Introducing D-ranks
Author's Notes: Hey guys. I know most of you are going to be disappointed to hear this, but after this chapter, I am going back to mainly once a week. Truth is the only reason I got so many chapters out so quickly was the fact that I was in the car dealership for a good four and a half hours so I could do more than one chapter at a time. I might write again in the middle of the week for this one, but since I'm planning on starting two other stories, those well be written first on week days. This one will always be my first priority though. With that said, get ready for some serious Uchiha bashing.
Hidden Leaf Village: En Route to the Hokage's Office: Directly After Bell Test
Naruto was angry. Actually angry didn't cover it, he was down right pissed. Sakura he could see doing his best to help out with training. Sasuke was another matter entirely.
It wasn't just the fact that he had that superior attitude that Naruto knew had no right being there. It was the pride as well. Sasuke in Naruto's opinion would always try to prove that he was better than him.
For Naruto the problem with that was not his own ego telling him to beat down some upstart that threatened him. No, what really made Naruto mad at the Uchiha's attitude that made him want to beat the kid to the ground right now was the fact that that kind of thinking got people killed on missions.
He was going to the Hokage to explain this to him, and he was hoping to get his approval to use any means necessary to get the kid's head on straight. Because if he didn't give the so called genius a much needed wake up call in the safety of the village, it would happen outside on a mission and the poor fool might not survive.
He and his father were currently discussing ways to get the kid to wake up, but they realized that anything too serious would get the council mad at them even with the hokage's approval. Unfortunately, it seemed to them that they would end up needing to do some pretty drastic things to get the kid to wake up. And even though father and son agreed most of the members of the council could go straight to hell, it did not change the fact that although they were a pain in the rear, the blond had to listen to them, hence his pissed off state.
Hokage's Office
Sarutobi was sitting at his desk looking out the window. The Jounins had finished their reports on the Genin test and had all been dismissed five minutes go. Kakashi had been one of the last ones out and had told the hokage that Naruto might be swinging by later to give his opinion about the test as well. Sarutobi knew that would most definitely be the case. Naruto was a good ninja, and liked to solve his own problems, but he would sometimes come to his former teachers or him for advice if he ever needed help.
And Sarutobi knew that Naruto would definitely need help dealing with the Uchiha since the council seemed to adore the last loyal Sharingan user. Especially since Naruto made it clear numerous times that he did not like people who let pride or those with well known last names get to their heads. Sarutobi was sure that the next few months at least would really put his favorite blond ninja to the test.
Just as he was thinking about this, there was a knocking at his door. He wasn't surprised when said blond came in when invited, and leaned forward as Naruto took a seat. Gesturing for him to speak, said blond sighed and decided to not beat around the bush with his leader and grandfather figure.
"Hokage-sama, I'm afraid I'm going to need your help with something. My two teammates leave a lot of things wanting. Sakura Haruno, although seems more interested in chasing our teammate than becoming a good ninja, has at least shown signs she can be helped. That I can handle on my own. What I really need your help on is dealing with the other new member of Team 7."
Naruto paused to gather his thoughts. Even though he and the hokage were close, he knew this was a delicate matter and so chose his next words carefully. "I can clearly see that Sasuke Uchiha and I will constantly be at odds with each other. He has allowed the village's worship of his clan get to his head and has proven multiple times during the test that he will not or can not work as a team player. The reason he has done this is that as he himself has stated, he strongly believes that he is superior to everyone else and does not need help. I have tried multiple times reaching out to him, but failed all but once. The second to last time, Sasuke actually put not only me and Kakashi-sensei in danger but his classmate as well. The only reason he even agreed to work with us last time was because we threatened to send him back to the academy, which if the council was not so interested in him, I would have done anyway. The boy needs a wake up call sir. And I'm afraid only a rather rude one will have any effect what so ever. However, like I said, the council has interest in him. Therefore I need your approval for me to do what I feel is necessary to open his eyes. Because if it is not done in the safety of the village walls, but outside during a mission, I cannot guarantee that the Uchiha will survive."
The hokage listened with his full attention and knew that Naruto was serious about this one hundred and ten percent. He agreed completely with him, especially about how the council was interested in the Uchiha and what that implied.
Nodding his head when Naruto had finished, Sarutobi said "I have heard your case Naruto, and I agree to it. Do what you feel is necessary to set Sasuke Uchiha on the right track. I will do my best to keep the council off your back while you take care of this problem. Just make sure not to kill him."
They both chuckled a little at that. Naruto then thanked the hokage and left the room. Unknown to the other, both had the same thought as he closed the door. 'This is going to be interesting.'
Team 7 Training Grounds The Next Day
Just as the day previous, the two rooks came to the training grounds five minutes early. What they came across astounded them. Naruto was sitting in a meditative position doing breathing exercises. This was not what shocked them though. What did was the fact that he was currently three feet of the ground and they could clearly see the wind forming a small funnel that was no bigger or smaller than Naruto himself.
Sakura thought to herself 'I've never seen such perfect chakra control before. I wonder how someone only a year older than us got that good.'
Sasuke just thought that he was doing it to show off. Sensing their presence, Naruto opened his eyes and dropped the miniature tornado underneath him. Landing lightly on his feet with his knees slightly bent.
"Glad to see both of you have a good sense of time." He said and then continued. "Today is going to be mostly about figuring out where you stand. After that, we will deal accordingly. We will skip Taijustu since I have seen you both in action. So lets start first with Ninjustu. After that, we will cover Genjustu. Then come weapon usage and finally chakra control. Once all that is done, I will figure out what our main focus will be on and how we can improve those areas that need it. Any questions?"
Sakura decided to ask a question. "Um, Naruto? I know it's not related but how did you get such good chakra control?"
Naruto just chuckled and started rubbing the back of his neck. "Shadow clones." He replied to which Sakura and Sasuke got a confused look.
Naruto explained how he had too much chakra to do the regular clone justu properly without overloading it. He then told of how when they were going over the justu at the academy how Mizuki and Iruka decided to teach him shadow clones instead. And how the clones would transfer memories including progress on chakra control back to the original once dispelled. He also explained how he had used this information to get where he was today. Sakura was still confused though.
"But Naruto. From what you said, you have gained years of knowledge. How could you do that with only one or two clones at a time?"
Naruto got a fox grin and formed his favorite hand sign. "Mass Shadow Clone Justu." He called and right after, a fog surrounded them. When it cleared, there was a sea of blond surrounding them. Seeing the shocked faces of the two rooks, Naruto dispelled the clones and explained how he had enough chakra maintain that number for a full day at least. Sakura and Sasuke were shocked that someone Naruto's age could have so much chakra to use. After that, Naruto decided to get things started.
They started with Ninjustu. Naruto was not surprised to see that Sasuke only knew fire styles. It was what the Uchihas were known for after all. Sakura unfortunately only had the three academy justus, but Naruto knew that even those came in handy to have.
After the demonstration, Naruto gave both of them a chakra card and explained how it worked. He gave one to Sasuke to see if he had more than just fire for his nature, and Sakura one to find out what hers was. It turns out Sasuke had a small affinity for Lighting as well as fire which led Naruto to believe that he had the possibility of being like Kakashi. Sakura turned out to have not only water as a primary, but earth as well.
Naruto was extremely pleased with this since because he had primarily wind, between the three they had all five elements. He knew that little tidbit would come in handy at some point or another.
Moving on to genjustu, he led them over to Kurenai's training field and asked her to perform a test for him, which she agreed to do. It turned out Sakura was a lot better at detecting and breaking genjustu than Sasuke was.
When they got back to their own training grounds, he tested them on weapons. He had them perform not only stationary tests, but moving tests as well. He would throw a shuriken or kunai across the field and the two would have to hit them with their own. Sasuke did better at this although Sakura was not far behind. After that, they came to Naruto's final and favorite test: chakra control. He showed them the kunai balancing technique and had them balance as many kunai on their fingers as possible.
Sakura again did the best by balancing kunai on each of her fingers while Sasuke could only manage seven, and that was only for about ten seconds at most. Needless to say he wasn't very happy with that fact.
After the testing was done, Naruto had the two work on their stamina since both were lacking in that department. Sasuke resented being told to do push ups and squats, especially when Naruto told him he was physically the weakest in his class, but did it when Naruto proved his point by arm wrestling him when he had his weights set to 25 percent. (In case you forgot, that makes it 250 pounds for each limb.) even with so much weight on his body, Naruto still soundly beat Sasuke. Naruto joined them, but went at a much faster pace than the two and doing at least twice as many as they were doing. It was to this scene that Kakashi came upon at noon when he came to the training grounds.
En Route To Hokage Tower
Team 7 was heading to the tower to start on some D-ranks. They had stopped at Ichiraku's to get a quick meal before continuing. It was roughly one o'clock when they reached the floor where missions were assigned. Iruka and Mizuki were currently working the desks like they usually did while the hokage was there as well. Seeing Naruto come in, the three started grinning. Naruto knew what that look meant and prepared himself to use a lot of clones today.
Stepping up to stand beside Kakashi Naruto asked "Judging by your looks Old Man, you guys must have quite a few D-ranks today." Sasuke and Sakura were shocked to hear Naruto talking to the Hokage like that.
Said old man chuckled and said "You could say that Naruto. We are really just glad that your back with us. The village just doesn't look the same without you doing all those D-ranks you used to. But now that your back, we can get a lot of stuff out of the way now. Also, a client specifically asked for you. You remember Mrs. Arien right?"
Naruto nodded. Mrs. Arien was a widow from the kyubi attack. Unlike others who had seen him as the kyubi first, Mrs. Arien saw him as a hero. She had one rather large garden in her back yard that she liked to maintain herself.
However, her arthritis would sometimes flare up and she would call in a Genin team to give her a hand. She and Naruto hit it off relatively well and Naruto learned a good deal more about gardening then he had before he met her.
"I take it her arthritis is acting up again?" He asked to which Sarutobi nodded and Iruka tossed the mission scroll to the blond.
"Anything else?" He asked. Iruka nodded and gave Naruto two more mission scrolls. Both maintenance missions. Nodding, he and Kakashi left the room and led the rooks to where they were going first.
On the way, Naruto explained to them who Mrs. Arien was and why they were helping with the gardening. Sasuke was disappointed that for at least a week or two they would only be doing these so called D-rank "missions" but kept his thoughts to himself.
When they got to Mrs. Arien's, they found her sitting down in a chair on her porch. Seeing Naruto come into her gate, she got up and gave him a hug before saying "Thanks for coming Naruto. I heard about what happened to your team. Will Matto and Heza be all right?"
Naruto nodded and said "Yeah, their all right, but they will be out of commission for a while."
The old lady nodded at this and led the team into the back yard. Sakura was amazed at how big the garden was. Turning to the client she asked "Do you really usually maintain this garden by yourself?"
Mrs. Arien chuckled and said "Yes, although when my arthritis acts up I'm afraid I have to hire a team to help. Ever since last year, I've been having Naruto come to do it. His ability to create shadow clones really helps when it comes time to weeding and transferring plants."
Naruto just rubbed the back of his neck at this and created about twenty shadow clones. He then waited as Mrs. Arien explained to the new guys what they should do and had them start weeding. Naruto left some clones with them to work on that, while ten others got started on transferring some plants into pots with fresher soil in them.
While they were doing that, the remaining two clones went with Naruto and Mrs. Arien to work on her rose garden, where they began cutting off the dead parts. Reaching into his pouch when they reached the roses, Naruto pulled out a scroll and unsealed a pair of gloves along with some clippers and a couple of garbage bags. His clones did the same, each one unsealing what they would need.
After they were ready, Naruto and Mrs. Arien got busy going through the rose bed. Mrs. Arien hung back letting Naruto do must of the work since he knew what he was doing. She would sometimes step in to pull a weed or two that had somehow managed to grow there or tell Naruto to clip a certain part of the plant.
It only took him and the clones five minutes to work through the bed of twenty roses which were lined up in two rows of ten split in the middle. Once that was done, the clones went to the ones transferring plants while the original tied up the bags with the dead roses in them and brought them to the gate of the front yard where they would be picked up by the garbage collectors.
Coming back around the house, Naruto saw that the plants were done being transferred and that the rest of the yard was pretty much weed free. Stepping up to him Mrs. Arien smiled and said "Ah, the wonders of shadow clones."
Naruto chuckled and helped the others bring their bags up to the gates. The total time the team was there was only about ten minutes. After saying good bye to Mrs. Arien, the team took off to their next assignment while Naruto had a shadow clone head to the hokage with the now finished mission scroll.
The next assignment was a rather simple one as well. All they had to do was paint a fence. What was so special about this fence was that it was a good two hundred feet long. Naruto was sure that the group at the missions desk had held onto this one especially for him to do.
Not that it really bothered him. It wasn't exactly the first time he had painted, and just like with gardening, he had actually gotten quite good at it. On the way there, he had a shadow clone go get the paint supplies from the shed where they are normally kept. The clone and team met at the fence roughly a minute apart.
Turning to Sakura and Sasuke he then explained how the best way to paint the fence was to do an outline or "cutting" (actual term.) the edges of each picket while demonstrating and then using another brush to quickly fill in the rest.
Sakura got an exasperated look. "But Naruto! That will take forever. And why did your clone only bring three cans of paint?"
Naruto just grinned and said "Sakura, Sakura, Sakura. I thought you were a quick learner."
Seeing her confused look, He grabbed a cutter's brush as well as a regular brush along with one of the three paint cans and with them in hand called out "Shadow Clone Justu." Roughly a hundred clones stood standing around them with the brushes and paint cans in hand. Looking at Sakura and Sasuke's surprised looks, Naruto continued to grin and said "Oh, the wonders of shadow clones."
He told Sakura and Sasuke to start on this side and to individually work in five foot gaps. He and his clones then left to the other side which was actually down another street that connected to this one. He knew if there were problems that Kakashi could handle them.
As he walked towards the end, he started positioning clones where they would best be placed at. He began placing them at the halfway point and gave each clone group a five foot section. When the clone group was finished with their section, they would leap frog to the next available section. With how many clones he had produced, he figured it would only take him about ten minutes to get everything done and double checked. Still grinning, he himself reached the very beginning and got started.
Back with Sakura and Sasuke, the two had both just finished their first segments and were working on the second when team 10 walked past. Ino noticed how it was just Sakura and Sasuke doing all the work and immediately thought, 'Look at her, so smug being next to Sasuke-kun. I bet she's loving every minute of it. Hey wait a minute. Where is that blond haired kid that picked them up at the academy two days ago.'
Deciding to get some answers, Ino said "Hey Sakura, you know that job's perfect for you. By the way, where's your other teammate? I thought you were supposed to do missions as a team?"
Sakura looked over her shoulder at Ino and scowled at her. "Gee thanks Ino. And for your information, Naruto is at the other end and working towards us."
Ino just raised and eyebrow as did Chouji and Shikamaru. Ino decided to try and get a rise from her. "Gee Sakura, what did you do to force your poor teammate to leave you and Sasuke-kun alone?" To which Sakura could only laugh which only got Ino mad. "What is so funny?" She asked with a vein starting to appear on her forehead.
Sakura just looked back at her one time friend before turning back around and finish working on the fence. Taking a breath before answering she said. "I didn't push Naruto any where Ino. He assigned us to start here and he and his shadow clones started on the other side. Now if you will excuse me, I really need to get this done."
Ino was about to retort to that when Asuma stepped in and told them they needed to keep going to the tower. Turning at the corner, the three Genins saw a rather unusual sight.
The fence was in an L shape with Sakura and Sasuke working on a thirty foot area. That left roughly one hundred and seventy feet for Naruto and his clones to work on. And work they had.
There were now only twenty clones and the original in the area bunched together in groups starting at the corner and ending about twenty feet from the corner. One clone would cut the picket and continue to the next one, while another clone would fill in the rest of the picket and continue as well. Finally, a third clone would come up and make sure that there were no missed spots.
Two of the clones were working with the original who was cutting heading away from the corner on the first five foot segment. Sensing Asuma's presence, he looked up from what he was doing and said "Going to start your team on missions Asuma?"
Asuma nodded and said "Yes. Although with you doing missions like this one again, I don't see what the others will be doing. Not that the other Genin squads are complaining I bet."
Naruto just chuckled while the Genin looked at the interaction going on and wonder just what was going on. Ino then had a thought. "Your name's Naruto right?"
Naruto looked back and nodded "That's right." He said, before turning back around and moving on to the next picket when he finished cutting the one he was on and moving so the clone beside him could work on it.
"Was it your idea to pair Sakura and Sasuke-kun like that back there?" Ino asked. The three males of team 10 were frowning knowing where this was going. Naruto just asked the clone who was spotting to take over which it did and turned around to look at her.
"Is there a problem?" He asked.
"Yeah there's a problem! What were you thinking putting those two together?" Ino all but shouted. To which Naruto raised an eyebrow, which only got her even more upset.
Naruto calmly unsealed one of the paint brushes that he keeps with him in case the others are being used by another team and started checking to make sure all the needles were straight. "Last time I checked, what I have my teammates do is none of your concern Yamanaka."
That did it for Ino, but before she could strangle this jerk of a blond, Naruto turned off his chakra weights and in a blur had painted every inch of the outside of the clothes the Yamanaka heir was wearing. Ino just stood there shocked as Naruto admired his handiwork for a second before making some hand signs and using his water manipulation skills, had every single drop of paint leave Ino's clothes and go back into the paint can leaving no trace it had actually happened.
Both Chouji and Shikamaru watched this and had one thought. 'That was cool.'
Naruto just looked at Ino and said. "Miss Yamanaka if that will be all, I really must be getting back to work."
At her nod, he turned around and started spotting. Asuma decided to get going and left with a wave to Naruto who returned it. The three Genin left knowing one thing. Don't mess with Naruto.
Once they were gone, Naruto finished up and went around the corner where he was pleased to find that the two rooks were almost done. Having a few of his clones help finish, he walked past the two and went to talk with Kakashi. Noticing the grin on his face, Sakura asked what was so funny, to which Naruto simply replied he had an interesting chat with team 10 and left it at that.
