Before you all continue reading, I would appreciate it if you read this upper part first. Firstly, I would like to thank RedFoxx and ShulkXMelia23 for pointing out that the previous chapter felt rushed and weak as hell. It has been revamped and posted. Something that I feel I need to point out is that what I am writing is about an arc and a half further than what is being posted, and I believe that Ch. 5 was written between the publishing of Ch. 1 and 2. It wasn't rushed writing, it was lazy and incompetent writing on my part.
Secondly, if you, reader, new or old, have criticism or feedback for me, tell me for God's sake. The comments given to me by Red and Shulk gave me the push necessary to fix the most pressing issues in Ch. 5. As of this chapter's release, 5 has been updated for the past hour or two, maybe longer, depending on when I finish this A/N.
Now, I will reply to the reviews, not including the parts that talked about the quality of Ch. 5, considering the previous paragraphs are basically an extended reply and apology towards that.
RedFoxx: About the Sasuke Retrieval Arc and Naruto vs. Nagato: I expect to follow the general trajectory of canon. Despite the various gripes that can be made with Kishimoto, I honestly feel that he is 10/10 as a storyteller in the grand scope of things. Naruto vs. Pein and Naruto vs. Sasuke are two of my favorite fights, and I hope to do them justice.
ShulkXMelia23: Oh boy. I love your reviews, but they're generally tough to unpack due to their length, so I'll do my best to touch on every point. Sasuke vs. Rock Lee: I definitely understand the significance of the fight, but I won't be showing it from Sasuke or Lee's perspective, rather from Naruto's, albeit in a slightly detached manner. Sasuke vs. Orochimaru: I'll be honest, my original draft of that fight is similar in quality and length to Team 7 vs Zabuza in OG Ch 5. It won't be like that when it is released. You have a keen eye on where Naruto and Tenten's relations could go. Keep that. Also, please don't feel guilty about reviewing: I love reading your feedback and thoughts, even if they do take a hot minute to unpack, and another hot minute for readers to read my response. They have a lot of value.
.puentes: Hola, gracias por la crítica. Puedo decir que la reacción de Naruto al darse cuenta para quién trabaja Konan es un punto de trama importante y definido para Pre-Shippuden. Cuando lleguemos a eso, espero que mis escritos sean satisfactorios. Desgraciadamente, no puedo hablar español, así que esto está siendo traducido por mi buen amigo Google. Espero que Google no arruine esta traducción.
With that, dear readers, please take this chapter as both a gift in thanks for your support, and a way to advertise the fact that Ch. 5 is no longer a trash-tier piece of writing. Enjoy!
Naruto talked about his mission in his next communication with his secret sensei, but never received a response. Soon, days of no response became weeks, weeks became months, and before long, Kakashi had nominated his team for the Chunin exams.
As Naruto walked down the street, he came across the Sandaime's grandson, being held by a man in a black costume of some kind, with purple face paint.
As Naruto approached the scene, he realized that the 'man' was only a year or so older than him, with a bandaged package on his back. Behind him was a young woman wearing foreign-looking clothing, with a large fan strapped to her back.
"Excuse me," Said Naruto, a fake smile plastered to his face, "what do you think you're doing with the Sandaime's grandson?" While Naruto knew that Konohamaru didn't like being defined by his relation to the old man, and Konohamaru knew Naruto didn't see him that way, his status as 'honorable grandson' had some uses from time to time.
"You idiot, Kankuro! Release him now!" Kankuro dropped Konohamaru, who with his friends huddled behind Naruto, using the blonde for protection.
"Thank you." Said Naruto genuinely. "May I assume you are here for the Chunin exams?" The girl nodded.
"Yeah, we're genin of Sunagakure. What's your name?" Naruto smiled.
"Please call me Naruto. I should end up seeing you during the exams, miss…?"
"Temari, and this is Kankuro." She said, gesturing towards the cat man.
"A pleasure. I must admit, I thought all teams were three-man, even outside Konoha. I've never heard of a two-man team before…"
"That's because there isn't one." Said a gravelly voice above and behind Naruto. Looking around, he saw a red-haired boy with a large gourd on his back, green eyes with shadows surrounding them, with the kanji for love below his hairline. The boy jumped down and looked at his teammates.
"Kankuro, Temari, don't mess around, or I'll kill you." The boy's teammates shuddered, and the shaking of the children grew more pronounced.
"Maa maa, shinobi-san." Said Naruto in a placating manner, "Your teammates have done nothing wrong. We were just having a nice little pre-exam chat." The boy looked at Naruto.
"I'll make sure you squeal during the exam, and prove my existence." Naruto frowned. "I'd rather you didn't, shinobi-san. What's your name?"
"I am Sabaku no Gaara. What is yours, smiley?" Naruto's smile grew even more, just to infuriate the redhead a little more.
"I'm Uzumaki Naruto. Nice to meet you, Gaara. Now, I'd love to stay and talk some more, but I have to walk these three," Naruto gestured to the kids still huddled behind him, "to the ramen stand. I promised I'd spend a meal with them. Let's do our best in the exams." With that, Naruto walked off with the Konohamaru Corps in tow.
"But Naruto-niisan, you didn't promise us ramen…" Said Moegi.
"You're right, but I figured I should have a word with you three about running into foreign shinobi like that. I might not be around next time." Said Naruto.
"Yeah yeah, I get that." Said Konohamaru, looking much less scared than before. "That cat man is such a weirdo, isn't he? Why would anyone want to hang around a hentai like that?" Naruto chuckled.
"You seem a lot more confident now that he isn't holding you by your shirt, eh Kono?" Naruto, Moegi, and Udon laughed as Konohamaru blushed and looked down. Naruto patted his disciple on the shoulder.
"Don't worry too much, Kono. You guys will be a genin like me in only a few years, and I'm sure whoever your sensei is will help you become wonderful shinobi." Naruto smiled good-naturedly at his young followers. He came into contact with them through Konohamaru, who gravitated towards the blonde who recognized him for himself, rather than the shadow of the Sandaime that loomed over him.
"What if you became our sensei, Naruto-nii?" Asked Udon. Naruto laughed once more as he sat down with the kids.
"For that to happen, I'd have to become a jonin in what, three years or thereabouts? And even then, Jiji would probably put you with someone more tried and true, maybe even that Ebisu fellow." Said Naruto, winking at Konohamaru, whose expression showed the utmost horror at the prospect of someone who only referred to him by his honorary title.
"Please do it, boss. I don't want that guy as my sensei." Said Konohamaru, with a deflated manner. Naruto shrugged and the kids dug in, all the while, Naruto wondered about who else had been watching his encounter with the Suna-nin. He had felt multiple stares on him, but hadn't had a real opportunity to look around for his observers without alerting them. Little did he know, seven others had watched him: three who were assigned to kill his teammate, three who were assigned to monitor him, and one who watched the situation with surprise at seeing an old friend.
Not too long after, Naruto found himself in the large hall with his team, the rookie nine, and what looked like many other teams, a significant number of which were staring at him and his classmates with harsh stares. Smiling and giving a soft wave, Naruto recounted the events that had led him there.
Firstly, Naruto had purchased a new set of clothes that Kakashi-sensei said was much more suitable for a shinobi career. Naruto had replaced his all-orange puffy jumpsuit with fairly simple clothing – a dark blue shirt with the kanji Ten on it in white, dark blue shinobi pants, and nondescript black hoodie with the Konoha leaf in orange. The 'Ten' kanji had a double meaning – it was not only part of Tenshi, but part of his oldest friend's name.
Next, entering the exam building, and dispelling the genjutsu. The entire team had dispelled the genjutsu successfully, and Naruto was more than willing to walk past, but it seemed that Sasuke had another idea: revealing the plot, creating more competition and enabling a fight with a Konoha genin he had never seen before, before the two of them were interrupted by a young man with green spandex, a bowl cut, large, wide eyes, and two of the most terrifying eyebrows the young blonde had ever seen.
As Sasuke was feeling fired up and ready to fight, he was more than ready to fight the hot-blooded genin, Naruto's attention was drawn to his teammate, who had scolded this Rock Lee for showing off. As Naruto saw the brown-haired girl with hair in panda buns, Naruto's heart stopped.
You see, Naruto had wondered how his oldest friend was doing, and he had reached a conclusion internally: she was likely better off, and happier off, without him in her life.
A lifetime of seeing people disgusted with him, violent towards him, and with no familial connections, Naruto could only rely on the positive feedback he gained from Iruka-sensei, who was only a young adult, the Ichiraku family, to whom he was also their best customer, the Sandaime, who had ordered the gag law that kept Naruto in the dark about his status for so many years, and an absentee sensei who wasn't even responding to him anymore.
In short, Naruto's self-esteem was abysmal for a boy of his age, and without any real outlets to share his worries for fear of sounding childish, he bottled his emotions up and came to conclusions in the graces of his own mind.
Naruto was also disgusted with himself in terms of his friendship with Tenten, because he had forgotten to seek her out for some time – in between having his own apartment and both learning and re-learning how to live life now that he was on his own in a new district, training with the scrolls sent to him by Tenshi-sensei, struggling in the academy, fighting for Iruka-sensei's acceptance, and the turbulent times from his unorthodox graduation to now, thinking about Tenten came about with little action to follow it up.
To Naruto, Tenten's friendship had gone from being like a well-maintained plant to something he was too afraid to discover again, for fear of seeing his own failure manifested.
Thus, Naruto tried to get Sasuke to move on, but the more the blonde quietly asked, the more adamant Sasuke became. Luckily for Naruto, in between his new outfit and lowered voice, he assumed that there was no way Tenten would know that he was her old friend who forgot about her.
The keyword is assumed, for truly, Tenten knew Naruto was there, and felt similar trepidations to seeking out her old friend.
For the other clanless orphan of what would one day be known as the Konoha 12, Uzumaki Naruto represented something fleeting, like a firefly, or perhaps a handful of rainwater – hard to hold on to.
Tenten's regrets were on a similar line to Naruto's – aside from a few questions in the days after he was gone, Tenten had never sought out the Uzumaki in great detail.
She had seen him once or twice – running from the academy, cackling like a monster, with Iruka-sensei behind him. Once, on the day of the Kyuubi festival, she had seen him running from a mob.
While Tenten was not a coward, especially since the start of her shinobi training, she knew better than to run in the middle of a mob, especially a mob that was leaving from the village, from what Tenten could see.
When Tenten saw Naruto stumble through the gates once more, covered in blood but uninjured, Tenten didn't know whether to be relieved or horrified that the only evidence a mob had been chasing him was from the red fluid covering his small body.
As a genin, she had been told that 'Academy Student Uzumaki Naruto has stolen the Forbidden Scroll!', and dispatched to check a civilian section of town with her team, but eventually everything returned to normal, with the overall message being 'Crisis Averted.'
It was a rather odd thing – two orphans, old friends, painfully aware of each other's presence, who fled from the possibility of reunion, even when they were mere feet away from each other, trying to pretend not to see the other.
The situation was even odder, because each held the other in the core of their hearts, as a childhood friend in a lonely village.
Regardless, Naruto and Sakura followed Sasuke and Rock Lee, the former grumbling about wasting time, with Tenten taking the rear of this odd bunch, staring at the back of her friend's hoodie, where his head lay just out of sight.
What was a bizarre matchup for Naruto to watch became suddenly interesting as this Rock Lee kicked Sasuke around like an old punching bag. As Lee seemed to be preparing what looked like a devastating aerial attack, a turtle smashed into the boy.
As Naruto kept his origami angel with him at all times, and didn't know how much of his everyday life was conveyed to his sensei, Naruto bit his tongue and refused to ask if the turtle was the boy's sensei. The fact that Tenten could hear him say such an idiotic statement was definitely not the reason he kept silent. Totally. Surely.
As Tenten talked to the turtle, Naruto risked a glance at her. Tenten had gone from the scrappy orphan in pigtails to a strong, happy-looking young woman. To his amusement, Naruto saw weariness mixed in with amusement as the turtle scolded Lee.
This emotion was followed by the appearance of the boy's sensei, a near carbon copy of him with even more defined eyebrows, and Tenten rolled her eyes and closed them as the two spandex… things? hugged, creating a genjutsu-like effect.
Naruto's cheeks were slightly pinker than they were before, but averted his eyes from his admittedly quite pretty old friend, back to the contents of whatever was going on below. It seemed that this Gai fellow was talking to Sakura about his rivalry with Kakashi, while the girl dodged the projectile hearts that this Lee fellow kissed at her.
Sasuke brooded in the corner, but Naruto suspected it wasn't because he was jealous of the kisses being given to his teammate. He was definitely sour about his loss, perhaps he was also jealous that someone had repulsed Sakura on their first meeting, after his years trying to get out of her hair?
That had been the occasion before the exam, but Naruto stopped delving back in his memory – as he listened to the conversations between his classmates and an older genin named Kabuto, Naruto looked around the exam – most of the shinobi were glaring at him and his classmates (Naruto suspected that Ino and Sakura's fighting in combination with Kiba's noisiness wasn't helping much), but a few were giving more neutral expressions.
Thus, Naruto made a game observing the genin who didn't seem like assholes at this stage in the game. The first contender was a red-haired Kusa-nin with glasses, who seemed more inquisitive than anything else.
Next was a team from Ame – while they were technically glaring at him, Naruto couldn't take their glares seriously, considering they all looked like they came into the exam after snorkeling in their bland, strange pajama onesies.
Another team from Ame caught his eye, a team of three kunoichi, a rarity in this exam room. One had a lazy, happy expression on her face and waved when Naruto saw her. Another was wearing a mask, and narrowed her eyes at the blonde looking at her team, and the third, a girl with purple hair in an onion-style bun gave Naruto a curt nod.
While Naruto smiled and nodded back to the first teammate, his focus remained on the third for a moment or two longer – she reminded him of his sensei. Not Iruka, his surrogate brother, or Kakashi, the lazy man whose mannerisms Naruto picked up sparingly, but Tenshi.
The girl's neutral expression, cold, guarded demeanor, and inquisitive eyes screamed Tenshi, at least to Naruto. While Naruto still felt the prickle of sadness (and worry) when he thought about his sensei, and how long it had been since her last message, he felt a sense of contentment at seeing someone so similar to her.
Mentally vowing to keep an eye on her in the tournament, Naruto turned towards his classmates once more, just in time to see Kabuto on the ground, a genin with a musical sound note headband standing above him. The silver-haired man was clutching his eardrums in an expression of pain.
In the next moment, a man named Morino was telling them to cut it out and enter for their first exam, and some minutes later, Naruto was looking down at his own paper in frustration. While Naruto didn't have the book smarts of Sakura, or the raw genius of Shikamaru, he wasn't completely stupid, especially with Tenshi's assistance.
Thus, Naruto realized that he should in no way, shape, or form, understand these questions. Well, a part of Naruto's mind did recall that Kakashi was exceptionally lazy. Would this qualify as some method to make his team study, getting into the chunin exams and flunking the first test?
That being said, Naruto also realized that Sasuke likely wouldn't get far either. Thus, Naruto answered the questions he could, and started theorizing more seals and techniques, using basic techniques. After all – if Naruto's grade alone didn't fail the team, Naruto's and Sasuke's together would likely sink anything Sakura could put together.
Not long after, Ibiki announced an all-or-nothing question ten. Naruto, seeing his chance, realized that Ibiki's threat to hold back genin permanently was stupid beyond belief – were there really any genin dumb enough to fall for that threat?
As Naruto would learn, there were many genin stupid enough. As Naruto watched, he saw Sakura wavering, starting to lift her hand. Sasuke looked at her angrily, and Naruto was feeling quite peeved as well.
"What an interesting ploy, Ibiki-san." Said Naruto, startling Sakura into lowering her hand.
"What do you mean, brat?" Ibiki had put the dots together, and was preparing to call out the Jinchuriki's team, but wondered if Naruto had as much intelligence as he was projecting.
"I'm surprised you could scare so many of them. You really thought that threatening to hold them back would work?" Naruto asked, incredulously. "I bet the Hokage cares much more about who can complete a mission rather than which rank it should be assigned to. If the Hokage knew that genin could complete a mission better than chunin or jonin, why even have a rank system?"
The silence that followed Naruto's argument lasted for several minutes, before Ibiki spoke again.
"Boy, take your hood off. Let me see your face." Naruto hesitated for a second, thinking about how if Tenten didn't see him before, she definitely would now, before following the older man's instructions. Ibiki saw the spiky blonde hair and blue eyes, serious and piercing.
Ibiki's memory was quite good, and he realized he had seen that stare before – from a famous Jonin on the Iwagakure front in the last war. A jonin who would become Hokage, and die on the same day that kid was born, and became the new host.
It was as if the clouds unraveled before Ibiki's eyes, and he realized just who he was looking at. Nodding to himself, Ibiki chuckled.
"Good job, kid. Good job. Everyone! You all pass." He pointed at Naruto. "Thank this brat for the trouble." Naruto laughed, blushing a little at the attention he received. Things seemed normal for another second or two before a woman wearing rather revealing clothing jumped in through the goddamn window and announced their second task would be in the so-called Forest of Death.
As Team 7 turned in their waivers, a different conversation was happening in the Jonin lounge, where all the sensei were watching their teams. As the teachers of the failed teams stood out, a few Konoha jonin talked about the exam, and in particular the first section's final moments.
"Quite the kid you've got there, Kakashi." Said Gai, looking (to the relief of his colleagues) less youthful. Now, Gai was both a genius and a buffoon. While his metaphors about youth left many shinobi wondering what had happened to the lad, and the bowl-haired sensei was known for the extensive damage he caused to training grounds, his metaphors and philosophy were quite visible to those who looked objectively.
Putting it bluntly, Gai's philosophy was one of embracing the optimism and joyful outlook of one's younger days. While Gai lost his father and some of his friends on the battlefield, that was also where the young Maito lad became a man, and where he learned more about life and death than any amount of time in the village.
In a career path where so many of his colleagues ended up scarred mentally and physically, Gai latched onto his optimism like a lifeline, knowing that a shinobi's end could occur at any moment, and living life to anything other than its fullest was a waste.
This strange wisdom was something that his students understood quite well, especially the kunoichi of the group. While Lee viewed his sensei as a godlike figure, and Neji thought his new teacher was a buffoon, Tenten learned early on that there was more to the man than his ramblings.
Thus, she leaned on him, perhaps not as much as the blacksmith who adopted her, but leaned on him nonetheless. She told him about her oldest friend, and asked if she was a bad person, and a bad friend.
Unfortunately, most teenagers see things in an all-or-nothing type of mindset, and so when Gai told her that she was not a bad friend, nor was she in the wrong, she assumed that he meant Naruto was. As such, Gai was intrigued to see more of the boy who gave one of his students such anxiety.
"Naruto definitely has his moments." Replied Kakashi, brightly.
As the silver-haired Jonin was sucked into a conversation with his three comrades from his younger days, another sensei was watching the screen in interest.
While a long cloak and dyed black hair obscured her identity, the woman's amber eyes watched her first student, before nodding in approval, happy she had told her team to keep an eye on the boy who reminded her so much of Yahiko.
I'm hoping that this chapter can wash down the trash that I posted last time, and I look forward to receiving more feedback and questions. Here is my next question for you: one team has been sent to observe Naruto, as seen in the first half of this chapter. Who do you think it is, and why?
Have a good one,
~KoS