"So… how are we supposed to carry this thing?" Blondie asked out loud, gazing at the iron chest. He grunted as he pushed with all his strengths, and barely moved it some inches.

He sighed, seeing the results of blondie, and approached the chest to try to unlock it. He approached it from all angles, but unfortunately the chest was really solid with no way of unlocking it without potentially damaging the contents.

"It would take at least two people to move it at decent speed, but that isn't the problem. I doubt any of us could handle sensei on a one on one…" Michiya muttered out loud about the issue. He gazed at his teammates to see if they had an idea, but was met with Hiroko's usual expression and blondie still pushing the chest.

He started meditating about the issue, after all he didn't want to fail the genin exam and disappoint his brother! Or lose that new section of the library… Finally an idea came to him, and grinned, glad that blondie was on his team.

"Hey blondie, you know the Kage Bunshin no Jutsu right? Just summon your clones and let them handle this thing." Naruto slapped himself in the face to his confusion, but anyways followed the order and summoned some clones. With that handled, what about the other issue? Sensei was a jounin, and if he wanted to he could easily defeat them in a straight fight.

"This doesn't make sense, there's no conceivable way we could win if sensei went serious against us." Michiya complained to the group as he checked the time. They didn't have much time left until sensei started chasing them. There seemed to only be one way: misdirection.

They would need to distract sensei long enough until blondie's clones arrived at the outpost, and with any luck sensei wouldn't discover their plan. Which seemed unlikely as sensei also heard about blondie's skills.

"Oi Mochi, deadpan girl says sensei has already arrived. We don't have time for you to stay frozen in place." That snapped him out of his thought process. It seemed he still had to learn to focus on his environment.

His eyes quickly darted around the area and barely noticed the figure of sensei under a tree, confirming Hiroko-san's assumption. He quickly turned to his teammates and taking advantage of how far away sensei was, started sending signals to attack at the count of three while blondie's clones ran to the outpost.

'One…' He took out a kunai along a small vial of glass containing a liquid. 'Two…' Dipping the kunai in the liquid, he started to turn his body to face sensei as chakra gathered at his feet. 'Three!'

Dust lifted as he ran to the now moving figure of their sensei, that was coming head first to them. He grinned, and taking full advantage of his momentum, shoved the kunai into the man's abdomen. Soon the feeling of metal ripping flesh changed to the well known sensation of wood, as smoke covered his vision. He quickly ran to the left, narrowly avoiding a punch meant to knock him out.

He had a vainly suppressed smile as a stream of water crushed the man's body, but quickly turned to a frown as smoke once again appeared. He started taking out some shuriken taking advantage of the small window of time he had, when suddenly he felt a presence behind him. He managed to turn in time and put his arms in front, fortunately avoiding getting knocked out of the fight. But he still hissed in pain at the swelling bruise his arm now had, while his mind started wandering of one pressing doubt.

'Where's blondie?!'

-o-

Naruto was now realizing on what he had missed on by graduating earlier, seeing his teammates exchanging weird hand seals and running off at the same time at a speed he could barely believe. He shook his head as he started running to tackle his sensei, after all he couldn't let them do all the work. Just when he was in short distance with him, the man jumped in the air to his confusion until he realized the shuriken headed his way. He narrowly avoided a death at a young age, only receiving a few cuts on his cheek, when he was kicked with a force he had never experienced before.

Naruto rolled on the ground for some moments until the momentum finally stopped, and had a moment to grasp what had just happened. 'So in the first minute of fighting I almost got myself killed and what I imagine are a few bruised ribs. Splendid start me…' He thought as he applauded himself, until he heard a small explosion going off. Taking a closer look, he realized it was the result of one of his teammate's water jutsu.

Naruto started realizing he may be a bit unprepared for this situation, he noted as he saw the amazing taijutsu fight between their sensei and his teammates. He sighed at his problem; on one hand he couldn't just go headfirst into the fight and risk becoming a liability for his team, on the other he couldn't just wait here and hope that his team had him covered.

"Hmmm, what should I do…" Naruto muttered as he glanced around, and noticed his group of clones carrying the chest. He put his fist on his hand as he remembered what Sasuke told him.

"Concluding from these experiments, those clones are way more useless than I thought. Yeah sure, they give you their memories back which is useful when you want to train. But their pitiful physical resistance only makes them good to read books or to use as a momentary distraction…" Sasuke told him while Naruto processed once again the feeling of being shredded by shuriken.

Naruto's body tensed slightly, remembering how many times he had 'died' that day.

'Anyways, now I got my way to help. Uzumaki Suicide Squad to the go!' He thought while summoning dozens of clones that ran to the ongoing fight.

Soon he watched as a cloud of smoke was lifted on the clearance, while a rapid stream of memories entered his mind. He seriously needed to find a way to stop that in the future. When the smoke was finally cleared after some moments, he realized all his clones had already been dispelled.

"Alright, so maybe not my brightest idea…" He thought as a bead of sweat started to run down his forehead and his pulse became the slightest bit more shaky. Being this outmatched made him kinda nervous, and he was starting to run out of ideas.

He took out his fuinjutsu kit he had brought just in case, and started doing his first strokes as he tried to still himself as much as he could. He didn't know if some lights would distract a jounin, but it was his best plan right now.

He grimaced slightly at the result, but it should have to do. Then he carefully proceeded on making the second seal atop the first one, and when done, he passed the slip of paper to a newly summoned clone. All that was left was to cover his eyes and hoped everything worked well.

An intense flash of light happened, and after it weared off he dared to take a peek. He came to the sight of everyone clutching their eyes tightly, and realized he should have told his teammates beforehand.

He shrugged the thought off and summoned once again dozens of clones. This time he went together with them, and with all his might, punched the man in the jaw. Waiting to hear the uncomfortable sound of bone breaking, he shut his eyes. At least until he felt rocks falling on his fist.

He spurned his eyes wide open and realized what happened, watching his now rock made sensei. After that massive smoke followed, accompanied with a hit to his gut that left him on the ground.

He grunted as he started the string of hand seals he had been taught. That familiar sense of heat on his throat made itself present, and he let it out right in front of him. A fireball half his size came forth while Naruto continued fueling it for some moments. He stopped and checked his surroundings, their sensei was nowhere to be found.

Complete silence filled the clearing, and Naruto started to walk to his teammates to check on them, when suddenly he couldn't walk no more. Naruto gazed down and saw hands holding his ankles, and then it was as if his body was no longer solid. When he opened his eyes once again, he realized he was now stuck on the ground with only his head free.

He glared at the smug figure of his sensei, as he tried to break free. But it was to no avail. He was well and truly stuck right now.

'Ugh this isn't fair! How come sensei didn't get affected by my seal? There's no way a genin can beat him, not even Sasuke.' Naruto vented while he continued trying to break out.

'How are we supposed to beat him when he just avoids all of our attacks,' He thought as another stream of water failed its mark. 'Wait… beat him? Our only goal was to transport that chest to the outpost or whatever, so why is he here fighting us?' Naruto realized in horror as he scouted his memories, and his fear was confirmed. His clones had been getting dispelled for quite a while now by what he guessed was sensei's clone, or sensei himself. And even though it seemed he was going easy on them, he would still end up dispelling each one before they arrived at the outpost.

'Dammit, I have to tell Mochi and Hiroko now!' But before he yelled at them about his discovery he realized something. If sensei knew that they knew his plan, he would quickly inform his clone or whatever to finish his clones off and retrieve the documents. He somehow needed to send the message across without alerting sensei, or free himself so he could go to his clones.

Watching his team getting wrecked by their sensei, he chose the latter. He scoured through his mind hoping to find something he could use to get out, but they all unfortunately needed his hands. If only he knew to do jutsus without hand seals…

He resigned to his fate as he closed his eyes, there was no way out of this one. All his efforts being useless, now having to go back to the Academy as the same old class clown.

Suddenly a resounding pain surged on his head, and when he opened his eyes wide in surprise, all things around him turned to little more than colors. Naruto blinked rapidly and everything went back to normal, and noticed he had been hit by one of Hiroko's jutsu.

'Great, now I'm all wet…' Naruto sighed as he shook his head, trying to dry himself. That's when he noticed, neck being splashed by the new mud. He grinned at that, as he moved his body with all his strength and managed to get his arm out. He then pushed down with his arm and slowly pulled himself out, being covered completely in mud. Naruto sighed about the thought of laundering he would have to do, while he quickly went to hide beside a tree.

Now being out of sight, he sprinted at the direction of his last memory, all the while his mind passing multiple situations of the imminent fight.

'Wait…' Naruto thought as he stopped running. In all his thoughts he ended up losing in a straight fight. After all he couldn't really see himself winning after the humiliation he had just received.

'If I can't beat sensei in a fair fight, what am I supposed to do? It's not like I can go back and ask for help…' He meditated about the issue, as he recalled their last fight in search of hints. 'What if I use my super light like last time? At least it would buy me a few seconds…' Naruto let out an annoyed grumble, being presented with a problem that was impossible.

There was no way a group of genin could fight or outrun a jounin, especially since they had to carry a big iron chest. The only way to escape that situation would be to give up the chest, but retrieving it was the whole purpose of the test. If only they could open the chest and take the documents, they could fake giving back the thing on a silver plate. Or if he had an empty iron chest lying around to do the same.

'Maybe I should have practiced genjutsu instead of fuinjutsu,' He thought while he finished his super light seal. 'at least with that I could make sensei see whatever I wanted and I would pass this test easily.'

'Bad luck that that is my weakest area, but for some reason I'm good with Henge no Jutsu. Aren't they like the same thing? I guess the difference is that Henge only affects the person using it…' Naruto stopped his musings for a moment, as he took a kunai from his holster. Making a hand seal, a puff of smoke appeared.

'What do you know, it also changes things.' Naruto thought as he stared at his cool katana of bright colors, a dragon seal on it. Fascinated by this, he took it firmly between his hands and gave it a swipe against a tree. Immediately the katana vanished in smoke, leaving the same old kunai behind. Naruto's eyes teared a bit at this happening, all the fantasies he had been making on his mind being shattered in an instant.

After he got over his disappointment, he realized something. He smirked as he rubbed his shin, for one time feeling smart. His smirk faltered as another memory reminded him of the little time he had. Naruto ran as if his life depended on it.

-o-

Michiya grunted as he received yet another hit from sensei. He dared to take a look at his arms and grimaced at how many bruises they had. 'Kaa-chan will really give me yet another earful when I get home of how careless I am and such.' A kick to his gut quickly reminded him of his situation, as he focused on the fight.

Getting on his feet, he couldn't stop himself from watching with jealousy the elegant moves from Hiroko. He was barely holding on while she seemed she was fighting with an equal, something which both knew wasn't really true as a pair of genin were no match to a jounin. Not even to one as dull as sensei seemed.

As he backstepped from a kick, he used the little moment to check for blondie, after all it had been a while since he last saw him. He directed his glance to the last spot he was; stuck underground with only his head showing, and realized there was now only a hole with piles of mud around it.

At that he quickly diverted his eyes and sticked some of his shurikens with his only paper bombs. The explosion that concurred made sensei focus almost completely on him. He smiled at that, glad that his distraction worked.

'Whatever you're doing blondie, make it be worth it those paper bombs.' He thought when he was interrupted once again by a kick that swiped his legs. Fortunately before sensei managed to land the last hit, Hiroko-san interrupted with a thin stream of water directed at the man. He quickly made distance between him and sensei, after all, he wasn't much on taijutsu.

He discreetly took out some shurikens that had been dipped in poison, thin metal wire connecting them. He couldn't depend on blondie or Hiroko-san to handle sensei, because he would.

-o-

Naruto nervously clenched his seal as he waited, the eerie silence on the forest not helping at all to calm his nerves. He had managed to get further than his group of clones, and now he just had to wait to put his plan in action.

Finally a blurb of orange approached his destination, and with a breath, he jumped right over the group. Channeling chakra to the slip of paper, he saw his sensei's confused and cautious expression. It seemed he hadn't been informed of his new seal. Naruto abruptly closed his eyes as an immense light travelled the forest.

He opened his eyes and his sensei was having the same reaction as last time. He quickly summoned more clones that immediately transformed into iron chests that were very similar to the original. Satisfied with their Henge, he approached the real chest and transformed it into a backpack instead. Something he hadn't realized was that the weights hadn't been changed, he noted as the weight on his back made itself present. This changed things a little, but luckily with this new form he could actually carry it.

"All of you, grab a chest and each run to a different direction!" Naruto barked orders to the confused group of clones. He turned around, and started sweating nervously as he noticed nobody else was behind him.

Hearing the whistle of air being directed at him, he quickly jumped behind a tree, which was then impaled by dozens of shuriken. Naruto without missing a beat, started sprinting far away as the sound of clones dispelling soon covered the area.

'It worked, it worked! Everything went according to plan!' Naruto thought excitedly as the wooden outpost entered his sight. He grinned immensely as he slowed down to a leisurely walk. He had done it, he had carried his team to victory as expected of the future Hokage. Naruto started to boast, until suddenly he was on the ground, the weight of the chest impeding him from standing up.

With a grunt he managed to roll over and discarded the heavy backpack, quickly getting back on his feet as he looked around the area. There was nothing. Cold sweat started to fall down his forehead, his arm carefully retiring a kunai from his tools bag.

There was nothing strange in that forest, no looming shadow or footprint to alert him, almost as if it had all been his imagination. Naruto let out a laugh as the stress was starting to consume him, but he stopped when he felt it. The cold feeling of a kunai to the back of his neck.

Then the figure of his sensei, the real one he assumed, came into sight with a strange cocky expression. He really looked too boring to be making those expressions. His scared expression turned to a glare as his sensei leisurely went for the chest, as if mocking him for his overconfidence. Naruto started to reprimand himself for his actions, he had truly done it now. He had cost his team their victory by getting cocky.

He thought and thought, but he couldn't see a way out of this situation. He couldn't make any sudden moves or the clone behind him would stop him, and he wasn't so sure of his chances against him. Naruto sighed as that seemed to be the only way, and crouched as he punched upwards. Expectedly, his fist met air and he started to roll to his side as he formed a hand seal. At least that's what he intended to do, but he was interrupted by a wave that appeared out of nowhere, which carried him with it along some branches and leaves.

He yelped in pain as his back hit the trunk of a tree, and in that moment the wave stopped and lowered until there were only puddles in the ground. Naruto could clearly see the figure of sensei on a tree branch, which seemed to be looking around the area.

"It makes sense I guess, that wave really seemed like one step above Hiroko-san can make.' He thought as he started to get ready to fight what he assumed was a dangerous ninja of high rank, one that even sensei seemed to be careful of handling. After that, he saw the figure of Hiroko and he smiled at that, he really felt he needed help to handle this enemy.

But it was to his confusion when she started to throw shuriken at their sensei, and even more when sensei kicked her from behind.

'Does that mean Hiroko-san made that? But how?! I mean maybe Sasuke could do something like that, but teachers always boast about the Uchiha clan being special or whatever.' Naruto thought for a moment of that, and realized his teammate also seemed to be part of a clan. Maybe clan children just were that special.

'Damn my clan must have sucked, because I don't seem to have anything special. Except having the worst luck in the world, that is." Naruto murmured the last part in resentment at life in general, but his musings stopped when he realized his teammate was still fighting their sensei to win the test. A test he had already screwed once by getting cocky.

But before he could go recklessly into battle, he was reminded he was slightly behind his teammates. Naruto could barely grasp what was happening in front of him. Sensei had kicked Hiroko which had turned into water. After that sensei received a kunai to his back, but it turned out she had just hit a log instead. And then sensei used the same thing he had done to him and trapped her in a hole, but she also turned into water.

Naruto's head hurt at what he was seeing, it all seemed to be taken out of a manga with very convoluted fights filled with twists at every moment. Were genin really supposed to fight at that level?

"What's going on here…" Naruto said out loud in shock and stayed there still only watching the fight happening before him, at least until Hiroko stared at him and he realized. He still could do something.

He quickly found the iron chest, which was now covered in mud, and carried with the help of some clones. He ran as far as he could to the wooden outpost, and just as his legs felt they would give up, he reached it. He grinned and collapsed on the ground with a silly expression on his face. There had been too many emotions in one day.

-o-

Naruto laid in the soft grass with a damped mood, after all he had been humiliated and his clothes were all muddied. The feeling of mud between his toes wasn't a welcomed one.

He blinked as he focused once again on sensei, who seemed to have something important to tell them. Maybe about how they were the best team he had ever seen.

"Congratulations you little kids, you have managed to become genin. From this day onwards we will be team 17, and we're gonna be tasked with retrieval and protection missions as you may have guessed." Naruto's eyebrow arched upwards at that, why was that their job?

Sensei sighed at his expression, and started explaining. "Well all of you accomplish an objective. For example the little one is here to make decoys and carry heavy stuff, which is quite useful while running." Naruto frowned at the nickname, but he found out he couldn't refute as both of his teammates were taller than him.

"The brown-haired knows how to fight well while in long-range which is a must when enemies are pursuing you. And finally the quiet one is here to fight the baddies if they ever catch up to us. So your roles would be: distraction, support and fighter." Naruto frowned once again, this time at his role on the team. Distraction really? He couldn't even be support at the very least? He could only sigh for now, but he was gonna show them he wasn't just that.

"Now, I will tell you about how you fared in your respective role during this test. Let's start with the one who had more issues, you blondie did the worst, but I suppose that's natural. There's some stuff you just hadn't learned because you somehow graduated early, like communicating through hand seals or channeling chakra to your feet to be faster." Naruto perked up at that, he thought he had just missed some lessons about geography and no more.

"But you also failed at some parts that should come naturally, like going headfirst against an enemy that clearly outmatched you, or pulling up a stunt without first telling your teammates. Or for Kami's sake, fooling around with a fake katana while there's an enemy dangerously close to retrieving what you're supposed to protect." He blushed at that, but to his defense thinking you had a cool katana at your disposal wasn't easy to ignore.

"Altogether you still did better than I expected, even if it was by a small margin. You actually used your clones as distractions, and pulled off some decent plans for a fresh genin that didn't complete all his formative years. Your last one may have worked if you didn't decide to get so smug about it, letting your guard down completely. That's something you never do, never suppose you've won until you've stabbed your enemy on the neck multiple times, or in this case do not slow down until you get to your destination. If not, instead of just being threatened.you will die." Naruto's body turned stiff at the last part, as his sensei said it in a cold voice.

"Now moving onto the talkative kid, you did decently. You engaged in a fight with the enemy buying time for the squad of clones. You were able to provide support for your teammate while fighting. You did your job." Mochi seemed to brighten up at that, but before his face could break out in a full smile, the jounin continued.

"Still you made some errors. You for some reason decided to go headfirst at me at the start, with no more strategy than shoving a kunai on me. You lost focus on some moments of the fight for who knows why. And you didn't try to help the little one when he was trapped in that hole. Allies are important, and you can't just let them fare for themselves. " As Naruto guessed, Mochi's face turned to a slight frown at the criticism.

"Finishing with the one with the scarf, you did the best. Fought me to buy time for blondie's clones, helped blondie get out of that hole, although in a very harsh manner. I doubt many kids could resist being hit on the head with such intensity. And you managed to elude my clone and help blondie on the final stretch. But the same as those two you still made mistakes even if they were somewhat minor. You let your support engage me in taijutsu, as I said before your way of helping blondie was too harsh, and you wasted a lot of chakra. That thing of the wave served very little purpose for the chakra expended, even if you had that lake to do it." Sensei finished his rambling, and all Hiroko responded with was a nod as she stared back to the ground.

Naruto stood for a moment silent watching her, having noticed something. Even if the intensity didn't quite compare to his, her eyes looked like Sasuke's.

-o-

She nodded at sensei's words, drilling them into her mind. After all, a clan kid does not fail.

She ignored Uzumaki watching her as she refocused her attention on sensei. It would already impact her status being on the same team as him. She couldn't endanger it anymore by willingly interacting with Uzumaki.

"Alright you three, I will see you here at 8 AM for our first mission. Don't be late, a shinobi must always be on time." Sensei told them and with that he disappeared in a swirl of leaves, leaving Uzumaki gaping.

She quickly left as she headed home, ignoring the propositions of Yamamoto-san to all have dinner together. She restrained a scowl, she had been dealt with a difficult team that her clan would not completely approve of.

A troublemaker for a teammate, a regular jounin with no prestige whatsoever, and it. The bickering would get worse, the expectations would grow, and the encouragement would remain the same. All in all, she had been dealt with another set of problems, but it's okay. She would pass through this, she had to.

She reached the cold metal handles of her clan's gates, and quickly went inside when the gap was large enough. Walking through the empty halls and the gardens filled with children, she reached a lonesome wooden house.

Inside, a woman with her same shade of blue hair was knelt in front of a picture. Her mother, who was once again praying for her dead father. Her mother turned to face her, and now she had to make a decision. Should she tell her about who was on her team, or keep silent as she knew how she would react to the news.

She just nodded at her as it was custom, and left for her room without a word. She couldn't do it, at least not right now. It was fortunate her mother was once again on one of those days, she didn't think she could avoid her questions if she asked. After all, when you were a jounin you learned how to interrogate.

Hiroko took out a scroll from her room and quickly exited the house, she couldn't take chances. And she already had something to improve, she thought as she read the steps to water walking. The best way to fix both flaws that had been pointed out today was to train her chakra control.

When she took her first step on the small lake and passed right through, she realized that coming from a Suiton using clan didn't give you the edge on everything involving water. She sighed at her big damped clothes but continued anyway. Try after try and it did no difference, she couldn't do it. Or maybe she could, she was just distracted about today.

How could she not, when in her team was the Kyuubi, the one that kills with just a look, the one who killed countless people in that fateful night. The one which caused her father's demise. She repeated the same old mantra she had been taught, every child receiving one so they could never forget. Because they wanted for one day for them to cause its death now that it was in human form.

They hadn't given her comfort with hugs and kisses, but they fueled her desire for revenge. It was the only thing she was thankful for, with that same desire she would accomplish her goals.

And the first one was now so close to her, but for now she would have to only observe. As a good shinobi always does.

-o-

A rather short chapter but I liked how it ended and I enjoyed vastly writing it in the contrary of the ones.

Reviews:

biginferno

Thanks for commenting, now about the pairing for this story I'm still not sure so I will have to see along the way.

imgonnadie

Thank you very much for the kind words, although it baffles me a bit since I thought the final part was too rushed and abruptly. This chapter will definitely be a priority when I decide to rewrite when we reach 100k words.

Banjo The Fox

Thank you for the kind words, and about the no killing part I don't think I understand very much. If you refer that this is a fix where Naruto will barely kill, then I guess you would be right because it doesn't suit the vision I have of him.

That's all the reviews for today, but remember that all comments are appreciated. For now I will answer to the new reviews on the next chapter even if they were from an old chapter. Let me know if you want me to change this system since I'm not too sure about it.

Well, I guess see you in about two weeks.