarutobi to have Danzo killed. The old Hokage had known that Danzo was ambitious for years, but had simply considered Danzo to be an annoying irritant. However, the man had been trying to establish himself as the shadow leader of the village and that was unforgivable. Over the next several weeks most of the former ROOT members would be entered back into the regular Konoha forces.

While all of this was happening, Naruto was sitting inside Konoha Intelligence headquarters filling reports. All three of his realms were out in a desperate attempt to get the information Kimimaru possessed into Intelligence's hands ASAP. Naruto really didn't want to spend his day filling out report after report. However, he was the only one who knew Oto's intelligence codes, base locations, and all that other good stuff that Konoha would need if the village went to war with Oto. At one point, Naruto had complained that a good chuck of this information would probably be useless in a few days once Orochimaru heard about Kimimaru's failure. Unfortunately for Naruto, he told to double his efforts so that it could be more useful.

Naruto was finally released from Konoha Intelligence at 6 in the evening when the Jonin in charge of intelligence decided that Naruto had been pumped dry of any useful information. The weary blond genin walked down the streets to Ichiraku Ramen not even noticing the respect in the villagers' eyes as he passed by. When Naruto got to Ichiraku's, he simply hauled himself up on a barstool and said, "An order of Miso Ramen please."

Ayame was covering for her father and she immediately glanced over to where Naruto was sitting. Normally, Naruto's order wouldn't even cause her to look up. However, Naruto's voice was weary and slightly depressed, instead of his usual hyper and chipper attitude. She quickly filled up a bowel for Naruto and then asked as she was placing the bowel down, "What's wrong Naruto? Did something bad happen?"

Looking up at Ayame, Naruto gave a weak smile and said, "Just got back from Konoha Intelligence. I've spent the last ten hours filling out reports for them on Oto. Some of the questions they were asking me were just plain ridiculous. Why should it matter whether Oto uses pork or beef in their mystery meat? They don't import any food from Fire Country or any other country for that matter."

That was something that Ayame could understand. As restaurant owners, she and her father had to deal with bimonthly inspections of their restaurant and had to insure that all of their ingredients could be properly tracked back the farms that grew them. It was a bureaucratic headache that all restaurant owners in Konoha grudgingly accepted. There was just too much risk of food being poisoned otherwise.

Wanting to change to more pleasant topics, Ayame suddenly asked, "So Naruto, what do your other bodies look like? I've been hearing about them all day from the grapevine, but no one's said what your other forms look like. Well, they mentioned that your other bodies have the Rinnegan, but that's it."

Naruto stopped eating his ramen and thought about Ayame's request. On the one hand, Naruto was a little leery about showing his other realms in public so soon after Sarutobi's announcement. But on the other hand, Ayame was a friend who was curious about what he could do. Eventually, Naruto's desire to show how much he had improved won out. The blond bloodline ninja quickly got off of his stool and calmly said, "Summoning, come forth from the Bardo: All." The typical ninja smoke filled the small restaurant. When it cleared, Human Naruto and Hell Naruto were standing on ether side of Deva Naruto.

Ayame, and all the nearby villagers, were a little surprised to see the other two Narutos. However, Human Naruto quickly gave Ayame his trademark grin and said, "So what do you think?" This simple gesture quickly convinced the nearby villagers that Naruto was still Naruto even though he had more bodies. Naruto would never realize it, but this simple event helped stop any hostile undercurrents among the villagers over his multiple bodies.


Sarutobi looked at the assembled genin instructors and calmly said, "As many of you know, the Chunin Exams will be taking place next month. Konoha was slatted to be the host of the exams this time. However, the breakup of the Oto spy ring in the village has caused the Fire Daimyo to petition the International Chunin Exam Committee to hold the exam somewhere else this time." Several people started murmuring and complaining about this move. This wasn't too surprising since the petition would be a blow to Konoha's prestige and in the harsh ninja market, prestige was vital.

The old Hokage sent a withering glare at the loudest Jonins and continued on. "Personally, I have to agree with the Fire Daimyo. Oto's former spy ring represented a massive breach of village security. How can we claim to keep all of the daimyo's safe when several vital areas of village security were compromised? Obviously, we can't make that claim. Today I received the ICEC's decision, and the exams next month will be held in Kumo since they are next in the rotation. Also, Konoha will be provisionally granted Kumo's slot in the rotation; provided that we have improved village security. Failure to meet the ICEC's standards of village security will cause Konoha to be prohibited from hosting the exams this cycle."

Hearing the ICEC's decision caused even the hottest headed Jonin in the meeting to become serious. Whether they wanted to admit it or not, Konoha had really dropped the ball when it came to village security and now they were paying for it. Luckily, the village still had the chance to avoid the damage that being dropped from the exam cycle would have caused, but the village would have to eat humble pie for a few months. Hopefully, a resounding success at the exams would erase part of the village's new black mark.

Sarutobi pulled out his pipe and calmly smoked it as he jonins were thinking everything through. He then put down the pipe and said, "Normally, I would ask you team leaders if you want to recommend your teams for the exams. However, I am changing things do to the situation the village finds itself in. We need all for all of our teams to tournament winning teams and we can't send many teams. Therefore, each of you will get to recommend one and only one genin for the exams. Once the list of recommended genin is compiled, I will temporarily assign those genin new teams for the exams. They will then be taken off the mission roster so they can concentrate on training. Now, I would like the names of the recommended genin."

Kakashi was torn by the Hokage's decision. What was he supposed to do? Part of him toyed with the idea of not recommending anyone from his team and claiming that they were too green. However, the Cyclops knew that he needed to recommend someone to help the village recover its prestige. Sakura barely earned a passing thought in Kakashi's decision. She was still only an average ninja without a bloodline or famous name to grab the customers. One day she'd have her chance at the spotlight, but not today.

That still left Kakashi with having to choose either Naruto or Sasuke as his recommendation. Both boys deserved the chance to become a chunin and both had a lot going for them. Sasuke was prodigy with the Sharingan and the Uchiha name. All three of those would defiantly catch the daimyos eyes. Naruto was incredibly adaptable, completely unpredictable, and currently wielded three powerful bloodlines. The multiple bloodlines and the fact that one of those bloodlines was the legendary Rinnegan would more than make up for the lack of an Uzumaki clan name. Simply put, Kakashi couldn't make up his mind.

Sarutobi had conveniently skipped over asking Kakashi for his recommendation at the moment. No one complained about this since they all knew the quandary that Kakashi had found himself in. Unfortunately, all the other Jonins had announced their decisions leaving everyone looking at Kakashi. Several Jonins thought about making the suggestion that both boys be sent to the exams. However, worries of their friends complaining about favoritism made those Jonin keep this idea to themselves.

Eventually, Sarutobi decided that enough was enough and took the decision out of Kakashi's hands. In a wise manner he said, "We all know that Naruto Uzumaki and Sasuke Uchiha of Team 7 both bring tremendous benefits to the exams. Kakashi's hesitation to name either boy is understandable given the situation. Which one will bring in the most prestige for Konoha is hard to say. However, no village has tried to assassinate Sasuke and Orochimaru was willing to risk everything he had in our village in the attempt to take out Naruto. There is also the fact that the Water Daimyo will be attending Kumo's exam and Naruto possesses two bloodlines from his lands. While we don't own Water anything, the daimyo could raise a fuss over this at the moment that will hurt our customer base. Therefore, the young Uchiha will be Team 7's representative in the exams."


The next day Team 7's usual training field was rocked by the yell, "Dance of the Clematis: Flower!" The bolder that Human Naruto was standing in front of was quickly cracked by the ferocity of the attack. Kakashi had announced that Sasuke would be going to Chunin Exams and Naruto needed to let out some steam. Intellectually, he could understand why the bastard got to go instead of him. However, understanding something and accepting it were two totally different things. Naruto had worked his butt off since day one to advance and now he was being denied the chance to show he hard won skills because of some prejudicial daimyo in another country.

Sakura walked into the clearing and watched Human Naruto as he proceeded to pulverize the medium sized boulder. It shocked her to see Naruto going after the boulder like that since part of her still thought of him as the goofy boy in school. She had noticed the frustration in his eyes a few minutes ago after Kakashi had made the announcement and had decided to check up on him. For a second, Sakura thought that Naruto had swapped out his Deva body for his Human body. However, this assumption was quickly disproven when the rock shards were blasted to the west. The only jutsu Naruto had that could do something like that was his divine judgment from the Deva body.

Knowing that the Deva Realm had to around somewhere, Sakura started looking around. She quickly spotted that Naruto reclining on a tree limb with a slightly depressed aura about him. This situation just didn't seem right to the female member of Team 7. Sasuke was supposed to be the one with the gloomy, bad boy mystic and Naruto was supposed to be the cheerful and friendly, if slightly clueless, guy. A gloomy Naruto was just as natural as an emo clown. In other words, Naruto shouldn't be down and out like he was. This situation needed to be changed ASAP.

However, Sakura didn't have the first clue on just how she was going to pull Naruto out of this situation. Agreeing to go on a date with him probably would snap Naruto right back to his usual self. But, Sakura didn't want to go out with Naruto; he was still a little too annoying to be datable. Eventually, she decided to simply wing it and hope that something would come up to snap Naruto back to his usual self. Sakura therefore walked up to the tree Deva Naruto was reclining in and asked, "So Naruto, how are you coming in mastering three fields of vision?"

Naruto couldn't pass up a chance to talk with Sakura, even though he was annoyed with the Old Man. He quickly had his Human body walk into the clearance and say, "What do you think Sakura? The hard part is getting used to double vision from the first body. Since I mastered that, adding another field of vision was a piece of cake." Deva Naruto gave the object of his affections a grin and said, "It sure makes sparing with myself easier now that I can look at the spar from another angle and see the mistakes that I'm making."

Sakura nodded her head and couldn't help being amazed at Naruto's newest bout of intelligence. Naruto was still Naruto, but Kimimaru's experiences seemed to help sand out some of Naruto's ruff edges allowing his intelligence to show more. Before the Rinnegan, Naruto wouldn't have thought of finding his flaws like that. Sakura didn't want to admit it, but seeing Naruto's intelligence made the thought of going out on a date a little less revolting. The two genin then started talking about various training plans never realizing the subtle changes in their stances with each other.


Team 7, minus Sasuke who was off training for the exams, walked into Hokage Tower and headed to the mission desks. Once there, Kakashi looked at the chunin at the desk and said, "Team 7 requesting a mission."

The chunin didn't even bother to look up as he pulled out the D rank mission folder and said, "We have a few missions available. The memorial park needs to be cleaned up, a shipment of manure needs to be delivered to the Yamanaka flower shop, and the sewers need to be examined for cracks in the sealing. So, which mission do you want to do sir?"

Kakashi immediately felt the killing intent seeping off of Naruto and Sakura. Not that he blamed them, given those options for missions. So to defuse the situation Kakashi said, "Uh, are there any C Rank missions that we could do?"

Sadly, this Chunin was a completely by the book kind of person and he rudely rejected Kakashi's request, "Absolutely not! Regulations clearly state that genin teams are not to go on C Rank missions unless they have a full team." Kakashi was about to try and reason with the desk jockey when Naruto decided to take over the negotiations. He quickly summoned his other two realms and had those bodies appear around the chunin's desk. This was then followed by a directed blast of killing intent from all three realms. The killing intent wasn't enough to alert the guards, but it was enough to tell the chunin that it would be a good idea for him if he were to forget certain regulations. In a slightly shaky manner, the chunin pulled out the C Rank folder and said, "We've got the mayor of a small village requesting a group of ninja to take care of a small bandit problem. Do you accept the mission?"

Kakashi nodded his head and gratefully accepted the mission folder and signaled for Naruto and Sakura to follow him. Naruto paused for a second to send his Human and Hell realms back to the Bardo and then caught up with the other two. Meanwhile, Kakashi was glancing at the mission report to make sure everything was correct. He then turned to face his two students and said, "Alright you two, this mission is a basic smoke them mission. We're going to head to this village, locate the bandit camp, and kill as many bandits as we can until there are no more bandits or they flee the area. This is a fairly typical mission from the small villages off of the main roads."

Sakura lightly bit her lower lip and asked, "Uh Kakashi sensei? How many bandits are we going to be facing?" Even with her increased training, Sakura was very worried about her combat abilities. She just hadn't found a fighting style that was hers yet.

The former ANBU captain understood Sakura's nervousness and he reassuringly said, "Don't worry about the bandits too much Sakura. Backwoods bandit groups like we're going to be facing rarely have more than five or six members. These groups usually have little combat training and rely on intimidation to secure loot from the farmers. Trade in those areas just can't support larger and better trained bandit groups. Nevertheless, you must not underestimate these bandits. We loose two or three genin every year to bandits because those ninjas disregarded the bandits as a threat. However, I don't have to worry about something like that happening since I know you and Naruto are more intelligent than that."

Naruto was quietly standing by as Kakashi gave his impromptu lecture which surprised several of the observing chunin. The boy's rants in the mission room about missions before Wave were still quite infamous to those who regularly worked in the room. Seeing Naruto acting fairly calm while Kakashi talked about the mission simply drove home to those people that Naruto wasn't the brash loser he had been before. The boy then showed off his intelligence by asking, "How long is this mission going to be and how much equipment should we pack? Also, is there anything in the area that we should watch out for?"

Kakashi gave one of his eye smiles and replied, "Good questions Naruto. It will take us about four days to get to the village, so only pack a week's worth of food. We can restock our food supplies in the village after the mission before heading home. As for equipment, standard mission equipment is acceptable. Also, there isn't anything in the area to really worry about. It's simple farmland that some ruffians have moved in on." Unfortunately for Team 7, they would soon learn to never stop looking underneath the underneath.