Lord Hitsugaya was seated at the head of a small nondescript conference table in a rather simple meeting room. Team 10 sat opposite him with Fuka sitting at the foot of the table, the boys on her right, and Sakura on her left. With the exception of a petty officer acting as scribe, there was no one else in the room for the meeting. It was a silent show of trust on Lord Hitsugaya's part to the shinobi to not have a few guards inside the room with him. There were the customary two ashigarus standing guard outside the conference room door.

The commander gave a respectful nod of his head to Fuka and said, "Thank you for coming so quickly to handle my request with your team Jonin Asakawa. I apologize for not being able to greet you and conduct this briefing yesterday when you arrived."

Fuka shook her head in a polite and subtle manner. "No apologies are necessary Lord Hitsugaya. You had no way to precisely determine when we would arrive and it would presumptuous of us to demand a meeting with you upon our arrival. We are here to help you at your discretion."

A flicker of a smile briefly appeared on the commander's face when he heard Fuka say that. Too many shinobi in his opinion had an overinflated sense of themselves and their own importance. They forgot that Samurai used chakra as well and that in a straight up fight a Samurai will more often than not kill an equally skilled shinobi up until the B ranks. Training and philosophical outlooks meant that shinobi were better suited for guerrilla warfare and espionage roles. Samurai training was suited to creating strong warriors of relatively uniform abilities.

While Samurai training was great for creating the core and the leadership of a regular army, it did have its limitations. Past the B ranking, it was far harder for the Samurai to advance their abilities on the generalized threat scale than shinobi. There were far more A rank ninjas than there were A rank samurai in both absolute numbers and percentages of their respective forces. Furthermore, the shinobi training overtook the samurai training at the higher level with an A rank shinobi more often than not being able to kill one of the rare A rank samurai. As for S rank samurai, those legendary warriors were as scarce as hen's teeth. Mifune of Iron Country was the only samurai in a generation to have been rumored to have reached such a status.

Lord Hitsugaya calmly continued his briefing after he accepted Fuka's response to his apology. "As I stated in the mission request, I need to have my troops trained in anti-asymmetrical protocols including sabotage detection, scout detection, and assassination prevention to name a few of the protocols. To help the realism of these war games, the training exercises are to be conducted under single-blind conditions."

All the genin of Team 10 turned to look at Fuka silently asking her a variant of the same question with their eyes. Both Sakura's and Kiba's showed that they wanted to voice their questions while Naruto's face was stoic. Protocol dictated that genin remain silent unless spoken to in this kind of meeting between military leaders. Fuka politely asked, "How are the single-blind conditions of the training exercises to be conducted?"

The commander of the 10th Yari regiment pulled out several folders and gently slid them down the table to Fuka. He then said, "There are five variations in these folders which were prepared by the 3rd Corps Command. Most of the exercises inside are the same, but there are one or two exercises that are different among each of the folders. The order that the exercises are to be conducted is unknown to my staff or me. You are to review them after this meeting and conduct the exercises in the order given. After each exercise is complete you will fill in the accompanying report and turn it in to one of my aids. Notices will be periodically sent into Command that will verify that the exercises in the chosen packet were followed."

Fuka nodded her head and selected one of the packets. She then showed the packet to the petty officer so he could record the packet number. Once the packet was recorded, Fuka sealed it in a storage seal. There was no reason to open it now. She then asked, "Do you have any further requests with this mission Lord Hitsugaya?"

The commander nodded his head and said, "I do have one request. I would like you to start conducting the exercises in the next two or three days if possible. I know you will need some time to observe the base in order to accurately fulfill the exercises listed by Command. However, I do wish to complete this training as quickly as possible so that the new ashigaru can move on to the next stage of their training."

Lord Hitsugaya received a polite nod from Fuka in reply before she spoke. "Understood sir, my team and I will make our necessary observations as quickly as possible so that we can start on the exercises."

There was silence for a moment as the two officers waited to see if the other had anything else to add. Lord Hitsugaya stood up after the moment passed and politely said, "That concludes our meeting Jonin Asakawa. Thank you for arriving so promptly and I hope these training exercises will go off without any serious issues."

Private Azuma Kazuma was carrying a very large bag of flour as he walked down the street of the base with a smile on his face. Azuma idly wondered what kind of bread the base's new guests from Konoha would like to eat. The base's grapevine was buzzing with the arrival of the genin team from Konoha who were going to be participating in a series of training exercises with soldiers on base. What those training exercises could be was up to speculation. In the past day, Azuma had probably overheard two dozen different supposed exercises they could be put through with several variations to each rumor.

All of this didn't matter to the young private since he worked in the mess hall as a cook. Azuma did some basic training and weapons practice like all non-combatants had to do in order to keep fit and know how to react in an emergency. However, the young man's real passion was cooking. He joined the army as a way to leave his small home town and gain some experience in life and as a chef. Once his term of service was up in a decade, Azuma planned to return to his home town with his experiences and open up a massive bakery.

Everything came crashing down around Azuma after he entered the mess hall and was unexpectedly pulled to the side. A cloth covered hand reached out before the chef could realize what was going on and covered his nose and mouth. Panic started to fill Azuma's heart as he was held in place and his nose was filled with a sweet smell. The baker tried to shift his bag of flour to get some sort of advantage over his assailant. However, his attacker seemed to have grown a third arm and held the bag of flour in place without relaxing his grip on Azuma. Soon the chloroform in the cloth overcame Azuma sending him into unconsciousness.

Both Kiba and Naruto were standing behind Azuma with each genin using one arm to hold their target in place. Kiba was using his other hand to hold the cloth that was covering Azuma's mouth. At the same time, Naruto was using his other hand to keep the flour bag from falling. The duo felt Azuma go limp in their grasp and turned their heads to confirm that other had also felt it. Naruto let go of Azuma and grabbed the bag of flour off of the unconscious man while Kiba shifted his grip to keep the man from falling. The duo carried the flour and the cook to a closet where Sakura was waiting while Fuka was a few feet away from Sakura as the team's lookout.

Azuma was carefully laid on the floor next to the closet so that Sakura could get a good look at the young chief. Kiba became part of the team's lookouts while Naruto pulled out two prepared seals. The first seal with the size of a post-it note piece of paper. The other second seal was written on an extra-long letter sized piece of paper Naruto looked up at Sakura and then spoke to her using Konoha's battle sign language, "See everything?"

Sakura nodded her head in response to Naruto's question. This nod was answered by Naruto placing the smaller seal on Azuma's throat and activating it. The seal imprinted Azuma's vocal cords into its matrix after a few seconds and then it was removed by Naruto. He handed the seal to Sakura who flipped the paper to the other side and put it on her neck over her own vocal cords. The minute amount of chakra she'd have to use to keep the paper in place would activate the seal. This seal would create a powerful and hard to detect genjutsu that would make Sakura sound like Azuma. Many people who were adept at genjutsus could do the same thing without a seal.

However, Sakura and the boys didn't have that kind of skill with genjutsu yet. Sakura gave Azuma one last look to make sure she hadn't missed a detail and then used the henge to transform her looks into Azuma. The real cook was then sealed away by Naruto into the seal on the large paper he was holding. Sakura grabbed the bag of flour while Azuma was being sealed. She then had Naruto double check her to make sure that the flour hadn't disrupted or distorted her illusion. After Naruto gave Sakura his all clear she glanced to Kiba and Fuka to confirm that they didn't see anything wrong.

The non-disguised members of Team 10 made themselves scarce as Sakura walked down to the kitchen. Sakura opened the kitchen door and saw a squad of cooks hurriedly working to prepare lunch for the army. The head chef spotted Sakura and called out, "Private Kazuma! What in Yama's asshole caused you to take so long getting a simple bag of flour?"

Sakura quickly replied, "Some of the boys were giving me hassles at the storehouse sir. It seems that some of the newbies thought that the shinobi were going to mess with our supplies." That earned a round of chuckles from the various cooks who could easily believe a greenhorn or two doing something like that. Sakura then continued, "Were there any task changes given how long I was forcefully delayed?"

One of the nearby cooks shook his head and replied, "No Azuma. Your roll dough is still where you left it in the mixer. Hope that flour lasts you through all of the other batches you need to make up since we don't want your roles on hold for lunch. They're the part that the boys don't complain about!"

Sakura followed the cook's eyes to see where Azuma had been working. Armed with this knowledge, she walked over to the work station and began to work on the rolls. A previous look at the mess hall had revealed a weekly schedule so Sakura knew what kind of rolls to make. She was so grateful that Fuka had suggested looking at things like that when the team started to plan this exercise. Azuma apparently didn't need cook books to make bread so Sakura wouldn't have a clue what he was working on without that fact. Even the best infiltration expert would be caught if they didn't have a clue what their cover was supposed to be doing and Sakura knew she wasn't even in the top 100 kunoichi for that list.

The genin's ancestors were really pulling overtime for her because the rolls on the menu were actually something Sakura knew how to bake. She worked on the rolls while keeping an eye discreetly on the cooks. Sakura fished a small bottle out of her outfit and hid it among the spices in her workstation. After a few minutes passed she opened the bottle and added a bit of its contents to the dough. Sakura worked her special additive throughout the dough as she kneaded it.

Once Sakura was done kneading the dough, she turned it into hundreds of rolls and put the rolls on trays already set with cooking parchment. Each time a tray was filled she took a moment to add it to a baking rack that was six feet tall. Sakura filled two and a half baking racks before she got to the last of the dough. She made it look like she was checking the spacing of the rolls as she prepared herself to cast another strong genjutsu.

A critical problem with assuming someone's identity is just how easy it is to reveal that something is wrong to people who regularly interact with the person whose identity you've taken. When Sakura and her teammates concocted this plan they figured that anyone would start to be suspicious if someone they knew started to act differently. Practically everyone knew that ninjas had jutsus that could make them look like other people. Everyone on the base also knew that a team of shinobi had been brought in to test them on tests that only the shinobi knew were going to happen. Every time Sakura interacted with people who knew Azuma she risked giving herself away.

This was where the genjutsu she was preparing came in. It would make a person talking to the caster think that they were talking to a friend that the caster was looking like as they always did. This genjutsu was at the limits of Sakura's current abilities and it would break down if she had to hold too many people or kept it up for any real length of time. She had to use it just enough to get the rolls baked and then return to the shadows until the mission was complete. The team had a Plan B that would work given how far things had gone already. However, it would be a personal failure to the girl if they had to switch now.

Sakura picked her target after a quick scan revealed that everyone else in the kitchen was busy with something else. She walked up to one of the cooks and said while casting the genjutsu with her hands hidden under her apron, "I need to bake the rolls."

The cook's eyes were unfocused for a moment as the genjutsu worked its illusion. He then said, "No problem Azuma. Oven 3 is free so go ahead and use it." It was a good thing for Sakura that all of the other chiefs were too busy with their own tasks to pay attention to her. Part of her was certain she would have been found out otherwise. Sakura passed the time waiting for her rolls to finish by scrubbing down her work station. She got the rolls out when the timer rang and calmly put the rolls in the mess hall tubs that were going to go out for lunch.

Soon everyone was busy as the troops started to pour into the mess hall starving for lunch. Sakura was given the duty of running tubs of prepared meals to the serving line as all the other cooks focused on feeding the soldiers. Sakura waited until the lunch rush started to die down and extracted herself from the kitchen by claiming to need the visit the restroom.

The fallout from the first training exercise was not pretty for anyone to see or smell. The highly concentrated laxatives stopped all training and all but the absolute minimum sentry duty for the rest of the day. Only the Samurai who had a different kitchen to prepare their meals and several squads who had previously been doing exercises during the regular lunch time were spared the constant diarrhea brought on by Team 10's attack.

As bad as it was for the regular ashigaru, their suffering was nothing next to the roasting that Lord Hitsugaya laid into the cooking staff that evening as he changed the menu to rump roast extra crispy. Fuka's report had shown several points where her team's infiltration was nearly exposed if the cooks had been paying more attention. There were also two points where a different interior patrol pattern could have spotted something wrong. Those temporary holes would be removed once a new and better patrol pattern could be devised to handle asymmetrical threats. The minor gaps in the current patrol pattern were brief and only noticeable to someone already in the base observing patrols. Furthermore, the gaps were only exploitable to someone who could move freely throughout the base unless the person wanted to be seen. They were therefor deemed to not merit any form of punishment for the planners.

Unfortunately for the cooks, they didn't have any sort of mitigating circumstances to appease Lord Hitsugaya's wraith. The head of the cooks tried to argue that his men were non-combat staff which only made things worse. That NCO was stripped of his rank, fined half of his pay for the next year, and thrown into the stocks for 30 days. All of the cooks had to go remedial genjutsu detection training and remedial situational awareness training. After that training, every cook but Azuma was fined half a month's pay and had their leave privileges revoked for the next month. The cooks also had to deal with looks of distrust and annoyance from everyone else on the base. Lord Hitsugaya had released information on what Team 10's first mission was and the fact that an enemy ninja team could have just as easily used deadly poison instead of laxatives.

The grilling of the cooking staff wasn't a major concern to Team 10. They had filed their reports about the first exercise and moved on to the next one. However, the genin members of the team did enjoy the new looks of respect laced with a touch of fear given to them. Sakura and Kiba were a little annoyed at the fear they saw in the ashigarus' eyes. However, Fuka explained that it was a perfectly normal reaction for the green ashigaru who realized just how easily they could be killed in war. That realization was then pounded into the soldiers' heads by Team 10 through the ambush exercise.

Team 10 entered the guest house they were staying at as the sun was setting over the horizon. Everyone on the team was covered in leaves, mud, sweat, and the occasional twig. There were smiles on everyone's face for a job well done now that they could cross off the ambush exercise from their list. Fuka was the first one in the house and said, "Alright, everyone to their rooms and change. Remember to use the wash rag and water buckets you were supposed to set up before we left to get the dirt down to a manageable level. We'll start cycling showers in after dinner. Naruto, it's your turn to cook tonight and it had better be something besides ramen."

"Hey! It's not like I fix ramen ever time it's my turn to cook!" Naruto yelled out in annoyance as he put his shoes on the rack.

Kiba smirked and added his two ryo to the conversation. "No, you just cook it every other time it's your turn to cook Naruto. I'll grant you that you'll cook different varieties of ramen. But, ramen is still ramen. Do you even know how to cook anything besides ramen?"

Naruto quickly fired back at Kiba, "Yes I know how to cook other dishes. Ramen may be my favorite meal, but even I don't want it all the time since variety is important. I serve it a lot when I need to cook for the team because it's relatively quick to make. If you have the right recipe and don't use instant ramen it can also be fairly healthy."

Sakura decided to get in on the fun and chimed in. "I agree with you Kiba that it is kind of repetitive that Naruto defaults to ramen for meals. However, he can at least cook dinner. You on the other hand turn a perfectly good potential meal into charcoal." The smile on Sakura's face grew bigger as she one upped both of her teammates.

Kiba let out a groan and muttered as he headed up the stairs, "One time. You singe the yakitori one damn time and suddenly you can't cook if your life depends on it."

Naruto followed Kiba up the stairs and paused midway up to glance behind him. He saw Sakura holding up her right hand in a victory sign. She quickly spotted that Naruto had seen her and put her hand down with a faint blush on her face. It was always amusing for Naruto to watch Sakura get excited over something and then get embarrassed once she realized that she was showing how excited she was. Why that was so amusing for him the young man couldn't figure out. Perhaps it had to do with some parental memories he had gone over? It didn't really matter at the end of the day and was something to try and solve another day. Just like that strange feeling he still got every time Sakura and his skin touched that he still hadn't figured out.

The blond ninja started to strip off of his clothes as soon as he reached his room and closed the door. Naruto put his muddy clothes in a plastic bag to be washed later and then walked over to the nightstand which had a large plastic box filled with water and a face towel lying on top. He grabbed the face towel, popped off the lid of the box, and proceeded to give himself a sponge bath. After a couple of minutes, Naruto was clean enough to walk around the house and use all of the amenities in it. Naruto put the now dirty face towel in the box, capped up the box, and quickly dressed in some clean clothes.

Now dressed, Naruto left his room and headed downstairs to the kitchen. He opened up the refrigerator to look at what was available. He found when he saw that there wasn't any leftover rice like he was expecting. Fuka or Sakura probably had the midnight munchies since Kiba usually didn't have midnight snacks. The guys on Team 10 preferred to just have big meals instead of sneaking in the carbs through snacks. Naruto saw half a head of cabbage, a few vegetables, and some thin cuts of beef. These items gave Naruto and idea for dinner so he grabbed them and the soy sauce out of the refrigerator. He grabbed a pot to cook some noodles and also grabbed a skillet while the water was coming to a boil.

The kitchen was soon filled with the smell of sizzling beef and veggies on a butter and soy covered skillet. Akamaru quickly followed his nose into the kitchen and sat down next to Naruto. The puppy looked up at the blond ninja and gave a cheerful bark as he started to wag his tail. Naruto looked down at the puppy and shook his head. "No way Akamaru, Kiba's got you on a strict diet to make sure you grow up healthy and I'm not about to get you in trouble with your partner."

Akamaru let out a whine and tried his best to look pathetic. This tactic had usually worked on Sakura and got Fuka a fair amount of time. That beef smelt so delicious to the ninja dog and he was bound and determined to have some of it. Naruto looked down at Akamaru and shook his head. "You're not getting any of this from me buddy. The only way you're getting some of this is if Kiba gives you some and I don't think that's going to happen." Akamaru then wandered off to try and find an easier mark to get some good food.

Lord Hitsugaya sat with Team 10 in the same conference room he had met with them just over 2 weeks ago. The commander looked over the team's reports on the various training exercises with approval. He had to give credit where credit was due. Team 10 might be a green genin team, but they were a competent team. The reports he had been given showed almost half a dozen points in each exercise the team did that a fully trained army force could have used to turn the tables on the ninjas. One of the later exercises was even marked as a victory for his troops. However, that was because of pure dumb luck and Hitsugaya personally considered that to be another failure for his men. Luck may be a part of any battle. But, if you need to rely on luck to win then you've already failed in your planning and training.

The commander looked at Fuka and said, "Your team has completed its mission Jonin Asakawa. The reports I have received have been most informative for the training of my new ashigaru. You have me complements on how well trained your team is for new genin. Their results in the assigned exercises speak for themselves."

Fuka bowed her head slightly and said, "You honor my team and me with your words Lord Hitsugaya." It was always interesting accepting complements from samurai on one's abilities as a shinobi. This was especially so given that Hitsugaya was complementing Team 10 for doing better than his own forces. Sakura and Kiba both took mental notes of how Fuka accepted the complement without potentially causing a problem.

Lord Hitsugaya then said, "A notice of this will be sent to 3rd Corps Command and to Konoha. Payment for the mission will be issued by Command upon the receiving my notice. I wish you and your team a safe travel back to Konoha. Unfortunately, I have many other tasks today and so I must end our meeting now."

Both Fuka and Lord Hitsugaya stood up and bowed to each other. Lord Hitsugaya then opened the door and stepped aside so that Fuka could leave. The genins in the room quietly got up and followed their sensei and commander out of the briefing room. Two ashigaru joined the team as soon as they left the meeting room and escorted the shinobi to the front exit. They may have been part of the Land of Fire's military, but that didn't mean they had unfettered access to the regiment's command. Both guards gave the shinobi wary looks as the quartet had earned frightening reputation among the people in the base over the past two weeks. Their mission was supposedly over, but no ashigaru was going to breathe easily until the shinobis had left the base.

Team 10 had to sign out of headquarters once they got to the front exit. The team was quickly signed out and left headquarters for the commissary. They stopped there for a few minutes to pick up some travel snacks for the road. Fuka bought all of the team's snacks so they could get out of the commissary quicker. She did keep the receipt so that her students could pay her back later.

Once everyone had their travel snacks, Team 10 headed for one of the base's guard stations at the gate. They didn't need to stop at the house they had been staying at since all of their things were already packed away in scrolls. Fuka had Kiba sign the team out of the base since the group would need to practice such things. It didn't take long for Kiba to sign out the team even if he was a little unsure about everything. The team then started to run back to Konoha at a reasonable traveling pace for a group of shinobi.

The army base soon disappeared from the view of Team 10 and they left the road for the trees near the roads. A smile erupted on Fuka's face once she was sure there was no way for anyone from the base to see her team. "Well done you three. You've successfully completed your first C-rank mission. Furthermore, you upheld Konoha and the Shinobi Forces' honor in your interactions with the Army."

Grins erupted on all of the genins' faces when they heard that news. Kiba and Sakura both let out small cheers of excitement over having completed a C-rank mission. Naruto's reaction was more subdued thanks to his inherited members, but he was still thrilled. This wasn't the memory of some distant relative completing a mission. This was him completing his first real mission. The thrill and sense of accomplishment was all his. Naruto didn't doubt that one day his descendants would probably relive this memory and he hoped that they could enjoy this moment just as much as he did.

Author's Note: sorry everyone for how long it took to get this chapter out. Things were rather crazy for me in real life.