Arashi looked up from his ramen, and stared.

There was a large fox with three tails standing right in front of him. And then it spoke.

"Arashi-san, I have been asked to deliver a message to you from Uzumaki Naruto. He and his team fought someone much stronger than a gennin, and their opponent had a summoning contract with snakes."

Yami then bowed, and left in a poof of smoke.

Arashi forgot about his ramen. The Hokage had to be warned.


Naruto slipped back into the tree cave, which startled Sasuke.

"How did you get in here? Why do you have a fox with three tails?"

Naruto grinned at him.

"Don't worry; he isn't a demon fox, not really. Isamu's a part of the team now. Apparently, my family has an affinity for foxes, so he came with me."

Sasuke was greatly annoyed. Naruto had gained yet another thing from his 'family'. He was about to say something else when Naruto shook his head, and pointed to the three sound ninja.

"Look at this."

Sasuke was reluctant to listen to Naruto, but decided to see how well he set up traps. He didn't forget it.

The first thing was simple. It was a well placed rock, which made the girl fall down.

"Kin that was pathetic. You tripped over a rock." said the one with bandages all over his face, which left one eye visible. Kin stood up, and brushed her black hair out of her face.

"Shut up, Dosu."

"Guys-

"That's all you can say? Shut up?"

"Guys-

"Go to hell."

"Dosu-

"Shut up, Zaku."

A second after he said that, Dosu was pink. A bright, bright pink. The can of paint above him was still dripping.

Kin began to laugh, until she tripped over a rock...again. This time, her feet went straight into the air, and her head landed on the ground in a muddy puddle.

This time, Dosu laughed.

Watching with great interest, Sasuke turned to Naruto.

"How did you find a bucket of pink paint in a forest?"

Naruto just looked at him as if he had two heads.

"I bring my prank supplies everywhere I go."

Sasuke decided not to ask anything else.

Naruto shrugged. He just kept them in a thin summoning scroll.

Zaku didn't bother telling Dosu about the next trap that was coming, seeing as he wanted to see what would happen next.

It was a mistake.

A rain of kunais came out of the trees and thudded into Dosu's body. He landed on the ground, red blood mixing with the pink paint.

Kin stared in horror. She had never expected a gennin to make traps like that one.

Naruto saw his chance and quickly performed a few hand seals, which put Kin in a genjutsu. He whispered the name of the jutsu as he finished.

"Kyuubi's Fire."

Kin was already feeling the effects of one of the few genjutsus that Naruto had designed for combat. She fell to the forest floor, and began shaking.

Zaku decided to help Kin and moved closer, and was forced to flip backwards as a rain of kunai came out of the trees.

Sasuke was scared out of his mind. He had never killed anyone, but Naruto did, and he didn't seem to care.

"Sasuke, you and I will go get that Zaku person, and Isamu, you stay and knock out that girl, Kin. Make sure she'll stay out a long time."

Sasuke frowned, wondering how Naruto knew Zaku's name, as he was too far away to hear the Sound ninja's conversations. Isamu seemed cheerful at the thought of doing something.

"Right. See ya, Naruto."

He ran over to where Kin was, easily going in and out of the trees.

Naruto turned to Sasuke.

"He'll be busy with my traps for a while. First, I'll attack him with two clones using a henge to look like us. Then, we'll attack from behind."

Naruto didn't wait to see if Sasuke agreed. He leapt into the trees above Zaku.

Sasuke snorted. He didn't think Naruto could do a thing, but he made sure that it looked like he wasn't in the tree. There was no reason to ruin Naruto's plan for nothing.

'Naruto' attacked from the right and ran straight at Zaku. 'Sasuke' threw a very large rock at him from the trees. Zaku dodged both of their attacks, before he saw a falling log right in front of him.

He blasted it into pieces.

Up in the trees, Naruto took note of how he used his hands.

At the same time, Kin was knocked unconscious, which for her, was a relief. Naruto's genjutsu was many things, but weak they were not.

Zaku was about to turn around when he felt cold metal rub against his neck. Naruto's voice whispered into his ear.

"If you want to live, give us your scroll."

Zaku pulled out an earth scroll, and handed it to someone behind him. After a few seconds, it was taken out of his hands. As soon as the scroll was gone, the kunai was taken away from his neck.

Zaku turned around and hit Naruto with a strong blast of air and sound. Naruto disappeared in a poof of smoke.

Zaku cursed as he realized that one of his teammates was dead, and the other was gone, probably dead.

Naruto had gone back into the tree, and used a genjutsu to hide his team and himself. Sasuke stared at the person he thought was his teammate.

"Sasuke, we've got to get to the tower. I'll take Hinata-hime, you take Kin. I'll take the earth scroll, and you keep the heaven. Let's go."

Sasuke slung Kin over his shoulder, and walked away.


"N…Na…Naruto-kun?" Naruto turned and grinned at Hinata, relieved that she had woken up when they were within twenty feet of the tower.

"Don't worry, Hinata-hime. We got both scrolls and everything's gonna be alright, I promise. We're almost at the tower right now, so you should get off."

Hinata blushed deeply as she realized that Naruto was carrying her. She slipped onto the ground, and muttered something to Naruto softly.

"Sorry."

Naruto smiled at her.

"It's okay. 'Sides, you kept that person from killing us."

Hinata looked horrified as the memory came back to her.

"But…shouldn't I have died?"

Naruto's smile grew brighter to hide his unease.

"Yeah, but I used a forbidden technique to get you back. Only thing is, your hair is red now, and you have some sort of mark on your cheek."

Hinata nodded, accepting the information as fact.

Naruto suddenly stopped.

"What's going on?"


Zaku was about to attack a Sand team. He thought he could take their scroll, and threaten the two of them to act as his temmates.

He picked the wrong Sand team.

Zaku heard two words as he was dying.

"Desert Coffin."