Training Ground seven: the next day

When Kakashi arrives at the training ground, three hours late as usual, there is something wrong. There is no one else there. It is empty. Just like yesterday. This can only cause one event. One very unhappy porn reading elite Jonin. What happens when you have one very unhappy porn reading elite Jonin as your teacher you might ask? Well it's not a scene from Icha Icha that's for sure. No, it's pain time. After his first attempt at pain failed, miserably I might add, Kakashi decided on something crueler. 'Well, if nature manipulation didn't teach them their lesson then maybe the high level chakra manipulations will. If I recall correctly Hinata hasn't done any chakra manipulations other then stand academy ones, while Sasuke has yet to finish kunai balancing, but damn, what to do about Naruto.' Just then a light bulb appeared above the Jonin's head 'I know, he said he was reading, sealing 101, hmm. I know, I'll teach him advanced seals and how they work. If I recall correctly sealing 101 doesn't teach anything about actual sealing, just how to duplicated some real common seals, pre-encrypted, so I get to fill him in on all the confusing mubo jumbo that goes with sealing, ha, If getting a lesson in high level sealing doesn't drive him mad I don't know what will.' With that Kakashi broke up into manic laughter before Shunshining off to find his tardy students this time instead of going off, reading some Icha Icha and coming back three hours later.

Ichiraku Ramen:

"Ah, Naruto, Sasuke and Hinata-sama. How did your early morning training go?" asked the ramen chef as he started preparing a Naruto meal. The creation of the Naruto meal was a very interesting birthday present to our young Jinchuriki.

Flashback no jutsu: Naruto's Tenth birthday

"Please Kakashi-sensei, please please" begged Naruto, the reason for the begging comes from a debate between Naruto, Kakashi and Sasuke, even if Sasuke just stood there muttering about ramen obsessed blondes. What the debate was about you might ask, well, it's something only our favourite ramen obsessed blonde would argue about. Whether or not to have Naruto's birthday lunch at Ichiraku or a decent restaurant. While Naruto was feverishly arguing that they should go to Ichiraku's as there is no meal superior to ramen, Kakashi having had ramen for lunch, for three weeks in a row. All because of a stupid bet he made with Naruto over whether or not he could master a jutsu in 3 days. After having ramen for three weeks straight Kakashi was really, really, really, REALLY tired of having ramen for lunch.

"But Kakashi-sensei, it's my birthday, PLEASE" begged Naruto. Finally Kakashi decided to give in, not because Naruto was getting to him, just because at this rate they will miss both lunch and dinner before Naruto stops begging. If ever.

Ichiraku ramen: 5 minutes later

Having dragged Sasuke and Kakashi to Ichiraku's Naruto got a big surprise. In front of him was a great big boll of Pork, Miso and chicken ramen. Naruto looks up from the bowl to Teuchi and Ayame. Who are both looking down at him with big smiles on their faces. Ayame deciding to fill in Naruto. "Happy birthday Naruto, turning ten is a big thing, so to celebrate we made you a new dish we created just for you. The Naruto meal, Three times as big as a normal bowl of ramen it contains pork, Miso and chicken ramen. Your three favourites, as the first customer to taste the new Naruto meal, it's on the house."

All Naruto could do was stare at Ayame and Teuchi, before he started crying. Ayame's smile fell right off her face, thinking that it was somehow her fault that Naruto was sad. Kakashi saw this as instantly understood. No one had ever treated Naruto this way. He was just overwhelmed, deciding to step in before there was more of a misunderstanding Kakashi cleared his throat before saying. "It's not your fault he's crying Ayame-san. It's just no one other than me and Sasuke here have treated Naruto with such kindness before, it's just so foreign to him that he is simply overwhelmed."

Ayame looking down at Naruto saw the look of confirmation on his face as he nodded and he picked up his chopsticks. Softly saying "itadakimasu" Naruto picked up some of the noddles with his chopsticks. Slowly rising them to his mouth, pausing a second before is mouth, before shoving them in and started chewing slowly. Slowly a look of realization crossed Naruto's face. Almost like he had some revelation about the meaning of life or something like that. All of a sudden the chop sticks where back in the bowl and Naruto began shovelling the ramen into his mouth, swallowing without chewing it anymore, he managed to work out in-between mouth full's. "this…gulp…really… chew…great…" after devouring the bowl in record time Naruto let loose a great burp, while saying "that was…THE BEST RAMEN EVER!!" deafening Kakashi, Sasuke and any Inuzuka within half a mile. Teuchi and Ayame smiled even more than before, both at the fact that Naruto enjoyed their birthday present, and that since the bowl is more expensive they have a lot more cash coming their way than normal.

Flashback no jutsu KAI

"So Sasuke and Hinata-sama what are you going to order" asked Ayame while her father was preparing Naruto's ramen.

Smiling meekly Hinata replied "one Miso please…and ano, co-uld y you p please not call me Hinata-sa Sama. I'm n not w worthy o of b been c called sama" stuttering heavily on the end. At which Naruto scowled.

"Hinata, if anyone is worthy of been called Sama it's you. Not only are you from a great and powerful clan, but you are both strong and caring. Never say you are not worthy of anything ever again."

Hinata blushing red from what Naruto had said, even if it wasn't meant entirely the way Hinata took it. Just then Kakashi decided to pop in with a puff of smoke.

"What are you three doing here" he said, with an angry tone in his voice, something Hinata had never heard before and something that Sasuke and Naruto had only heard once or twice.

Naruto turned around and said, with a smile on his face, "We are having an after training breakfast."

Giving Naruto a puzzled look Kakashi asked "training? You're meant to be waiting for me at training ground seven"

Still smiling Naruto returned "yeah, well, since you're always three hours late we decided that starting yesterday we would train while we waited, after we were done we would have some breakfast before waiting for you to show up. by the way why are you here ero-sensei? Do you have ramen for breakfast as well?"

Shaking his head Kakashi said "No. I'm here because you three are later then me for training. For the second time. Why do you think I gave you such hard training yesterday, I don't like waiting." At this Naruto's face turned to panic, Sasuke remained neutral; although a little upset he hasn't had a chance to order yet, while Hinata blushed with embarrassment at been late for two training sessions in a row. "What? We're later then you? Come on guys we better go then" just as Naruto was about to drag Hinata and Sasuke back to the training grounds, without even haven ramen, Kakashi gave them a little eye smile and said "maa, let's have breakfast first, and how about from now on we meet up here instead of the training grounds, that why I won't miss you." At this Naruto cheered, Sasuke looked down at been condemned to having ramen every morning, while Hinata just smiled meekly, she seemed to slowly be getting better at interacting with her teammates.

Training ground seven: half an hour later

"Ok, now I had planned to be cruel and make you all entire hard training for been late." At this team seven looked relived that they wouldn't be put through the torture that Kakashi called 'training' yesterday. There was a good reason elemental manipulation was considered a high level Chunin skill. It is one of the most exhausting exercises one can do. It leaves you completely drained, mentally, physically and chakra wise. "And we are still going to do them" at this team seven let out a groan, looks like they were not spared after all.

"Today we are doing chakra exercises, Hinata have you done any chakra exercises outside of the basic academy ones?" Hinata shook her head in a negative reply "ok good, you're lucky, as you're a kunoichi you have better chakra control then Naruto and Sasuke here, but you have less chakra. So you are going to play catch up in the chakra exercises, and once you have finished them you will move onto chakra building. As the more chakra you have the harder it is to control, that is why we teach you control first as it will help you deal with the higher levels of chakra easily. Sasuke, you're going to continue Kunai balancing, but instead of balancing the kunai on your finger, you will be balancing your entire body on the kunai point. I'll show you how to do that after I've explained tree walking to Hinata. Finally Naruto, since you seem to enjoy sealing." Kakashi pauses before giving an evil laugh "I'll be helping you in understanding how real fuinjutsu works." After finishing Kakashi gives another evil laugh, while the genin cringe in fear. When someone like Kakashi laughs, especially evilly, it's a REALLY bad sign for your continued wellbeing.

"Well then, follow me Hinata" says Kakashi as he starts walking to a big tree a bit over from where everyone else was. Hinata quickly falls into step behind and slightly to the side of him. Noticing this Kakashi frowns under his mask, 'this is something that needs fixing, Hinata seems to be making improvement interacting with the rest of the team, well not so much Naruto, but then Naruto's personally is so different from hers. Yet, this shyness and inferiority issues seem to be deeply ingrained. Poor Hinata, she acts insecure and weak because her subconscious thinks that is the way she should be behaving, this will defiantly be hard to fix.' Finally reaching the tree Kakashi stops and turns around "now Hinata, what you need to do is climb this tree without using your hands. What you have to do is draw chakra down to your feet, the hardest place is the body to control chakra, and use it to stick to the tree. Watch." Kakashi walks towards the tree and starts walking, having mastered this exercise to the level where he can walk on surfaces without even thinking about it anymore. Once he reaches the top he turns around and looks down at Hinata "I want you to practise this until it becomes natural, to the level where I could throw you at the tree and you would stick to it without thinking about it." With that he tosses a kunai down to her and says "use this to mark your progress." With that Kakashi jumps off the tree and heads towards Sasuke, who is trying to balance a kunai on his finger, and failing, painfully.

"Poor Sasuke, if you can't balance the kunai on your finger then this training exercise will hurt. A lot." Grabbing the kunai off Sasuke Kakashi embeds it handle first 5cm into the ground. "ok now lie down next to the kunai." Complying with Kakashi's strange request Sasuke lies down next to the kunai. "ok now rest your finger on the kunai tip." Still not seeing where this was going Sasuke follows along. "Good, now try and raise your finger above the kunai using your chakra." Starting to get a sinking feeling Sasuke yet again follows Kakashi's instructions "good, now push your hand down just using your elbow, while maintaining the chakra push" Sasuke follows Kakashi's instructions. Seconds later a yell is heard, as Sasuke stabs the kunai about half a centimetre. Smiling Kakashi says "well, it seems you were not releasing enough chakra, once you can push down with your elbow move to your entire arm, then your entire body. Once you can push down with all your weight call me and I'll give you the next step, oh and here is some bandages and blood replenishing pills, trust me you'll need them" Kakashi says as he tosses the bandages and pills to Sasuke before heading off to Naruto.

"ah Naruto, you get to enjoy me explaining seals, there is a reason that seal masters are the most highly sought after type of ninja, while they are the most powerful…" before Kakashi could finish Naruto cut him off yelling in joy, Kakashi silenced him with a loud "But" turning his attention back to Kakashi Naruto listened while Kakashi explained "it is also the most difficult to learn, kinda. Sealing it's self is unbelievably simple. All it takes is a few kanji and chakra." At this Naruto interrupts

"But Kakashi-sensei, all the seals I've seen have been in this really complex squiggly stuff." Nodding at Naruto Kakashi explained

"That's because you have only seen encrypted seals, every seal you will ever see in use is encrypted. This is to protect the seals from been cracked. Let's say Konoha made a superior explosive seal, you wouldn't want the enemies to find out how it works right? So every seal master attaches an encryption seal as the last seal in the sequence. This encrypts the seal the second it is finished, every encryption is identical, but because of how incredibly complex it is no one has ever been able to decipher the encryption code, so it doesn't matter. The only down side with the encryption seal is that if you duplicate the encryption exactly, it will still work just like the original seal was designed. So if the enemy managed to get a hold of an encrypted seal they could copy it, but they would be unable to understand how it works, why it works, what exactly it does, and how to replicate it other than copy then highly complicated code. So to duplicate an encrypted seal would take hours upon hours, while a normal seal could be made in minutes, seconds if the seal is simple and the seal master is skilled enough. The other problem with copying an encrypted seal is that it has to be finalized with chakra in the right manner, but as the user does not know what the manner is, because they don't know how the seal works, they have to try through trial and error, so it can take months to figure out how even some of the simplest seals work."

While Kakashi stopped a moment to let it all sink into Naruto, Naruto just stared at Kakashi with a look of awe on his face. Deciding Naruto had enough time to let it sink in Kakashi continues

"Each Kanji determines how a seal will work; I will give you an example as it is the best way to understand." Pulling out a small piece of paper, seal brush and small pot of ink, Kakashi draws the kanji for lightning, then turns to Naruto "this is how we created a basic shock tag, first is the kanji for lightning, as you see right now, this stores the electrical charge," Kakashi then draws a circle around it writes the kanji for five, then a little away from that rights the kanji for time. "The circle is a barrier; it holds the electrical charge in, keeping it from escaping. The five denotes how long something will be, the time kanji means that the 5 is time, so the barrier will hold for five seconds after the seal is activated." Kakashi then draws the kanji for first, but rights it twice the normal size, over the time kanji "this means that when the seal is activated the first kanji activated is the timer, this is very important, if you don't add this step the chakra will randomly activate either the timer or the charge storage, if it activates the charge storage, you'll be in for a shock." Finally Kakashi draws a line from the final stroke of the kanji for time, to the first stroke of the kanji for five, then from the final stroke of the kanji for five to the circle. "This signifies the relation, so the timer is activated, it is activated for five seconds, and the timer is for the barrier. Once the barrier releases the lightning kanji will be unable to contain the chakra anymore and release it."

Pausing for a moment Kakashi is about to continue when Naruto asks a question

"So is that it?" frowning at his students impatience Kakashi says

"No Naruto, there are two more steps first we need to apply the right chakra to the seal. To begin I simply apply normal chakra to the circle. The charges the barrier, then I apply lightning element chakra to the lightning kanji, this charges the kanji, the more lightning chakra I add the more powerful the tag."

At this Naruto asks the obvious question "then does that mean that I'll only be able to create seals that have to do with wind, lightning and my third element?"

Smiling at his student's intelligence Kakashi decides to inform Naruto about one of the most interesting aspects of seals "no Naruto. There is a really powerful seal called a chakra converter. What it does is it takes your normal chakra and then converts it to the chakra of the right element. Despite how useful this sounds it is not used in battle for one small reason. It is highly inefficient. It has an efficiency of one percent. So for example, if you put enough chakra to create one hundred kage bunshin in the seal, you would get enough chakra of the right element to create 1 kage bunshin. This makes it more efficient to just use your normal chakra in battle rather than the elemental chakra, as the bonus gained from using elemental chakra is not worth the in most situations. Thanks to your massive chakra reserves you may be able to use this in the future for two elements you lack, but it would only be realistic for jutsu that require chakra of the right element and will not work with normal chakra."

Then a moment of inspiration hits Naruto, one of those really rare profound thoughts. "Um, Kakashi sensei?"

"Yes Naruto?"

"Would it be more efficient if you converted the chakra to an element you already possess, for example I have a secondary affinity with lightning, if I used a lightning conversion seal to increase my affinity to that of a level matching a primary element would it be more chakra efficient?"

At this a dumb look crosses Kakashi's face, even though you can't see it through the mask

"…I never thought of that, I don't think anyone has. once you get skilled enough to start creating your own seals we'll have to try that, as you would have to create your own seal array to do that, as the normal one is reliant on the fact you have no affinity with the element, so it forces the chakra to convert to the element, but that is why it wastes so much chakra, but you are looking more for a seal the strength of the lightning chakra, that should in theory be more efficient, but probably more difficult to create. Anyways we have moved off topic, we still need to finish off this seal."

At that Naruto looks confused "what do you mean, what's left?"

Shaking his head Kakashi says "Naruto, what was the first thing I told you about?"

"Um…oh encryption, we didn't encrypt this seal"

Smiling this time Kakashi nods his head "yes, now we draw the seal for encryption like this" with that Kakashi draws the kanji for encryption really big, so that it covers everything else on the seal "the encryption kanji will only effect kanji that it is drawn over, now we just channel chakra into the encryption kanji like this and…" as Kakashi channels chakra into the encryption kanji the lines of the different kanji begin to break apart, and form the classical squiggles you see in normal seals. They then glow blue and Kakashi removes his hand "now the seal is complete and ready for use, watch" with that Kakashi channels a bit of chakra into the seal to activate it and tosses it at a tree, five seconds later the area where the seal was is burnt black from the lightning travelling through it.

Naruto yells in excitement "cool"

Smiling Kakashi pulls a book out of his pouch and says "this is called 'an introduction to seals, by Minato Namikaze' now; whatever happens you cannot let this book fall into the hands of anyone else. Sealing guides are one of the most valuable things in the elemental countries. Especially ones by Minato-sensei, he was the world's most renowned seal master, his nickname of the yellow flash, was thanks to his use of seals to create his signature technique the 'Hiraishin no jutsu'."

At this Naruto just smiles, then laughs in excitement. His hero, the fourth hokage, even if he did seal the kyuubi into him, was known for his seals, and Naruto was learning seals. It was all Naruto could do to keep from dancing around yelling.

Kakashi gives Naruto an eye smile before sitting down under a tree and watching his three students train.

AN:

Well, that was fun, I have had this chapter in mind for ages, it has just taken a while to sit down and actually write it. Next chapter, the mission to wave.

Oh and for the elements, no one has been close, although '9 taled fox' inspired me for Hinata, kinda. I was looking for a reason why Hinata's element was water, and he gave me an idea, so congrats to him.

Also here is a hint, while the reason for Sasuke, and Hinata having odd elements has do with the kyuubi, Naruto's does not. As a further hint, Sasuke and Hinata's reason is hinted at in the first chapter, somewhere, good reason to go back and read the new edited version ne?

Finally, looks like after wave will be more training, from the looks of the poll, the poll will continue until the next chapter, which should be out either next week or the week after, depending on when inspiration strikes. I'm going to try and go for a chapter a week, or at the latest a chapter every two.

ja