Naruto
Shinobi's Pride
Chapter 02
Naruto was walking the streets of Konoha. It had been a month since team seven had been formed and today was Ino's birthday and Naruto wanted to buy her some flowers. Naruto knew the best place to buy flowers was at the Yamanaka Flower shop, Naruto just prayed Ino wasn't working today. Naruto arrived at the flower shop and walked in as luck would have it. Ino was in fact working today which made Naruto curse to himself.
"Hey Ino, how are you doing today?" Naruto asked his friend.
"Miserable I'm working at the flower shop when I should be out having fun with my friends on my birthday." Ino replied.
"Well I'm here to buy some flowers. I think a bouquet of Cosmos will be perfect." Naruto said.
"Cosmos, huh those are pretty expensive, what's the occasion?" Ino asked.
"Well it's my friend's birthday and I want to do something nice for her. She really loves flowers so I thought why not get her a bouquet." Naruto replied not giving away the fact he was buying them for Ino.
"Well whoever this mystery girl is, she is lucky to have a friend like you." Ino said smiling. "The bouquet will be 1500 yen."
Naruto pulled out his frog wallet and pulled out the requested amount and handed it to Ino who in turn gave him the flower bouquet.
"So who is this lucky girl getting these flowers?" Ino asked.
Naruto smirked and handed the flowers to Ino.
"You are." Naruto replied.
Ino blushed she didn't know what to say.
"Happy Birthday Ino." Naruto said.
"Thank you Naruto." Ino said smiling.
"How bout I take you out to dinner for your birthday?" Naruto asked.
"That would be nice. Be at my house at six no later Uzumaki Naruto." Ino said in a demanding voice.
"Sounds like a date then." Naruto said teasingly.
Ino blushed again she hadn't thought about it as a date but hey she knew she could get any guy she wanted, but could she seriously date her best friend.
XxXxXxX
Naruto arrived at the Yamanaka clan compound at 5:55 and made his way to Ino's house and knocked on the door. Naruto was wearing a nice men's kimono with his hair combed and looking nice, he wanted this date to go smoothly.
The door opened and before him stood Yamanaka Inoichi Ino's father.
"Ah Naruto, glad to see you, Ino has been waiting for you." Inoichi said smiling.
"I didn't want to make her mad by being late so I came a bit earlier than what she said." Naruto said with a sheepish smile.
"Ino Naruto is here!" Inoichi called for his daughter
A few moments later Ino came down from the second floor wearing a short black dress with no sleeves or back and her hair was done up in a pretty bun.
"Hey Naruto." Ino said with a smile.
"Are you ready for dinner?" Naruto asked.
"We better not be going for ramen." Ino said seriously.
"Don't worry, I wouldn't take you for ramen for your birthday." Naruto said.
"You kids have fun now." Inoichi said.
Naruto and Ino walked the streets of Konoha on their way to where Naruto was planning to take Ino for dinner. Naruto and Ino arrived at a steakhouse, one of the nicest places in Konoha, Ino was left speechless.
"Is this better than ramen?" Naruto asked.
"Naruto you're a jerk." Ino said kissing Naruto on the cheek. "First you buy me Cosmos, now you take me to one of the nicest places in Konoha for dinner. If I didn't know any better I would say you're trying to become my boyfriend."
"Ino we both know you only have eyes for Sasuke." Naruto said, hiding the pain in his voice at that.
"That's true but I guess if the right guy came along I might date him." Ino said smiling. 'Could I date Naruto?'
"Well whoever gets with you will be one lucky guy." Naruto said as the two of them entered the restaurant.
"Welcome to Genji, how may I help you?" the receptionist asked.
"Table for two." Naruto replied.
"Right this way." the receptionist said smiling.
The receptionist led Naruto and Ino to one of their many tables/grills and gave them each a menu.
"Please enjoy your meal." the receptionist said and walked away.
After dinner Naruto and Ino were seated atop the Hokage Monument overlooking Konoha.
"How does no one know about this place? The sunset is so beautiful from here." Ino said.
"I know. I wanted to make your birthday special. Happy Birthday Ino." Naruto said smiling.
"You're going to make some girl happy when you finally get a girlfriend, Naruto." Ino said, smiling back.
XxXxXxX
The next morning Naruto arrived at the mission hall where he saw Hinata and Sasuke waiting for him. He also noticed that Hinata and Sasuke were holding hands.
Hinata was the first to notice Naruto and immediately let go of Sasuke's hand, blushing like a tomato.
"N-Naruto-kun g-good morning." Hinata said.
"Morning dobe." Sasuke said, smirking.
"Teme, Hinata-chan. Good to see you both." Naruto said pretending he didn't see anything.
Hinata was still blushing when Kakashi walked up to the group though she was still standing pretty close to Sasuke.
"Good morning. Well since everyone is here let's go get our mission." Kakashi said.
As Kakashi entered the mission hall Sasuke walked over to Naruto.
"If you tell anyone about what you saw between Hinata and I, I will personally beat you into the ground." Sasuke said threateningly.
"I don't know what you're talking about Teme." Naruto said feigning innocence.
"Keep it that way." Sasuke said.
The members of team seven entere the mission hall where they saw the Hokage sitting behind a desk with Iruka seated beside him.
"Ah team seven, how are you doing this morning?" Asked Hiruzen.
"We're here for a mission a c rank if you don't mind my team has come far in their training and I want to see if they can handle more difficult missions." Kakashi explained.
"A c rank you say? Well I do have something, an escort mission. The client has asked for protection back to his home village in Nami. He has also asked that you remain with him until he finishes his bridge." Hiruzen said.
"If he wants protection wouldn't that imply he fears ninja not just bandits? Shouldn't this be a b rank mission?"
"It's possible that he might fear enemy shinobi but they weren't in the mission details. If you encounter enemy shinobi or worse Rogue Ninja then this mission is beyond the scope of rookie genin. Kakashi, I will leave it up to you if you continue the mission." Hiruzen said.
"I have trained my genin appropriately even if we face rogue ninja my team can handle it." Kakashi said.
"Very well. Iruka go get the client." Hiruzen ordered.
Iruka rose from his seat and left the room and a few moments later a short heavy set man entered the room with Iruka behind him.
"This is my protection? I requested ninja, not a bunch of brats." the man said.
"Perhaps there is more to your mission request than what you asked for. You paid for a c rank mission c rank missions are handled by experienced genin and chunin. My team can handle this mission." Kakashi explained to the client.
"This is Tazuna, a bridge builder who is trying to build a bridge from Nami to the mainland." Hiruzen explained.
"If this is my protection then we leave in the morning at nine." Tazuna said firmly before leaving the room.
"Well I guess you three get the day off." Kakashi said to his team.
Naruto sighed he hadn't expected to get the day off so he went to the Konoha Shinobi Library. Naruto had been working on creating a jutsu to use the Suiryudan no Jutsu with wind chakra instead of water. Naruto had been teaching himself how to use elemental chakra and discovered his affinity was wind.
Naruto was close to a breakthrough in his research he could get the chakra molded but he was still having issues with the execution of the jutsu. Naruto decided to consult the library for his answer. He knew that many shinobi created their own jutsu just by reading in the library.
After doing some more research Naruto found his answer. To convert one jutsu's element to another depends on the seals used for the jutsu you need seals that correspond with the element you want to use.
Heading to the training grounds to try his hand at converting his jutsu. He had been working on it for almost a month now and now he knew what to do. Naruto ran through the hand seals for the Suiryudan no Jutsu only instead of water seals he used wind seals.
"Futon: Kazeryudan no jutsu!" Naruto yelled.
This time when Naruto channeled his wind chakra a green serpentine dragon composed entirely of wind shot forward from Naurto and tore through a nearby tree completely destroying the trunk.
"Yea I did it, I finally did it." Naruto said, celebrating.
"Congratulations Naruto. It seems you found what you needed to finish your jutsu." came Kakashi's voice.
"Yea I did. But I can't use this jutsu against Sasuke or Hinata-chan; they wouldn't be able to resist it's power." Naruto said.
"Well you can always test it on an enemy shinobi. I have a feeling that you will need that jutsu in the near future." Kakashi said.
"So do I sensei. Everything about this mission feels wrong." Naruto said in agreement with Kakashi.
XxXxXxX
The next morning team seven met Kakashi and Tazuna at the main gate of Konoha ready to depart.
"Alright we have a lot of ground to cover so be ready for long days and short nights." Kakashi said.
Team Seven nodded and walked toward the gate ready to leave.
After a day or two of walking Naruto saw a puddle in the middle of the road which was odd since it hadn't rained in weeks. Naruto however feigned obliviousness and walked past it while running through the hand seals for his jutsu.
As Tazuna and Team Seven passed the puddle two masked shinobi rose from the water and attacked. They tore through Kakashi only to see a burning dragon coming at them. Sasuke and Naruto had combined their jutsu to form a combo. Naruto had used his Kazeryudan while Sasuke used Gakukyu. This in turn created a fire dragon which reduced the two attackers to ash.
"Well done you two." came Kakashi's voice from the tree line. "Now Tazuna-san we need to have a talk. It seems you lied about the mission parameters. Your request only said you wanted protection from bandits not trained ninja."
"My village is poor. I couldn't afford anything beyond a c rank. You see Gato came in and bought all out trade routes then imposed high taxes to use the routes. My bridge will hopefully break Gato's hold on our village and restore trade to our village." Tazuna explained.
Kakashi sighed hearing this. "Well then I guess we continue the mission. Those two ninja were the Demon Brothers of Kiri wanted criminals. If they are after Tazuna then they were hired by Gato and they will have a leader they answer to."
Team Seven knew that this would be a dangerous mission but they also knew they could handle it.
"The next opponent will be on my level." Kakashi said, looking over his team.
"Got it sensei." Naruto said.
"We'll be ready for them." Sasuke said smirking.
Kakashi looked up at the sun checking its position before speaking again. "We'll camp here for the night then get moving again tomorrow."
After another day of walking, team seven finally made it to the shoreline where a man was waiting for them.
"Ah Tazuna-san glad you made it back safely." the man said.
"I wouldn't have if not for these ninja here." Tazuna said with a chuckle.
~Jutsu List~
Suiton: Suiryudan no Jutsu: Water Release: Water Dragon Bullet Technique
Futon: Kazeryudan no Jutsu: Wind Release: Wind Dragon Bullet Technique
Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu: Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique