Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi. Someone go out and write some graffiti on the wall that says Kenchi is awesome. It's a message that needs to be spread to the world, and I'm not going to be the one to do it. I've got job interviews to do, I can't have a criminal record.

Chapter 8: To The Letter


Another sunrise, another peaceful morning awakening in his own bed for one Uzumaki Naruto.

Only there was something strange afoot on this day. Naruto could feel it before he even opened his eyes, but it seemed like whatever it was had been there for quite some time before he'd noticed it. Whatever it was wasn't hurting him, and it had already had plenty of time to do so, so it was allowed to continue existing in its same state. Until it was actually time for him to wake up for real it could wait.

Right on the dot, the alarm next to Naruto's head on the nightstand went off, but before his hand could reach out for it the device shut off.

Okay, that was too weird to ignore in exchange for catching his 'z's.

Opening his eyes, Naruto bore witness to the eerily calm expression of his sensei, standing crouched on his bed looking down over him. Her sheathed nodachi had been used to reach over and tap the alarm clock off without waking him as she seemed to just be staring at him.

The second Naruto's vision cleared and he realized what was going on he did the only thing that felt logical at the time, "WAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!"

After several seconds of him shouting at the top of his lungs the door to his room burst open with Tenten leading the way in her pajamas with her hair down out of her buns, holding a handful of odd throwing knives that she planned to throw right at Shigure upon getting first sight of the strange woman.

She refrained from throwing though, as lingering behind was Shikamaru who looked inside of the doorway, saw Shigure, and then started yelling himself, "AAAAAAAHHHH!" His yell startled Tenten worse than Naruto's original one that roused her from her sleep did, "Devil woman with the sword! In the house! What the hell!?"

This was his nightmare. One of the terrible Ryouzanpaku masters in his house.

Well, it was Naruto's house, but he was staying there at least for the time being, so technically it was his house to an extent as well.

Naruto eventually stopped yelling when the logic portion of his brain caught up with his instinct and he shut himself up, "Shigure?" He asked before turning his head to look at his clock, "…It's six a.m."

Shigure kept looking down at Naruto with a slight shift of her lips into something of a frown. He still wouldn't call her sensei for whatever reason. He still did everything she told him to do when training, but while she'd never say it she was a bit bothered by him not referring to her as such.

Shikamaru then stopped yelling and looked rightfully embarrassed for suddenly losing his cool like that. But seriously, he had nightmares that started out similarly to the current real-world situation. Hopefully no one had paid attention to him, but Tenten holding onto her left ear told him that even if she wasn't saying anything she was a bit put out by the ringing in her ears.

"Who is this woman?" Tenten asked, wondering why Naruto seemed cool with the entire situation now after previously yelling his head off, "How'd she get into the house? A lot of the place is booby-trapped." Feeling a poking at her leg she looked down to see a mouse chewing on a portion of a cookie, "Oh God, you've got mice!"

"That's Shigure's pet." Naruto said in explanation, "…And probably how she figured out where all the traps were before coming in. Why are you here by the way?"

At first she didn't speak, but instead reached out and gave him several pats on the head as if he were an animal of some sort, "You're allowed to use shuriken again." She said, pointing to the stockpile she'd taken from him previously that she'd left in the corner of his room, "You know… the most important rules. Don't you?"

"Everything's a weapon."

"Do you know any more?"

"Uh…" These all had to be as obvious as the first one was, "Every weapon can be deadly." He hurriedly said, hoping that the second would be as blatantly obvious as the first. Once he got a nod he pumped his fist victoriously, "Sweet! What do I get back now?"

Shigure thought about it before jumping off of Naruto's bed back onto the floor, "You… can select this time. Look around your armory… and choose when you arrive for training this evening. I'll be there."

With that, she walked out of Naruto's room between Shikamaru and Tenten, waiting for her mouse Tochumaru to climb up onto her shoulder so that she could leave through the front door… as if that were cool after getting into the house at who knows what hour.

What an incredibly odd lady.

As the scene that started their day seemed to be over, Tenten yawned a bit and sat down on the end of Naruto's bed, "Who was that?"

"My master I guess." Naruto figured was the best way to explain the situation to his for-the-time-being roommate, "She's also the lady that's kind of the point of Shikamaru and my mission. She's got the stuff we're supposed to be stealing, but I don't know which weapon it is, or if she even keeps them at Ryouzanpaku."

"That woman was a master?" Tenten said, looking a bit bewildered, "I almost…" She was about to attack her. What horrible thing would have happened to her if Shikamaru's abruptly adding onto Naruto's yelling didn't throw her off?

"Yeah, don't ever do what you were about to do if you like those pajamas."

Shikamaru sighed and leaned against the doorframe to Naruto's room, "She's Katsujinken so she won't kill you. If she was about that she would have murdered him over and over again by now for sneaking onto their property." He said, gesturing to Naruto.

"Whatever." Naruto jumped up out of bed and did some rudimentary stretches, "It's time to use that brain of yours Shikamaru, you and Tenten." Of course he was talking about finding a way to neutralize Ragnarok with finality, "No killing though please."

"A Katsujinken ninja." Tenten said with a shake of her head, "That's kind of counterproductive don't you think?"

"I'm not Katsujinken!" Naruto shouted, stopping his morning stretches to glare at Tenten, "I just don't want to start killing a bunch of teenagers in the street. Is that so wrong?" So far nobody had tried to kill him and his, they'd just threatened to beat their brains in, "Why would I want to do that?"

"Because killing them would make it really easy to get them to leave you alone." Tenten answered, balancing a kunai by its point on her fingertip before she admitted that Naruto had something of a point in his own way, "But then again that would be really stupid to do. I mean everyone would know you did it so that would make being a ninja much harder for you than it already is."

"-Because people already know you're a ninja at your school." Shikamaru followed up, rubbing it in deeper on Naruto, "Jeez Naruto. Now I'm as much of a fan of the totally platonic cohabitation as anyone else, but I'm not living here forever, and she's going to want to go outside in the daylight at some point."

"Indeed." Tenten chimed in, "Your house is nice, but only being able to go out into the backyard is getting old and it's only been two days since I've been here." Nothing personal, but she really despised being overly dependent on other people. Still, killing off kids left and right really wasn't a smart course of action at all in this scenario, "Well let's look at the bright side. You already proved you can beat some of them, so we don't have to worry about if you can do it or not."

"I can beat all of them." Naruto boasted openly with a thumb pointed at his puffed out chest, "Just leave it to me. This whole thing'll be settled in no time, 'ttebayo!"

Tenten just deadpanned a stare at him before running a hand through her hair, "Yeah… you beat the Eighth Fist and hung with the Third. Let's not go overboard here buddy. Kisara wasn't supposed to be the most dangerous. The danger goes up the smaller the number, not down."

"I know that damn it!" Naruto replied, rebutting harshly out of embarrassment for whatever reason before leaving the room, "Grah! I'm taking a shower first today if you're gonna be all negative like that!"

"It's not negative, it's just being realistic!" Tenten called down the hall after him, getting a slam from the upstairs bathroom door in response, "Hehe, he forgot to train before he showered. He seems like the kind of guy that'll be pissed about that when he realizes it later."

"He also forgot that there's a shower in the first floor bathroom and a furo in the basement."

"…Hey can we really do this by ourselves? Beat Ragnarok?" It was a bit understandable that she'd feel apprehensive about their chances. Tenten had been a Valkyrie, a divisional gang member of Ragnarok, not a Fist, "It's just the three of us. If you count Naruto's friends from his school that's more, but we're not going to be working with them ourselves are we?" Even then it was still just a handful of people from what she'd heard, "Should I have stayed in, as a spy?"

Shikamaru sighed. It was way too early in the morning for him to be playing stand-up for a girl. Even so, "You said the reason you had a place to stay when we met was because of them right? Well that'd be too risky for you if we did that. Do you really believe in your subterfuge that much to get away with it when you have to spend most waking minutes around them?"

He himself was alright at it. He'd never want to put that to the test in a room full of jackals, but he felt he'd be okay. From what he knew, Naruto sucked at it. Sure, he was great at hiding things, but the way Naruto did it was by not addressing whatever the thing was to begin with and ignoring it as if he were whiting out something on a page.

That worked when you were mostly left alone, but in Tenten's circumstance she was a member of a small, rather intimately close-knit unit. When it came to outright deceiving people to their faces with words and actions, he couldn't so he left things unsaid when he could. In a situation like hers, Naruto would have been compromised.

Tenten shook her head with a frown on her face. She could do it, but she wouldn't have felt comfortable with it and it would have shown. The little jump-out she was living with them now to avoid would seem like nothing compared to what they'd do if she was caught as a double-agent and they must have known that.

The concern was appreciated and noted. They'd just met her and instead of trying to use her as a way to keep tabs on the enemy they pulled her out. Not the wisest choice, but it showed their character for better or worse.

"It's okay. We said we're in this together and we meant it." Scratching his scalp, Shikamaru continued, "Look, Naruto's stronger than me. He sounds like he's full of hot air all of the time, but if he says anything, even if it sounds like bloviating, he'd cut off his left hand to back it up before he let it be untrue. All we need is everything you already know. That's more than enough."

"But all of the Fists are stronger than me and the Fourth Fist Loki is a strategist on top of it." Tenten said in deep contemplation, "He's the best at winning without ever having to do any of the heavy lifting himself. He keeps himself away from the actual battle at all costs when he's taking it seriously, never wants to handle the dirty work himself."

"Well I can't say that'll be an option for us." Shikamaru admitted lazily, "Chances are, we're going to have to fight. We can't just send Naruto in. But here's the thing, I've heard about that guy. Naruto told me about that guy. I know a guy kind of like that."

He was a guy kind of like that. And Shikamaru wasn't afraid of a guy like that. He knew how to deal with him when the time came.

"Loki's an administrator, not an operator." The unwilling ninja said, "He watches things from afar and never gets his hands dirty if he can help it. So we've got to put him in the place where he feels the least comfortable, with no other option but to do the fighting himself. It doesn't matter if he's actually really talented as a fighter, taking away his options'll make him overthink every move he makes and panic."

"Uh huh…" Tenten followed along with a nod, "But you've got to outmaneuver him first. Shikamaru, he's going to have a plan. He's going to have a plan in case the plan fails."

"I know. We've got to disrupt that. The thing is, you beat a guy like Loki by drawing him in with three things." He seemed to be barely awake as he spoke, but he had Tenten's full attention nonetheless. It was just something about how he carried himself, as if he had full confidence-, no it wasn't confidence, it was more like full understanding, in what he was saying, "Distraction, diversion, and division. Then you put him on display for the whole world to see."

"And that's how you beat him?"

"No." Shikamaru said, shaking his head much to Tenten's confusion, "For a guy like that… that's how you break him."

What about how he said all of that sent a chill down her spine? Yeah, this guy was definitely one of them, a ninja, even if he didn't want to be like he appeared to, "…You know, you're actually pretty reliable when you want to be." Tenten said with a small smile. She was starting to see how Naruto and Shikamaru's dynamic worked and they'd kept from killing each other despite being so fundamentally different, "I didn't know you were that smart."

"No, I'm not." Shikamaru replied with a bit of a glare, even though he was too lazy to hold it, "And definitely don't tell Naruto I said any of that. He'd ask me to actively do more stuff if he knew how much I actually thought about it." Naruto had an idea that Shikamaru was pretty damn intelligent, but even he had no idea just how much, and the latter liked it that way.

Actually, now that Shikamaru had time to think about what he figured they were up against when it came to Ragnarok, there was something to the point of the numbers game they'd been talking about earlier. Something very intriguing happened to Naruto yesterday, that if played straight could wind up helping them immensely when it came to how outnumbered they were.

All he had to do was convince Naruto that it was worth looking into, because it would seriously make things a whole lot easier. And hey, he could skip school today to plot and scheme as much as he needed to.

He was going to skip anyway, but now at least he could act like he had a reason for it.

XxX

(Hidden Warehouse – Ragnarok Hideout)

"You were defeated?" The focused look from behind the glasses of Ragnarok's First Fist Odin was one more of interest than of anger at being told this news; that his newest Fist had been overcome in combat, "By Uzumaki… or Shirahama?"

"Uzumaki." Kisara groused outright. It wouldn't do to try and cover it up if he was asking about it. If he didn't believe what she was saying he'd find out somehow anyway, "I don't know much of what Shirahama can do outside of what Shiratori told me from when they fought. She can't point out what kind of style he actually uses… it's like a bunch of them at once."

"Oh really?" Color him intrigued, "Go on."

"I don't know exactly how good he is, but Uzumaki… he's… he's." It really hurt to suck it up and admit as much, but she'd already acknowledged defeat and interest of her own in his moves, so with a sigh she had to finish her thought, "…He's the real deal. I still don't know about all of that ninja crap, but whatever he does he's good enough at it to beat me head up."

She had no excuses. The first time she couldn't put him down she complained that there were too many of her own gang members around to properly fight him despite the fact that he seemed to be the only one that really cared about that at the time, but the second bout was clear. He'd won handily. She didn't even remember landing a single clean blow on him either.

He fought her without pitying her like a sexist or devaluing her skills as a fighter just because she was a woman. He took it gravely serious from start to finish and did his due diligence in getting the job done.

Uzumaki Naruto was still cockier than shit, but she had a feeling that even if she'd beaten him on that occasion, if she had done it but left him well enough to come back later for another try he'd have taken it and still been super-confident in his abilities, because it wasn't arrogance.

It wasn't the kind of self-belief you developed by being told by others that you were good, it was the kind of self-belief you developed when there was no one to tell you so, no positive reinforcement whatsoever. It was the kind of confidence that you had to give yourself only by shoving it down your own throat every day when you woke up and looked in the mirror in the morning.

It was more determination than confidence really. When misinterpreted the two had many crossover points, but she could see where the difference lied with Naruto.

"Valkyrie."

Odin's voice roused her from her thoughts, and thank goodness that he did. There were more important things for her to think about than some stupid guy she was going to find a way to defeat later, "Yeah? What's wrong?"

"I wonder, should I extend the olive branch to these would-be enemies of ours."

"I already tried asking Uzumaki. He turned me down." She didn't want that loudmouth in her gang anyway, she already had one in Koga. But at least unlike Koga, Naruto would have actually been useful, "He's not into what we're about or whatever he was complaining about back then."

"Did you ask him to join Ragnarok in general, or just your gang?"

"Why would I ask that grinning jackass to join Ragnarok outside of my jurisdiction? Like he's better than me."

"Apparently he is." Odin said with a small smile that got Kisara to growl under her breath, "But I understand why you did what you did at the time." A Fist of Ragnarok would never admit to being on someone else's level outside of their own ranks unless it was proven in battle, "I'll tell you what. I won't have you punished for losing."

Really? That was a surprise. All this time she'd been dreading getting in trouble for not having her district of the town cleared out of any and all opposition to Ragnarok's influence by now. In this case she'd actually lost a fight, but wasn't going to receive consequences for it?

"Why?" Kisara had been expecting something like being replaced, but then again it wasn't like anyone else in Ragnarok was good enough for her spot.

"Since you're the only person that knows how to find him in the slightest, I want you to give him a message." Odin said, walking off while shoving his hands into the pockets of his white suit, "The First Fist wishes for a summit. No fighting, just a venue to talk."

Loki of all people couldn't corner and finish Shirahama Kenichi. Freya and the entirety of the Valkyries couldn't corner and finish Uzumaki Naruto. The latter had just gotten through defeating the most recent inductee into the Fists in the girl right in front of him.

Once again, to destroy potential resources like them seemed like such a waste.

XxX

(Later That Day – Ryouzanpaku Dojo – Shigure's Room)

"I don't think I'm ever gonna get over how much stuff is in here." Naruto said as he sat down on the floor and looked around to take it all in once again, "How long did it take to learn how to use all of this stuff the right way?" He asked before switching his question, "…How old are you?"

Once again, in what seemed to be a normal occurrence whenever Naruto tried to push her buttons in order to get some kind of outburst out of her, she just stared at him until he felt uncomfortable for ever bringing it up. After hearing him mumble a 'nevermind' she turned her back to him and looked around, "You've had all day so choose… what you'd like to learn about."

Naruto's eyes craned to the ceiling and stared for a moment, "Part of me really wants to use that Zanbatou near the ceiling." Final Fantasy VII buster sword style, "…But, I still want the manriki-gusari. Give me my chain back."

"Why are you so set on using that weapon?" Shigure slowly asked curiously, "And if you want to be taught to use a chain weapon, why not choose the kusarigama?" She so badly wanted to teach him how to use something sharp.

"'Cuz I can't pull out a sickle in school." Naruto said, making the weapons master feel a bit embarrassed, not that it showed on her face one bit. Sure, he carried shuriken and kunai when he could, but he never pulled them out in the halls. He wanted to, but now he'd be the first suspect if there were nicks in the walls or lockers, and he didn't need that crap, "Besides, one of the things I remember about my mom is that she was really good with chain weapons."

Being that he was so small when he'd left home, he didn't have a ton of full, clear memories about what his parents were like, but the ones that he did have were strong.

"Very well." Shigure said, handing Naruto his choice of combat tool that she'd kept confiscated from him since they'd begun training, "I'll teach you how to use this first if you really want me to. I will teach you how to use both the manriki-gusari and the kusarigama… for different situations."

She did ask him to pick, but she was a little put down that he didn't choose anything with a blade first. He wouldn't have a choice in this one though, he'd be learning how to use both even if he wound up focusing more on the blade-less weapon for starters (which was surprisingly responsible for someone like him).

She wanted to teach someone how to wield dangerous weaponry efficiently damn it! And from the look of surprise on his face he apparently never expected her to actually be willing to double up on what she was teaching him. Clearly he was interested, and thus she was pleased.

So up and out of the room they went, with Naruto reveling in the fact that Shigure's own impatience in wanting to get to teaching him the good stuff wound up with him getting his direct combat weapon of choice back as well as the deadly-enhanced version with a sickle on the end.

He hadn't planned it like that at all, thinking that she'd probably commend him for being 'responsible' for not picking that one first. Instead she was bummed that he hadn't picked it over the supposedly nonlethal version.

And now they were both going to go train with dangerous tools, and both were almost just as excited about it as the other. That would change for one of them soon enough when the training actually started, but for now it was a nice little walk outside to get across the yard to the actual dojo building where it would all commence.

Once again, something that should have been and was probably about to be a sensei/student bonding moment was about to be ruined when once they entered and saw Kenichi already training with Ma Kensei on the Chinese Kenpo aspect of his fighting, Naruto found his progression halted when he was randomly plucked up by his backpack and held up face-to-face with Apachai, "…What?"

Even though by now he knew that the massive Thai man was as docile as they came most of the time, he couldn't help but remember the extremely wicked scar that still existed on his body from the first time they'd met. So instead of barking the question at him as he was wont to do due to his irritation at being lifted off of the ground like a small rodent by the scruff of its neck, he refrained from doing anything that would overly excite him.

"Apa, Apachai wants to know why Naruto doesn't call Shigure master."

Though she didn't turn back around or say a word, Shigure did stop and listen intently to whatever answer Naruto would give Apachai to get him to put him down. She was very curious about this, but never asked him in the week or so that she had been working with him. She knew that he knew better, but that he simply chose not to refer to her as –sensei for whatever reason, no matter if it seemed disrespectful or not.

Looking around, Naruto noticed that he had more than just Apachai's attention, noting that Kensei wanted to hear his answer to the point that he even allowed Kenichi to stop his regimen without tyrannically forcing him back to work so that he could take it in as well.

Feeling put on the spot, Naruto sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck and grinned at them all with squinted eyes, "Well I can't. It's not right."

"What do you mean by not right?" Kensei asked, shuffling over while hiding his hands in the long sleeves of his Chinese shirt, "It's a show of respect and trust to refer to your teacher as such you know."

"Yeah I know, she asked me to train with her." Naruto said with a bit of a twitching eye, maintained while still squinting somehow, "But the reason is because I can't do it and betray her trust like that."

"Betray her trust?" Kenichi said in confusion before remembering what Naruto was talking about, "Oh! Wait, are you still going to do that? Steal from Ryouzanpaku?"

"Yeah. One day soon I'm gonna find what I'm looking for here, and I'm gonna take it to finish my mission." Naruto said with a bit of a fire in his eyes as he reminded himself of his overreaching goal, "But I'm still grateful. You don't know how much."

Because she was taking a chance on him. Because for once in his life someone wanted to help him because he was him. Back at the Homeland, he was only taught because he had to be. He was a face in a crowd and the only thing that mattered was that he developed well enough to become a working cog in the machine. He understood and accepted it, but it wound up being so cold, and he couldn't ever truly adjust to it. He couldn't become a robot, because he made a promise to never let them change who he was.

Shigure wanted to help. He had nothing to give in return other than a bit of tuition pay each month for the training, which really wasn't that much in the grand scheme of things.

"So I can't do it; call her –sensei." Naruto said, shaking his head with a frown, "Because that'd be betraying her when I finally do get what I want. At least this way... at least like this I'm letting you all know what the score is in advance right?"

He had a rather abnormal sense of honor that could be confusing, and a rather strange approach to being a ninja. He had a clearly established line, and absolutely he'd dance all over it, but he wouldn't cross it. He'd steal from them because it was his apparent mission, but he'd tell them he was going to do it because he had involuntarily gotten friends that were close to the dojo. He would gleefully hit an opponent from behind if he was given the opening to do so, even against Kenichi and Miu in spars, but he wouldn't cripple an actual adversary against him just because he could.

He wouldn't lie and say that he wasn't going to do his job even if they would believe him, even if it would give him an advantage. Outright deception to someone offering and giving him help was clearly stepping over his line. It was betrayal to him, and to a Konoha ninja, betrayal was the absolute worst crime that existed.

Granted that teaching was taught solely with the intention to instill in the children that only the overall clan of Konoha was never to be betrayed, but Naruto took that as any friend. Which was why he told them anytime they would listen that one day he was going to get what he was after, warning them outright what he was going to eventually do.

"Can you put me down now?" Naruto asked after no one had said anything for a few moments, "These are one of my school clothes sets." He didn't get what was so strange about what he'd said. He figured that not calling her –sensei when he was knowingly going to eventually rip her off was respectful.

The hulking Apachai set Naruto back down on the ground, and eager to put that entire awkward episode behind them all, Naruto started to fish through his heavy backpack for a change of clothes to train in. Before he could walk off somewhere to do so, Shigure set a hand on his head, confusing him.

Her index finger then pressed off of the center of his goggles and pushed his head back a bit, "…Hard-headed, but it makes you… who you are I guess." With that she simply walked away and sat down, waiting on Naruto to go change and return.

Still totally confused, Naruto just readjusted the eyewear on his forehead and went off to go put on some active clothes he could actually live with getting torn up in training.

Kensei just grinned underneath the brim of his cap and decided to get back to work, directing Kenichi to get back to the task of smoothly going through the motions of his techniques while having to shift his body position around his master's (drastically slowed) attacks, "I don't think I've seen Shigure-don so lively since she's been here. Who would think that it would be someone like Naruto to bring it out of her? They're complete opposites."

'Lively?' Kenichi thought to himself before focusing back up, lest he wind up catching a nerfed blow from Kensei that would still probably put him out for fifteen minutes minimum if it landed, 'That's lively?' She barely said anything and then went to sit off in the far end of the room.

XxX

(Three Days Later – Kouryo High School)

For Naruto, Cross-country club was normally so easy it was boring. All he did was stretch and run. In the first week he wound up blowing out the aces of the club, but it wasn't because he was trying to be a jerk, he was really trying to tire himself out for real and push his cardiovascular conditioning.

…It was just that his endurance was already so well-developed that he had to go way past what anyone else was already doing to tire himself out. There were a few of them that could do five-minute mile runs, and he made them feel inadequate. The loud kid that no one had thought was much of an athlete or anything at all until that dumb ninja rumor was somehow proven true.

Of course everyone got over it, and Naruto stopped feeling so awkward about it when everybody realized that eventually they'd be running meets. And they would always have an ace-in-the-hole if they wanted it, since Naruto really only wanted to join for the training, not for the accolades, thus he would sit out running unless they needed him to.

The least he could do for stealing their shine was refrain from stealing their scholarships… at least for this season. For the following year's track & field and cross-country all bets were off because he needed to get into a university too, and he damn sure wasn't going to get in for scholastic achievement.

Still, he hated running, and he had to weigh himself down to get any effect at all. He had to argue with the coach to get the man to let him wear his bag at practice, and then he still had to carry more in addition to it to get any sort of noticeable drag.

'I feel like Kenichi only no one's whipping me.' Naruto thought to himself as he ran laps around the school at the start of practice, pulling a gigantic super-single tractor tire tied to his back to significantly slow him down and make him work. He hated running for practice. It was so boring, 'Whatever. Handle it here so you can just work on the good stuff with Shigure later.'

Things could have been even more boring though, so the bright side had to be looked for. Running all over the place at least gave Naruto the chance to run past the Gardening Club greenhouse where he could easily yell greetings to his friend, and by the room used for the Gymnastics Club, but he couldn't really drag a gigantic tire in there to say hello to Miu sometimes.

He'd actually tried but had forgotten to untie himself before going in, so he wound up getting stuck at the door with a huge tire behind him. It was probably best to give that a few more weeks to let people forget about that before he ventured that way again.

"Yo! Long time no see!"

Turning to his right, Naruto saw the white hair in a ponytail and the easygoing grin of Takeda Ikki, dressed in workout clothes and running right alongside him, pumping his arms out in jabs with every few steps, "Takeda! Yeah, definitely 'ttebayo! How's that left arm doing?"

Even if they'd fought before, Takeda helped Kenichi out in a pinch, and besides all of that the guy was just so laidback all of the time that it was hard to not think he was totally cool.

"Good enough to put me at the top of the school's Boxing Club." Takeda boasted casually before clapping Naruto on the back, "Just doing some roadwork right now. But man, it's so good to be able to get back in the ring again! You don't even know how grateful I am to you Ryouzanpaku folks. Ukita's even made amends for what he used to do and gotten back into actual Judo."

Naruto snickered and shrugged, "I don't get it, but if you want to thank me for kicking your ass I'll take it. And I ain't Ryouzanpaku either, but I'll tell them later."

"Little smartass." Takeda jested, flicking his ultra-quick left out at Naruto in a faux-jab as they kept running, "By the way, there's some rumblings going around that you beat Nanjou Kisara during the underclass career fair trip. That's mighty impressive."

"Nah, really?" Let it be known that Naruto loved being praised by others for the things that he did. Lack of positive reinforcement by peers or positive-influence adults for the better part of the decade either kills your self-esteem or forces you to build it up so high yourself that it borders on superciliousness. It was quite clear that with Naruto it was the latter, "Go on, tell me more."

"I didn't know you were starting your own group either."

Hold up. Literally, because Naruto tripped over his own feet and got a face full of dirt and grass before instantly hopping back up as if he'd never done it, "Say what now?"

Was it really getting that much buzz that fast? And people were really taking it that seriously? Apparently since Niijima had finally been proven correct (somewhat) about Naruto's ninja background that gave him a golden ticket of sorts when it came to his rumors.

"Yeah, that didn't sound like something you'd do, but that's the word." Takeda said, laughing to himself due to the dirt marks and the three ants stuck to Naruto's face, "They're usually around that Niijima guy. But they say that you and Kenichi are never around because he's training with devastating masters, and you're keeping your mystique as the shinobi."

Wiping his face with one hand, pasted a bit of a grimace on his face when he remembered what Shikamaru asked him to do if they were really going to take the fight to Ragnarok in a hurry, "…Show me where."

XxX

(Kouryou High School – 3rd Floor Physics Lab)

"This is going to be the start of an empire Kenichi old boy, mark my words."

"Niijima, what the hell are you talking about?" Kenichi asked as he stood in disbelief. Apparently the several others outside of the room standing guard or something were for some reason completely loyal to Niijima as the man in charge, and why he couldn't understand, "What empire?"

"The one we'll build together from the ground up." Niijima said with a devious smirk, "Look, you've proven that you're not a perennial loser the way everyone always said you were. I mean you're actually finding ways to take on Ragnarok and win!"

"Not by choice!" Not by his choice. Naruto on the other hand was just fine with taking the fight right to them, and it was only deterrence from him and Miu that kept him from hastily going on a straightforward crusade to their doorstep, "You're just going to make things worse!"

"How much worse could this possibly make things?" Niijima deadpanned earnestly. Seriously, he had a point. They had already pissed off multiple members of Ragnarok's Eight Fists, and actually defeated one. There wasn't really any going back now, "At worst, this'll at least give you some extra muscle to turn the tide of things around! Or do you want guys like Loki to try getting at you with your sister around again?"

Ooh, cheap shot. And it was one that resonated. Honoka didn't need to be exposed to dangerous things like that what had happened. Even if she did find it a bit fun to hang around the dojo with Apachai, it was a different matter when he found out how scared she'd been after he'd been defeated by Loki and heavily injured.

If she hadn't found Naruto, or if Naruto hadn't been so ready for action when she did find him, things could have gone worse than they did that day. And Takeda did really save his ass aside from that.

But still… it wasn't his kind of thing.

A few loud cheers came from outside before the door to the lab was kicked in by Naruto who was being trailed by an amused-looking Takeda… and a huge tractor tire tied to the former's back, "Niijima. You can keep the… whatever you're calling this group of guys."

"You see! Naruto's on board!" Niijima shouted, tongue forking out of his mouth as he stood on his chair and pointed at the blond ninja until he had a cell phone tossed at him that he had to catch, "What's this?"

"Meet someone new." Naruto said as he stayed at the doorway.

While Niijima began talking to whomever it was on Naruto's phone that he was asked to speak to, Kenichi went over to Naruto whose foot was tapping impatiently and irritably on the floor for some reason, "Naruto-san, why are you and Takeda-senpai here?"

"Uh, something happened that you need to hear about."

(Flashback – On the Way to the Physics Lab)

"You should really untie yourself from that thing and take it back outside." Takeda said as Naruto rolled the tractor wheel through the hall door that was being held open for him, "This doesn't seem smart."

"I'm not letting somebody steal my tire!" Naruto exclaimed, as if someone would actually take his stupid tire away from him, "This is the only one that groundskeepers let me take to use. They don't have any spares."

Takeda just decided to go with the flow in the end. If something went wrong, hey it wasn't his fault. Besides, most of the stricter teachers that would call Naruto out on it were gone and the only ones left were the ones in charge of club activities, so it was probably going to be fine.

"Oh God, are you really dragging a tire around with you?"

Upon hearing that voice come from an empty classroom, both Naruto and Takeda backtracked and saw Kisara sitting around on one of the desks, this time without her entire posse in tow. Only Shiratori.

After catching sight of Naruto and Takeda she jumped off of her temporary seat and walked over to them, with Takeda gearing up for a fight of sorts, "Calm down, I'm not going to kick your asses today. But I have been looking for you Uzumaki. For a few days. I figured knowing you were in cross-country would make you easier to find!"

"Well the entire point of cross-country is running all over the place." Which was perfect for avoiding trouble, a second benefit to the club. He made up his own routes to run so even if someone figured out his route one day he never did the same one two days in a row. It explained how it was so hard to find him when he really wasn't hiding or sneaking around school any longer to avoid Ragnarok, "So what's up?"

"Odin wants a sit-down."

Takeda gaped in shock and awe while Naruto just stared flatly, "…Which one's that again?" The latter asked.

"The First Fist you ass! Stop eating paint chips and get your shit together!" She seriously lost to this rube? Kisara just couldn't believe it sometimes.

"Well I'm sorry! All these nicknames and numbers, I can't keep it straight!" It wasn't like Naruto had ever met him either, so what was she getting all bent out of shape about?

Kisara looked about ready to initiate round three with Naruto, and he looked fully prepared to reciprocate in kind despite mentioning previously that he really didn't want to dance for a third time. At the last second though, she scoffed and pulled out a folded paper that she handed to Naruto, "Tch. Here. Take this. It's the time and place for the meet and what the conditions to it are supposed to be."

"Okay, I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer but why the hell would I go to this thing?" Naruto asked as he looked at the folded paper in his hand with a raised brow, "If it's not a trap I'll eat my goggles."

"You don't have to go alone." Kisara said, holding her beret down to shadow her eyes, "It's not just for you. It's for everyone like you that Ragnarok is against right now. Takeda, Ukita, the Shirahama kid, whatever. I won't be there anyway and this wasn't my idea, so I really don't care what you do with it."

She moved right past them without incident and went along her own business, leaving Naruto to watch her depart down the hall and Takeda to gawk at what had just happened, taking the paper from Naruto's hand to open it up and read it, "Naruto do you have any idea how legit this is?" He asked, getting no response, "Naruto? Naruto!"

"Huh?" Eyes departing from Kisara's fine retreating backside, Naruto paid Takeda attention once more, "What? What's up?"

Really? He felt totally comfortable ogling a woman that had tried to cave his head in not too long ago? Alright, whatever floated his boat was just fine with Takeda, "I thought this could have been a trap for the deserter's penalty that Ukita and I owe, but this is… really legit."

"How legit?" Naruto asked, moving next to the boxer to see what he was looking at.

"Too legit."

"…Too legit to quit?"

"If you're not going to do the dance that goes with that song stop it." Takeda said, "Because if you do it I'll do it, and if someone sees it we're both screwed."

"Sorry." Naruto said as he had to concede that everything seemed absolutely official and straight-up, as if they were two actual warring factions instead of just a bunch of kids with above-average fighting ability, "But man. Should we go?"

A big part of Takeda was dreading his deserter's penalty, but it was scary just how curious he really was as to what would happen if this was really real, "So you're including me in this now?" The hard-punching second-year student asked before chuckling, "Just kidding. But it does seem like a trap."

"I still want to go though." Apparently Naruto was 'horror movie curious' as well, and he knew that he knew better, "But I can't… maybe." With that, he pulled out his cell phone and quick-dialed one of his contacts much to Takeda's confusion, "…Hey Shikamaru. Alright, hear me out because I'm about to say something that'll probably piss you off."

(End Flashback)

XxX

(One Hour Later – Ryouzanpaku Dojo)

Naruto stood on the top of a single wooden post hammered into the ground that was seven feet tall with only enough space on it for both of his feet to barely fit. In his hand he was spinning the chain weapon of the weighted manriki-gusari and glaring hatefully at Shigure from behind his goggles. He'd gotten better with starting up the motion of the swinging the chain, able to get it going quickly with one circular motion of his wrist.

Shigure had clearly worked with him to the extent where she'd cleaned up his basics with the weapon, as it only took the slightest of finger and wrist movements to keep it moving blurrily above his head or by his side, wherever he chose to hold the business end of the chain. Kenichi could see the clear difference from just three days ago when he'd seen Shigure fix him up from how he'd been using it before.

The even-tempered female weapons specialist was holding onto a rather large and filled loose sack with her pet mouse on her shoulder observing the whole thing up close. Reaching into the bag she pulled out a blank CD that glowed in the sunlight ominously.

Sitting off to the side a very safe distance away on the grass on a picnic blanket were the rest of the Ryouzanpaku masters as well as Kenichi and Miu, the latter of whom was serving the masters snacks as if they were day spectators to some outdoor gathering.

"Taking any bets?" Kensei whispered to Sakaki behind Akisame as the burly, brutish Karate master took a large swig from a bottle of sake, "On when or if she kills him during this exercise or not?"

"Sure." Sakaki said, wiping his mouth before making his wager, "How about 4800 yen if she takes off a hand, 2500 for cutting him deep enough to need a transfusion-."

"How much does no lasting damage pay?" Akisame asked without even turning his head to the conversation going on literally right behind his back.

"55000."

"Eh. Sounds fair enough." Akisame replied calmly, "Put me down for that one. I'll consider myself a risk-taker today."

"Should we make a chart for each level of bodily damage he takes?" Kensei asked as he stroked his mustache in thought, "Just to keep things more on-the-level. It would make betting on his injuries more orderly."

Not seeming to care at all about the value of the sixteen-year old life on the post before them, Apachai gleefully spoke up, "Apa, what about if Naruto dies?"

"Death pays out 10000 even."

Kenichi didn't know what to make of all of this. Apparently Shigure leaving Naruto reasonably unscathed during this exercise was less likely and paid out more than it would have if she went ahead and accidentally mutilated or killed him.

Of course he then remembered where he was, who he was talking about, and his own short brush about learning how to handle an armed opponent with her and realized that it was sort of appropriate. It was actually very appropriate.

Eventually the very low sums of money being thrown around in case of his theoretical maiming grew to be too much for the hothead that all of this was for, "Is that all my life is worth to you bastards!?" Naruto snapped at them all, as he could clearly hear every word that they'd been saying, "10000 yen? 10000 yen won't even buy this place groceries for the week!"

"If you don't stop yelling at all of us about what your life is worth to you…" Hayato said as Miu finished providing the others with snacks and sat down on his right between him and Kenichi, "…And start focusing on the training, you'll regret it Naruto-kun."

Right. The old man might have pissed him off more than any other master at Ryouzanpaku, aside from Sakaki Shio of course, but he was absolutely dead-on. The game face needed to be present for this one or it would probably get cut off. And with that, Naruto stared her down, letting her know he was just about ready to do this.

"Good luck Naruto-kun!" Miu cheered for his sake despite the fact that she had her own misgivings about the whole thing. Nothing about this screamed good fortune for her fellow yellow-hair, "Remember to turn to the right if you have to take one in a vital!"

The staredown wasn't much of one because with a subtle flick of her wrist Shigure pitched a blank CD at Naruto's head almost too fast for him to see before he managed to lean his head out of the way at the last second. The disk, which was completely unsharpened by the way, continued on until it reached the treeline by one of the outer walls of the dojo and sheared the top leaves off of the plant.

Kenichi let out a gulp of doom for his friend, who hadn't even turned his back to see what one blunt CD did to wood when thrown by Kousaka Shigure. At least it explained why the goggles were for once appropriate entirely for safety purposes, because he knew. It probably wouldn't have surprised him too much if he'd looked anyway.

Nodding to herself in satisfaction at his initial performance, she grabbed several more and rapidly hurled them out at Naruto who did his best to remain up on the pole while avoiding them and blocking what he could with the chain itself. Without warning she threw one directly overhead and Naruto without missing a beat let one of the lengthy weighted ends of the weapon fly up and with the speed of as if he'd been merely punching something directly in front of him he smashed it out of the air.

"Wow." Kenichi said, having never seen someone his age actually use a real weapon like that before. He'd seen punks pull pocketknives on him and he'd heard of the Valkyries, but according to Naruto they weren't that exceptional with weapons.

Shigure gave three dull claps before a bit of a gleam came to her eye, "Good… now faster." And with that, she started picking up the pace of throwing the thin disks at Naruto who was bending his body out of the way of them in odd ways when he couldn't find it in him to block them with enough accuracy, "Do not leave the post under any circumstances."

"I know the rules!" Naruto shouted back as he could swear he felt the tempo of the practice increasing. One of the CDs got past his defense and unable to dodge it well enough it cut the side of his neck and drew blood, "Oi!"

"Focus." Shigure chided as she continued hurling the disks, now beginning to move around Naruto's body to force him into at least a two-dimensional form of defense, "Lose your concentration for a moment with dangerous weaponry and it will cost you your life."

"How many CDs are in that bag?" Naruto asked as he continued to dodge before jumping off of the post straight up to simultaneously dodge a few throws and kick one out of the air that he was supposed to attack. Why was she throwing CDs of all things? Maybe she just liked their flight pattern?

"A few hundred. Maybe more than a thousand. They are… cheap nowadays." A sharp glint came to her eye when she got serious and threw one that hit Naruto dead-center in the chest and knocked him not only off the post, but sent him flying fifteen yards back before landing on the ground where he came to a stop, "I thought you knew the rules."

"Center shot! 2000 yen payout already!" Sakaki barked victoriously as he reached over and gave Kenichi several hard pats on the back, "That's the secret to gambling Kenichi, always bet on more than one outcome to cover your losses if you're going for the big one!"

Miu just shook her head in abhorrence to Sakaki's reaction while Kenichi just gaped at one of his masters, "I really don't see how 2000 yen could get you excited about watching Naruto-kun get cut up."

"OWWWW!" Naruto shouted, sitting up to reveal a CD sticking out of his chest. He tried to ignore Kenichi's rather girlish scream at the sight (as did everyone else) in exchange for fiddling around with it, "Oh man! Am I dead? I'm dead right!? What the hell!? I was following the rules!"

Shigure shook her head and walked over to Naruto who was poking at the CD still embedded in his torso like a stuck saw blade, "You broke the rules. One of them anyway." She tapped at his legs for explanation, "One anchor point has to remain on the post at all times. No jumping."

A leg, a foot, a hand, an elbow, something as long as he was never completely off of the damn thing. He was allowed one for benefit of the doubt purposes, but when he did it again he had to be punished.

Seeing Shigure reach out to pull on the CD, Naruto's eyes went wide, "No-no-no-no-no-no-n-! Fuck!" He yelled when she literally pulled him back to his feet with the object sticking out of him before it finally came out, "Why was that so deep?" He asked as he looked at the nifty new cut he had in his shirt and chest that was now bleeding liberally.

"It wasn't that deep." Shigure said, looking at the blood on the device. Her throw was perfect and cut him evenly. The wound was light enough where it wasn't going to do anything but bleed, and it was enough of a punishment for screwing up that he'd learn his lessons hard enough without really tearing him apart, 'Your wound somehow started congealing around the edges in only two minutes.'

Which didn't make any sense. In the past he'd gotten up and walked home from things that would have put others away for weeks at a time. He had healed from a broken arm far too quickly, even with Akisame's methods to speed up the recovery of his broken bone, and now this right before her eyes. There was something strange about Naruto and the ki around his injury. It was faint, but it was there. She was close enough to feel it. This boy couldn't use his ki yet so it wasn't a conscious thing.

"Alright, let's try that again." Naruto said, stomping back to the post before jumping back onto it to ready his weapon once again, "Come on, let's go."

"Are you insane?" Kenichi asked Naruto from where he and the others were sitting, "You want to go again? What's wrong with you?"

"I can go longer than three f'n minutes without getting off of this post!" Naruto yelled right back to him before locking his eyes back onto Shigure, "Start throwing the stupid things and I'll stop every single one!"

Shigure nodded and started off at the same pace that she did originally, only for Naruto to dodge each one and break the one that she threw up for him to take advantage of smoothly, "Faster." With that she began to pick up the intensity again just like before, only this time Naruto stayed rooted to the post.

"Why is Shigure-san making Naruto do this?" Miu asked her grandfather after they'd been at it for a few minutes without stopping. It seemed counteractive to everything that Naruto had shown himself to be beforehand, "In an actual fight Naruto-kun isn't going to duck and sway or block attacks, he's going to use his feet to keep away and then rush back in for a counterattack."

"And what will happen when he faces someone that he can't outpace?" Hayato asked rhetorically, "The method of outmaneuvering his enemies is only an advantage to him as long as he is quicker than anyone he fights. What will he do when speed isn't on his side, or when attacking even with all of that speed is worthless to him?"

As he spoke, he pointed out what Shigure's instructions were forcing Naruto to do. She wasn't teaching him her more formal way to dodge or slip attacks. Though this was how Shigure trained, she hadn't taught Naruto her method of motionless evasion first, she was taking what he already knew and making him evolve in a way he hadn't thought of doing before.

"That boy… even if Shigure taught him every single motion she could, he wouldn't learn them perfectly even if he repeated them all for days at a time." Akisame said, speaking more to Kenichi now than to anyone else, "Kenichi learns the full motion of whatever we teach to the letter, because he has to commit everything to memory perfectly, almost to a point of direct imitation. On the other hand, Naruto can't do that. He bastardizes whatever is taught to him and adjusts it to his liking just to feel comfortable enough to use a technique."

"That can't be true." To Kenichi that sounded extremely harsh, and here he thought that they were blunt with him when they told him that he sucked, "I've seen Naruto-san use real techniques."

"Perhaps I misworded things." Akisame said, thinking of a better way to explain, "You're right, he's fully capable of learning techniques, but he immediately personalizes whatever he's taught in such a manner that a stricter teacher would deem the moves he makes as incorrect. It's uncanny really. I've learned from watching him spar with you and Miu, I'm certain that he wasn't taught to move the way he does, not entirely."

Chances were, Naruto gave whoever trained him initially fits to near ulcer-forming levels. He probably wasn't even aware that he was doing it. But since the concept of ninjutsu was such a versatile, personalized discipline of fighting it was just the kind of mindset he needed to innovate one day when he truly grew into his own.

Shigure realized that when she started training him. She wasn't teaching him the Kousaka style of weapons combat, she was instructing him on how to operate the weapons the way that he was supposed to.

"So it's not a bad thing?" Miu asked curiously. Even having studied martial arts all her life she didn't get how they weren't deriding Naruto for this if it was all true, "But we're taught how to do things a certain way for a reason."

"Ninjutsu is a styleless style, or it is in theory." Hayato explained, having actually tangled with a few in the past during his long, long life, "When there is freedom from mechanical conditioning there is simplicity. It is a very difficult model to understand, let alone master, which is why there are no modern equivalents that anyone would consider real ninjutsu." None that were common knowledge anyway.

'That's why he said that he was taught when he was so young.' Miu figured, 'He said that even if he wanted to teach others, he couldn't because they're too old to learn.'

They had gone again four or five times over the course of nearly thirty minutes with Naruto eventually losing his footing and having to start over again, but only now since it was deemed that he was used to the process Shigure forewent warming him up with the slower stuff and got right to the serious work.

By now, Shigure's tempo had grown too frantic for Naruto to keep up with all of it and he was being nicked up all over his arms and legs, cheeks as well. She had long since stopped warning him when she started to speed up, but he was still able to avoid Shigure knocking him off the post for the time being, even as she was moving all around him trying to make him work harder and harder.

The cuts started to pile up on his body until Shigure decided to throw him a curve and hurled multiple CDs at once, aiming solely for his lower body, 'You shouldn't have the experience or the reflexes to stop all of these, so what will you do?'

Naruto realized this in a split-second and surprised many of them by sitting down on the post and covering up as best he could, bracing himself for the CDs that cut his arms and legs. For someone that was 'dodge first' in his mindset, this was a very surprising course of action to take.

Shigure just stared at him until Naruto lowered his arms and looked at her determinedly, breathing heavily due to the pain from all of the wounds and the effort he'd been exerting to try and keep up with the pace she'd set for around half an hour straight, "You were… half-right in what you did. But now-." She flicked out one more CD that caught him clean and knocked him down unceremoniously, "-You can no longer protect yourself from that position."

"Naruto-san!" The limp arcing of Naruto's body before he hit the ground was extremely scary to watch, especially when he didn't immediately get back up or respond.

Akisame had originally been out there to see how Shigure took to teaching Naruto and putting him through his paces firsthand. He had to say that while she was rough in her approach, she certainly had a way of getting her point across, even when she didn't lecture with her every move the way most of the other masters did. That was perfect for someone like Naruto that learned by action rather than by explanation.

After about two minutes of hearing the boy on the grass breathe heavily through his nose as no one seemed to even move to help, Naruto's body seemed to undergo a reboot as he started slowly writhing on the grass, quietly grunting in pain or discomfort after Tochumaru started poking at his face to try and rouse him.

Eventually, Naruto got back up to his feet entirely, swaying in place before he steadied himself and shook his spiky yellow head to regain his bearings, "One more time." Shigure shook her head in the negative at that request, "Why not?"

"Time to move on to technique training." She said, slinging the still quite filled bag over her back as she headed back into the dojo building, "For now get your breath back and rest for a few moments, we'll do this again tomorrow as a regular daily exercise for you." Before she got inside though, she turned around to face him again, "…Clean up this mess before you come back in."

With the show seemingly over, all of the masters got up and went off to see to their own business while Naruto grumbled to himself and went to fetch something to begin getting the pieces of CD out of the grass. Body sore and littered with varying degrees of cuts, Naruto was soon joined in his task to clean up by Kenichi and Miu, "What are you guys doing?"

"I don't know what to say about that." Kenichi said with a bit of an impressed sheepish chuckle, "You kept getting up from all of that, even when you weren't doing that well. She cut you all over."

"What are you talking about?" A confused Naruto asked, "I thought I did alright. I never did that before." He then noticed Kenichi paying attention to all of his cuts instead of to what he was saying, "Oh! Those! No, those are just when I couldn't dodge any wider for some of them. If I'd really messed up with any of those they'd have knocked me off every time."

Shigure's aim was impeccable though, to intentionally give him only that much room to maneuver and not a centimeter more or less. Tenten said she was good with throwing things, so maybe he could practice at home sometime? It wouldn't be as fast-paced or as complete as working with Shigure, but it would be something.

"So you were supposed to get cut up like that?" That was a rather… brutal outlook on productive training from Kenichi's perspective. His own didn't go quite that far to the point of getting his body marked up for mistakes, even though it was body-breaking.

"Well no, but for the first time I think it worked out pretty well." He'd get cut less next time, and the next time after that, and he'd stay on longer without being knocked off no matter how quickly Shigure threw them at him, "Eventually when she doesn't expect it I'm gonna take a shot at her in the middle of it just to prove I can counter her."

"You're ambitious Naruto-kun." Miu said with a bit of a laugh, but she was imagining just how poorly that would probably go. He was given points for tenacity and spirit though, "Do you really think it'll go that well?"

"Not really!" Kenichi fell face-first into the debris-laden grass at the happy sounding declaration that came from the ninja of the conversation, "But what if it did? If I beat a master, even off of something lucky like them slipping on a random banana peel and falling down a flight of stairs, that still counts right?"

"Even if it did, it'd be a sneak attack." Kenichi chided dryly.

"I don't think he'd care." Miu answered before Naruto could state the obvious.

XxX

(The Next Day – Mall)

A well-lit public place with lots of ways out, lots of people around, and even more. Those were the promised conditions of the meeting venue, and for someone like Naruto that was the closest thing to the extension an olive branch that he was going to see in a situation like this, especially since Naruto had gotten there well before he was even supposed to meet Kenichi for the gathering in order to scout it out for ways out and other things that could help later.

A trap from Loki wasn't out of the realm of possibility, and Naruto wanted to make sure they could avoid that chance at all costs. Last time it happened, things didn't go so well.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Kenichi asked, dressed in casual streetwear of jeans and a tan t-shirt with blue stripes, "This is literally walking into the trouble isn't it?"

"No, I don't think it's a good idea." Naruto answered honestly, wearing his own standard clothes of grey cargo pants and a long-sleeved dark blue shirt with a black, white, and silver spiral wave design on the sleeves, "But sometimes your best idea is a crappy one. You said you didn't want to fight these guys anymore right? Other than taking them all out, this is our best shot."

Sitting back and being reactionary, trying to deter Ragnarok by repeatedly rebuffing their attempts to take them down wasn't working. Kenichi's defensive 'wait and react' measure of handling the situation was just making things more and more annoying. On the other hand, Naruto's idea to more or less just straight up punch them in the mouth and see how they liked it probably wouldn't have flown much better either.

Even so, while this was more Kenichi's speed to not wanting to start fights, it was still pretty intimidating. He was going to be talking to the heaviest hitters of a group full of delinquents. He had nightmares that started out like this. Even if he was getting more ripped by the day, and even if he was growing by leaps and bounds in fighting skill, it was still scarier than hell.

"Why'd you bring Shigure-sensei's pet mouse?" Kenichi asked, noticing for the third time since they'd met that day that Tochumaru was poking out of the top of Naruto's backpack looking around and munching on one of a variety of snacks that Naruto had packed that morning for him before leaving his house.

"I don't know." Naruto admitted, craning his neck enough to take a peek at the little rodent before continuing to go about his business, "He followed me home last night after training so I guess Shigure wanted him to watch what I was doing or something."

They hadn't said anything about what was going to go down today to anyone in Ryouzanpaku, so perhaps it was a coincidence, but things like that didn't exist with those people.

"So if you're living at Ryouzanpaku now, where's Miu?" Naruto asked, getting Kenichi to twitch involuntarily, "I don't think you'd be able to leave without her following you… or that you'd want to." Seriously, they were usually around each other now that he lived out of the dojo. Nigh inseperable.

"Ah, this whole thing is my problem. I don't want her to get involved in any of this if she doesn't have to." He trained so hard for one reason in order to get powerful enough to protect someone such as Miu. Part of that didn't involve letting her fight his battles, even if they were shaping up to get pretty terrifying, "She's here, I just wandered by the pet store first and while she was looking at the kittens I said I had to go do something. She said okay, so it technically isn't ditching her right?"

Naruto raised an eyebrow. Distracting her with cats. Damn, that was good. A him-brand move. Really underhanded, "You're gonna-?" He stopped and just dragged a hand down his face, thinking that he should call her anyway. Now wasn't really the time to be chivalrous, but still he had to give props for a diversion well done, "Alright. You know what you're doing."

It wasn't like it was going to be the two of them against the world anyway, so if that was what Kenichi wanted it'd be okay. It should have been okay anyway.

Catching sight of Takeda and Ukita just waiting around in front of one of the arcades in the mall, the former Ragnarok Skill Trio members headed on over and joined up on the walk, falling in step with Naruto and Kenichi. Granted, this made the latter feel significantly better about what they were walking into, but not enough to calm his nerves entirely.

"So everybody invited is here." Takeda said, a long blade of grass sitting in his mouth, proceeding to give Kenichi a salute and bump fists with Naruto upon getting over to them, "This looks like it'll be a fun little party."

"If this is how it's going to end I'd much rather go down giving those bastards a taste of Judo than wait for someone to come for me." Ukita said, pushing up his sunglasses on his nose, trying to look cooler, "But I really hope it doesn't go that far." He admitted belatedly with a twinge of uncertainty, "Now where's this meeting?"

"It's supposed to be at the department store under construction at the north end."

Everyone recoiled in surprise upon hearing Niijima and finding him hiding within one of the aesthetic planters littered around the ground floor of the mall. As if that were entirely acceptable for someone to do.

"Why the hell did you do that?" Naruto asked loudly, grabbing Niijima out of the planter and setting him down on the ground, trying to ignore the bystanders gawking at the display at the moment, "Observe and report! What happened to observe and report!?" Naruto hissed under his breath at him.

'What the hell is going on?' Everyone else thought before Ukita spoke up over everyone else, "No, nevermind. What is he even doing here?" He might have heard about the entire situation yesterday, but that didn't explain why he was there.

"If this is a real negotiation I can't let you pack of meatheads go in there without an envoy." Niijima claimed to the angry judoka, "None of you are really smart enough to bargain much of anything without it breaking out into a fistfight." Takeda and Ukita cracked their knuckles, but this didn't do much to deter the odd-looking boy who was currently grinning with suddenly jagged teeth, "Am I really that wrong, or could you really talk your way out of the deserter's penalty?"

They could not with any confidence say that they could.

"…Fine."

As the five young men went on to their predetermined meeting place, they managed to miss a person hiding in another planter on the second floor; a brown-haired teenage girl wearing a green stocking cap looking down at them through ranged goggles on her eyes. She wore a yellow A-shirt with suspenders attached to short brown shorts and boots and camouflage paint on certain parts of her face and body, "Got to send Loki-sama a message that the saps are all ready for the trap to be set."

As the young woman that had just spoken tried to put a short-wave walkie-talkie to her ear and mouth she found it somehow taken from her hand as cold steel was put to her neck, "Ah, I can't really let you send that message. Get up please. Come on."

Standing up with a nervous gulp, the girl was led out of her hiding place by some girl around her age with brown hair in buns wearing a red jacket, a light brown short skirt, and open-toed shoes that wrapped snugly around her ankles, "W-Who are you?" The female underling of Loki asked as her arm was bound and she was calmly led away.

"Me?" Tenten asked as she hid the fact she was holding Number 20 at kunai-point between the two of them, "I'm the person that was supposed to shadow one of those guys you were spying on, just in case someone like you was watching them."

"Wait a minute, you used to be in the Valkyries didn't you?" Because she looked awfully familiar. As Loki's right hand she had to know pretty much everything he did, and he knew about every member of Ragnarok, especially the members of Freya's small attack squad.

"Ma~ybe. But that doesn't matter. What matters right now is this." Tenten presented a floor plan of the mall for Number 20 to see, "Right now I need you to point out every spot on this map where you've got people hidden to attack my friend and his friends down there."

"I'll never betray Loki-sama like that!" She had to warn Loki somehow that things were going wrong. While the original method of communication had been nixed, she still had her phone. If only she could get an opening to pocket-dial or do something without this… traitor to Ragnarok doing something about it.

'This had better work Shikamaru.' Tenten thought to herself as she led Loki's chief underling away. She could already feel the multitude of eyes on her back following her, and they weren't from the patrons shopping at the mall, 'If it doesn't, Naruto isn't the only one that's going to be in trouble here.'


Why the #$% have I been watching Epic Meal Time on Youtube so much recently? That shit is great, but that food should kill people, and I'm not joking. I'm scared to try and make anything on that show for fear that my heart isn't manly enough to take the calories and I suffer a massive heart attack.

While that has absolutely nothing to do with anything at all I still felt it needed to be pointed out.

Anyway, I can't be sure but I think I've got something cool up my sleeve that'll come at you soon, so just stay tuned and I'll hit you with what I've got in my mental mind to see if it works for you.

I think it'll be a nice little twist.

Kenchi out.