Here is the bi-weekly update of Dark Phoenix. Let's see how Sakura takes to working on D-ranks. Thanks for all your reviews, I'm really happy about the number I got. Happy reading.


The Hokage Gets Serious

The next day at nine the Hokage arrived at his office, seeing that new amounts of paperwork had been placed on his desk. He grinned evilly and made two shadow clones and now three Sandaime Hokages were sorting through the paperwork. What he found enraged him. Before he hadn't really noticed just how many useless documents he got on his desk. This looked like a conspiracy. After two hours he was sure. Many of those decrees the civilian council wanted to have signed were only meant to increase their wealth and didn't help the village as a whole. Some that were slipped into his mountain of work were outright attempts to legally abuse Naruto. Like the hot springs requesting to be able to deny people they think unsuited to use the premises entry. Or the grocers asking to set taxes for their goods themselves. No, this would stop.

The problem was that he had lost insight what was really happening in the village. But who could know the real circumstances? He had a second look at the documents that were the fishiest. He would have to check the laws and decrees that had already been passed without him really noticing. Then he had an idea. It would be a bit risky, but he would have the information he needed.

"Crow, get me elder Danzo Shimura here." The Hokage ordered.

Crow vanished from his post and ten minutes later it knocked at the door.

"Enter." The Hokage said.

Danzo walked in, using his cane.

"You called me, Hokage Sama?" Danzo asked.

"Yes, thanks for coming so promptly, Danzo. I have some things to discuss with you." The Hokage said and activated the privacy seals.

Danzo wondered what had happened to have Hiruzen so serious. Did he find out about his ROOT? Improbable. He had erased his traces very well. So what could he want?

"Please take a seat, this will take some time." The Hokage said and Danzo sat down.

"Just this morning I came upon a serious problem with the finances of the village. It seems that thanks to the amounts of paperwork I have to deal with daily, some decrees that deprive the village of funds have been passed. Sadly I don't know yet how much money was … displaced … that way. We both know that the strength of our military depends on the proper funds. I have some suspicions where the funds went, but I need to investigate this without the culprits finding out about it. That's where you come in. I want you to take your ROOT and find all the dirt the ones that embezzle our funds have hidden." The Hokage said.

"You know that you ordered me to disband ROOT years ago, Hiruzen." Danzo said, now dropping the honorifics.

"And we both know that you ignored that order and only took your ninja and went underground. Don't think I am stupid Danzo. I let you get away with it, because you and your ROOT are useful for the village. As long as I officially disbanded you, nobody could say anything against it. And if your training methods wouldn't be so despicable, I wouldn't even have had to do it. But we always differed in our opinions there. Nonetheless. Your ROOT are a part of the military of Konoha. A well hidden part, but it is still financed by the village."

Danzo kept quiet. He wouldn't have thought that Hiruzen had known all the time. It seemed he had underestimated his old rival.

"What do you intend to do now?" He asked.

"Oh, as long as you follow my orders, nothing. As I said, you are useful. But if you go against me, I will end you. Simple as that." The Hokage told Danzo.

"Why now of all times, Hiruzen? What has changed?" Danzo asked.

"We both know that I am too old to be Hokage. I wanted to retire long ago and thought that with Minato leading the village the village would be strong and still retain the will of fire. Sadly he died sealing the Kyubi away. I didn't really want to take back the hat, but did it because I saw it as my duty to protect the village. The same is true for you; you are the same age as I am. We both are not really suitable candidates for the position. We should only enjoy our retirement and give advice to the younger generation. But we both have still a duty we are fulfilling. I have called back Jiraiya to discuss with him my choice of successor." The Hokage informed Danzo.

"You want to make Jiraiya your successor?" Danzo asked disbelievingly. "Do you think that is wise? While he is strong enough to take the position, I don't think he would be a good administrator."

"No, Jiraiya wouldn't even want to be Hokage. And it would be a shame to let his spy network go to waste. I had considered Tsunade, but with her dislike for the village because of her losses in the past, I doubt she would return, even if she would be the best choice. No, I called Jiraiya back to get his opinion on the candidate I chose." The Hokage said.

"Are you going to tell me who you chose?" Danzo asked now interested.

Especially as he wondered why Hiruzen was informing him. They had always been at odds with their opinion how the village should be led.

"Can't you deduct it yourself?" The Hokage asked.

Danzo thought about it. He went over all the jonin of the village. There were only a few that were suited. The most probable candidate was…

"Kakashi?" Danzo asked.

"Yes. If you think about it he is the only real option we have. He has orders to get back to his old strength. He also is tasked with taking care of our two most difficult new genin." He informed Danzo.

"Sasuke Uchiha and Naruto Uzumaki. I already heard that the Uzumaki boy was hiding his true abilities. Impressive if you ask me." Danzo said.

"Indeed. Both boys don't have many ties that bind them to the village. Sadly I haven't been able to really remedy that fact until they graduated from the academy. Now that they are ninja, I can correct the bad influence the civilian council had on them. I only hope that it isn't too late already. That's Kakashi's main task for now. But if I want Kakashi to take over for me once he is ready and his team has been promoted, I need to clean up the current mess as much as possible. Otherwise things wouldn't really change and from Jiraiya's reports I know that things will get troubling sooner than I like." The Hokage said.

Danzo had to agree. He knew from his own spies that there was a mercenary group that took many high class missions for some of the other villages. They consisted of S-rank missing nins, but their goals were unknown so far. Then there was the new village Oto. He hadn't been able to find out much about it. And he had somewhat lost sight of Orochimaru after he had finished the surgery he had hired him for on his arm. Thankfully Hiruzen didn't seem to know about the sharingans he had implanted in his eye and his arm. That wouldn't be tolerated in any way.

"So how do you want me to do this?" Danzo asked.

"I will go through the laws that were passed myself with a few shadow clones over the next few days. I want you to send me two of your ROOT agents that are skilled in administration. One will replace the current secretary and one will go through the jungle of paperwork that is put on my desk each day. I only want him to sort it in categories that make the most sense. Before we can confront the ones responsible, we need to know the whole picture. I want three of your agents to go through the decrees that have been passed since Minato's death. They are to write them down chronologically. I will go through them as soon as they are done. Five of your agents are to inspect the way business is done in the village without being seen.

"I have the suspicion that many businessmen are evading taxes. That and that they demand more taxes than what is legal. I know I have been too passive the past years, but I intend to rectify at least some of my mistakes before I let Kakashi take over. If everything goes well, I will announce him as my successor during the final round of the chunin exams in six months. Normally he should get his team ready to take them in the six months he has. The only shaky candidate is Sakura. I don't know if she will persevere in her choice of career. Kakashi has orders to put his team through the grinder." The Hokage said.

"That is a sound plan. In six months of constant training he should also be back to his past strength and perhaps have got to S-rank level. If I remember right, he was close when he quit ANBU. I will send my agents for the tower in one hour, Hiruzen, and send the ones for the village out as well. How do you want to organize the reporting?" Danzo asked.

"I want your agents to report back to me in three days. They should have a first impression by then. I guess we will need two or three weeks to get all the documents checked." The Hokage sighed.

Danzo nodded. It was good to see that the God of Shinobi intended to go out with a last major strike.


Team seven stood in the mission office to get their first mission. Sakura was relieved to get a mission for a change. A mission meant that she wouldn't have to go through what she had dubbed 'Kakashi's training from hell'. She had been sore every day of last week after training. The weekend had been training free for them, but Kakashi had given them homework. Thankfully it was all theory, but it would be tested during this week's training hours.

She had to spend five hours reading up and practising hand signals that were used by the Konoha military forces. These signals would be part of their teamwork exercises. And of course she had to practise a new chakra control exercise. Sticking five leafs to her arms. She had known how to do it with one leaf since the academy, but now Kakashi had told them they had to stick fives leafs to their arms and keep them there two hours without losing them once. She had hated the exercise. She always lost control and had to start new. Why would it help them to be able to do that exercise?

And she also hadn't had much time taking care of her body to impress Sasuke. Her hair was messier than ever before, her skin was losing some of its shine and she got calluses on her hands. How should she ever get Sasuke this way? More, she couldn't stop herself from eating all the food Kakashi gave them, even if it was way too fat. She had tried to only eat a bit of it, but her stomach was betraying her. Her mother had promised her to take care of her lunchboxes from this week on. She would make sure she ate low fat.

The three genin listened to the Hokage when he told Kakashi the available missions. Sakura was glad. Most of those missions didn't sound that bad. Babysitting for the Minister, weeding a garden for a council member, yes she could do that.

"We take cleaning out the field of Mr Takashima, Hokage Sama." Kakashi decided.

Sakura wanted to cry. That was another hard exercise. And it was a bit outside of the village. Mr Takashima had just started a farm two miles outside of Konoha. There would be no chance to rest and flirt with Sasuke from what she could tell. And she was sure Kakashi would make the way there another exercise.

"Alright, team. We won't need any special equipment, any farming tools we might need will be at the farm. Let's go." Kakashi said and left the office.


Naruto and Sasuke turned the cleaning of the field into a challenge. They would start on one side of the field and each had a clone of Naruto with them to take the waste which they pulled from the field. Five other clones of Naruto would sort through their findings and sort them. The small stones would be put aside for a pond Mr Takashima wanted to build later. The bigger ones would be used for walls to surround the property. Sticks and bigger branches would either be shredded later or burned. Some would perhaps be used as stabilizers for vegetable plants. That would be Mr Takashima's decision.

Sakura was also cleaning her part with a shadow clone taking care of getting the waste away, but she was way slower than the two boys. Sasuke wanted to prove that he could go the same pace as Naruto and Naruto wanted to shove it into the Uchiha's face that there were people better than him. Kakashi watched the whole action amused. The competitiveness between Naruto and Sasuke would only end in the mission getting done faster. Perhaps he could get the team to two missions a day in a few weeks. But then again, his goal was taking only missions that wouldn't get his team in close contact with the villagers too much.

"Wow, your students are doing good work. I'm surprised they are that fast." Mr Takashima said.

"Well, they are ninjas; they should be faster than civilians. And they don't even use their abilities besides Naruto making his shadow clones to assist." Kakashi answered.

"Are your two male students by any chance overly competitive?" Mr Takashima asked.

"A bit. But as long as it results in better work, I don't mind." Kakashi said.

He looked at Sakura. The girl was already slowing down.

"Hey, Sakura, don't get slower. This is also meant as a strength building exercise." He shouted to her.

Sakura returned to her former pace.

"She was slowing down?" Mr Takashima asked surprised.

"Yes, she sometimes needs a good push to do her best, but we are working on that." Kakashi replied unconcerned.

Mr Takashima wondered about this, but then again, who could really understand how ninjas worked?


After four hours the field was cleared of all things that would be in the way of farming.

"Wow, good work. I didn't think it would be done today." Mr Takashima told the team happily.

"No problem, Mr Takashima, that's our job." Kakashi said.

"I have some refreshments prepared for you and your team, Mr Hatake." Mr Takashima said. "As a sign of my gratitude for the good and speedy work."

"That we'll gladly accept." Kakashi said. "You heard Mr Takashima. Wash your hands and then come over to get some snacks." Kakashi called out to his team.

The three nodded and went to the hose to wash their dirty hands. Soon they were back with Kakashi. Well, Naruto and Sasuke were. Sakura needed a bit longer, being exhausted after four hours of constant hard work. Additionally she had to deal with the effects of the gravity seals which made her slower. With her small reserves she had massive problems to keep the effects of the seals from influencing her too much.

Mr Takashima and his wife were presenting the genin with a plate of sushi each.

"My wife led a sushi restaurant before we came to Konoha from Water Country." Mr Takashima explained.

"Why did you move?" Sakura asked, eating gratefully.

"Well, in Water Country there is a civil war going on. The Mizukage, the leader of Kiri has declared all those that possess a bloodline limit devils and responsible for the horrors of wars. They are hunted down mercilessly. But even we civilians are sometimes involved in the fights of the two sides, the one following the Mizukage and the one opposing him, who think that the bloodline limit users, who fought for Kiri in the past shouldn't be persecuted. We didn't want to be killed in the middle of those fights and decided it would be safer to move here." Mrs Takashima informed the genin.

Sasuke was shocked. People who had a bloodline limit like his clan were hunted down in Water Country? But why? Normally the clans that had a bloodline limit were the strongest in a village's military. Like his clan had been. Their sharingan had been praised in Konoha.

Naruto silently ate his sushi. He could empathize with the rebels. Nobody would take being hunted down for something that had helped his village in the past. And what choice did those people have? They were just born like that. An ability wasn't evil in itself. It was how you used it.

"These are really good, Mrs Takashima." Sakura said, not really getting the mood of her two team-mates.

"Thanks, dear." Mrs Takashima answered.


The civilian council was at a loss how they had lost a good part of their power in such short a time. The Hokage seemingly had suddenly grown a backbone. He was keeping the ninjas that formerly had done their bidding under a firm watch. It had taken them a week to find out, but both the jonin commander and the ANBU commander had given orders to all ninjas that the civilian council had no say in shinobi matters. They had no authority to order ninja to do anything. The Hokage, after all ninjas had been informed, even the new genin had been told the orders, had given them a warning to not try to usurp his power. Trying to usurp the Hokage's power was treason and would be handled accordingly.

They had held a meeting to discuss their options, but soon realized that there was nothing they could do. The Hokage held the power of the military. They only had control over the civilian affairs as long as they didn't threaten the military strength of the village. That meant withholding service from shinobi in any way or sabotaging the goods sold to shinobi. They knew if they continued to treat the demon like he deserved to be treated, they would face the Hokage's wrath. After checking on the sales numbers of the past three years, they made a surprising discovery. The only things the demon brat had bought from them were the occasional fresh products like milk and eggs. Nothing else. How did the brat do that? As much as they tried to find out, they couldn't wrap their minds around it. The brat was the dead last of his class. A failure as a ninja. There should have been no way for him to manage that.

In the shadows Gazelle, the ANBU on duty grinned under his mask. This promised to be interesting in the future. He was one of the ANBU that were more than tired of the arrogant behaviour of the civilian council. Having them obsessed with trying to figure out how the so called demon brat managed to trick them was indeed amusing. And from what Kakashi told about his team, the blond was really good.


After finishing their snack, Kakashi took his team back to the Hokage tower to report about the mission. He had made his genin run the whole way back in a sprint. After all, two miles should be nothing for a ninja; even a fresh genin should be able to do it. When they reached the gates, Sakura wanted to collapse. Her sensei was definitely a sadist.

"Team seven reporting back from a D-rank mission." Kakashi informed the guards.

"Already? Didn't you have that field clearing mission?" One of the chunin asked.

"Yes, my team was just good in their time." Kakashi answered.

"Okay, we have noted you being back." The other chunin said and Kakashi led his team to the tower.

"Did you also have the impression that two of the three genin were about to collapse?" One asked.

"Yes. The Uchiha is hiding it somewhat well, but the girl was really obvious. Strangely Uzumaki didn't seem tired." The other answered.

All ninjas had been briefed to not refer to Naruto by any derogative terms, so most just called him Uzumaki when they talked about him.

"I wouldn't think he would be tired after a sprint. Don't you remember how we had to hunt him down after one of his pranks? If he has practice in anything, then it is running at high speeds." The first one said snorting.

"True." His partner replied.


In the Hokage Tower Kakashi instructed his genin to watch how he made his report as they would be required to do it themselves in the near future.

"Team seven back for report." Kakashi stated.

The chunin on duty nodded and took out a notepad for a short summary. Kakashi would later hand in a thorough written report about the performance of his team after all. The Hokage just wanted to get an overview of the successfully fulfilled missions every day.

"Team seven was tasked with clearing out the field of the newly moved in Takashima couple. Genins Haruno, Uchiha and Uzumaki took to clearing the field of stones, wood and other waste, leaving the remains for shadow clones of Uzumaki to be sorted into categories for later use by the Takashimas. After four hours of work the field was finished. Individual report on the performance of my genin will follow in my written report." Kakashi said.

"Good, the short report will be handed in to Hokage Sama." The chunin confirmed.

"I have a question, Kakashi sensei." Naruto asked.

"Yes, Naruto?" Kakashi answered.

"Is there a possibility for a genin to take more D-rank missions outside of the ones a team does?" He asked looking at an immense amount of missions labelled D-rank.

"With the permission of Hokage Sama and the jonin sensei of said genin it is definitely possible. Why, are you interested?" Kakashi asked.

"You know that I am an orphan and I need to earn money someway. This would be the easiest way for me to do it. I could give some missions to my shadow clones and let them do the missions while I am busy with our team's training." Naruto argued.

"Hm, if Hokage Sama agrees I don't see any reason to not allow it as long as you do the missions properly. But I want you to keep it to three missions a day. I don't want you to be too tired from chakra exhaustion for your team training." Kakashi said.

Naruto looked at Kakashi as if he was crazy.

"Sensei, chakra exhaustion is no problem for me and you know it. I would have to fire A-rank jutsus around for five hours in a row to get exhausted. And even then I would probably be up again after an hour of resting and eating." He said.

Kakashi had to agree with the statement, but didn't comment.

"Naruto, don't brag with false abilities. You can't have that much chakra." Sakura scolded.

"No, Sakura, Naruto is right in his statement, he does have overly large chakra reserves. He has been born with them and his training only increased them over time." Kakashi admonished her. He would have thought she was too tired to argue after all the hard work of today.

"But he can't have more chakra than Sasuke. Sasuke was always the best and the strongest at the academy." She protested.

"Didn't you realize yet that I faked my abilities in the academy? I would have thought all the training sessions last week would have made that much clear. Sasuke has large reserves for a fresh genin, that's true, and compared to the others in our class he has the largest reserves, but he is nowhere near my level." Naruto set her straight.

"How big could your reserves be, idiot?" She sneered.

"Kage level." Kakashi said, shocking both Sakura and Sasuke. "Naruto's reserves are the biggest of anyone in the village. But large reserves alone don't make a good ninja. You need to have good control over your chakra too and the experience from fighting opponents."

Naruto nodded. He knew the only thing he really needed for a promotion to chunin was said experience. He had the abilities and control without a doubt. But even he had to admit, he was getting better and stronger with Kakashi's intense training. Training on his own had given him a very good base to work with but the teamwork exercises his sensei came up with helped him practice to really use the theoretical skills he had. It would be invaluable in the field. He knew the old man wouldn't promote him to jonin straight away, but if he got the experience he needed in the next six months until the chunin exams only a natural catastrophe or something similar would be able to prevent his promotion. Kakashi dismissed his team with the reminder to be at the gates at six like the other mornings.


The next morning Naruto got the information from Kakashi that the Hokage had agreed to let him do three additional D-rank missions a day as long as Naruto was not on a mission outside of the village at the time. Naruto made ten clones and sent one of them to the mission office to get the missions for him. The idea was a spontaneous one. He knew that he had his parents' money that he would get as soon as he was declared the Namikaze and Uzumaki heir at the chunin exams and he also had a good amount of money from his trips into the Forest of Death after the last chunin exams in there, but he also didn't want anybody to know about that. So him taking more D-ranks solo would give him a good cover and more money. Thankfully the payment was going to the mission office before it was transferred to the ninja's account.

Around lunch, a chunin arrived at the training ground.

"Kakashi, Naruto Uzumaki is to come to the Hokage's office immediately. Here is the order of Hokage Sama." He said.

Kakashi checked the order and saw it was genuine.

"Naruto, you are wanted by Hokage Sama." He said to his genin.

Naruto nodded and stopped his exercise.

"Once you are finished with whatever Hokage Sama wants, you are to come back to continue training." Kakashi ordered.

"Yes, Kakashi sensei." Naruto said and took off towards the tower.

"Okay, you two back to chakra control training." Kakashi said.

Sakura groaned and Sasuke just continued training tree-walking while sticking a leaf to each back of his hands with chakra.


Naruto arrived at the tower and walked towards the Hokage's office. He looked at the secretary that surprisingly didn't glare at him. He had also never seen her before.

"I was called by Hokage Sama to come here immediately." Naruto said neutrally and handed her the note the chunin had given Kakashi.

"I will see if Hokage Sama is available." The new secretary said.

Soon Naruto was in the Hokage's office.

"Ah, Naruto, good that you came so fast." The Hokage greeted.

"Why did you want to see me, old man?" Naruto asked. As nobody but the hidden ANBU was in the room he could treat the Hokage informal.

"Two reasons. First, I have opened an account for you at the shinobi bank. While the civilian council has been warned that any sabotage of shinobi will be treated like treason, I doubt they will really fall in line. The shinobi bank is run by retired shinobi and under the direct control of the Hokage. All your payments will go to that account. Second, I wanted to talk to you about your expertise in fuinjutsu. Yesterday our main supplier for seals died on a mission. As seals are a delicate topic, I can't just import pre-made seals from outside the village. Too much potential for sabotage. While some of our ninjas can make the basic seals for their needs, most of our forces just buy them at shinobi equipment shops or are given them from the armoury if the mission requires them." The Hokage explained.

"So you want me to take over for the killed ninja?" Naruto clarified.

"Yes, this would be treated as an on-going secret B-rank mission for your file. You will be paid by the number of seals you made. The current payment for twenty explosive tags for example is one thousand four hundred and thirty ryo. You will be given a list with the prices you will be paid for each kind of seal. If you supply other useful seals we will decide on their prices accordingly." The Hokage said.

"Okay, but won't people protest if they know that I made those seals? I am not the most well-liked guy in the village after all and many would accuse me of trying to kill them through faulty seals." Naruto said.

"That won't be a problem, because the seals will be distributed under the codename Dark Phoenix." The Hokage assured Naruto.

"Okay, that would work. What about the supplies to make the seals and how many seals do you need right now?" Naruto asked.

The Hokage took a piece of paper and handed it to Naruto. Naruto looked over the seals that were needed.

"For the supplies, you can get the paper and ink at Jakonato's and put it on the village armoury tab. Just use a henge when you get them." He handed him a permission document.

"Consider it done, old man. They will be ready tomorrow morning." Naruto said.

"So fast?" The Hokage asked surprised.

"Shadow clones." Naruto only said grinning.

"Ah, of course. Well, then I won't keep you from your training anymore, Naruto." The Hokage said.

Naruto nodded and left the room. Outside the tower he made a shadow clone and gave it the permission document and let it go buying the supplies for the seals. He himself went back to his training ground.

He informed Kakashi that he had got an on-going mission for the Hokage to supply the village with seals. Keeping it a secret from his sensei wouldn't have made any sense as Kakashi already knew about his identity and his real abilities.


So, the plot thickens. Massiv changes will occure. Till in two weeks.