Chapter 10: First Impressions
~I I I~
~ Hokage's Office, 0600 Hours ~
It was far to early to be moving about in Kakashi's opinion. Unfortunately, when an ANBU squad delivers you to the "Old Man" despite your personal preferences, you generally hop-to.
It wasn't all bad. He rather enjoyed viewing that tasty treat sitting right outside his office door. She was just his speed.
"Glad that you could join me for this brief discussion," the withered voice of the Hokage snapped him out of his petite daydream.
To his left were pretty much all of the potential Jounin instructors from what he could see and the geezer's office was packed.
What? Just because he was being forced to hop-to didn't mean he couldn't be the last one in the office.
Kakashi still had a reputation to think of.
Point of fact, he was having a really difficult time paying attention to the "Rah-Rah!" speech they were getting. What was this one? Version seven? They all sounded the same after some point. 'Do well. Never flag. Tend to that Fire thing.'
Kakashi barely withheld his sigh.
It wasn't that he didn't care about his comrades. He just cared about his precious books more. Books never talked back. Books never put their cold, clammy feet on you early in the morning when they wanted to cuddle. More importantly, books didn't burn through your cash preventing you from buying more books.
He was ever so relieved when the dismissal came, his chakra already pooling for the sealless Body Flicker that would grant him blessed freedom for the rest of the day. He could already smell the fresh pages of his afternoon's guiltless pleasure and that's why the delay cost him.
"I need Asuma, Gai, Kakashi, and Kurenai to please stay for a moment. There is something I'd like you to do..."
Eye closed and teeth gnashed together, Kakashi barely kept his agonized groan in check. Why did your superiors always make it sound like they weren't ordering you to do something they knew you didn't want to do in the first place? It wasn't like you ever had a choice, right?
~III~
It was decided that the first few days of school would be sans training so Naruto could settle into a rhythm. Tama-chan would go to class in the morning and they would switch out at lunch so Sua-chan could be there for afternoon sparring. Bento in hand and fox on neck, Naruto got to class a good half hour early, so he could observe students as they arrived.
From his lessons with Kyuubi and the books he'd read, he recognized at least one Hyuuga and the crest for the Uchihas on the back of a boy with black hair shaped oddly like a duck's bottom. The platinum blonde mop on a rather loud female brought back unpleasant thoughts of the Yamanaka he still needed to find, but he couldn't recognize the pink-haired banshee standing next to her – they appeared to be arguing over and giggling at the duck-haired Uchiha boy. Naruto subconsciously patted down his own gaggle of spikes before moving on.
The larger boy with a bag of chips stuck in his face could have been an Akimichi and the scraggly one with the dog on his head was most likely an Inuzuka, but that was as far as he could go with the Great Clans in History books from his summer reading.
It didn't matter.
Naruto was looking to assess his classmates before he decided anything. Maybe they wouldn't be total arses like most of the adults.
With a disinterested grunt, the boy rose from his spot and strolled into the building, his eyes lingering on the Hyuuga female as he passed by. On a whim, he winked at her and chuckled as she did her best tomato imitation.
He pointedly ignored the silent stares of the kids from civilian families as he walked inside to find a seat.
As he was walking into the classroom marked on his schedule, his skin tingled bringing him to a stop. He sniffed and smelled the soft scent of floral soap and a chemical he couldn't identify. Slowly he looked to his right to the empty front corner of the room and noticed the very faint trace lines of someone camouflaged there. With a smirk and a shake of his head, the boy strolled over to a seat halfway up the middle row of the class and settled in to watch the show.
In that same corner, a very surprised Yuhi Kurenai held her breath wondering whether or not her genjutsu was failing. Looking at the two, male shinobi sharing her illusion, both now looking at her in confusion, they settled in to watch the new students with renewed interest.
Kids began to file in most not noticing the hidden trio in the corner – the Inuzuka paused when his dog barked at the corner and sniffed hesitantly before moving on but that was the extent of his interest. The Uchiha sauntered over to the far wall in the front and straight away set himself to ignoring everyone else in the class. It didn't take long for the rest of the herd to file in afterward, the mass of fangirls (shinobi and civilian alike) achieving maximum density around the emo clan boy. Bringing up the rear, a very red-faced Hyuuga slipped in, paused just off to the side of Naruto's row, her index fingers waging war for dominance in front of her bulky jacket, before "eeping" quietly and hurrying up to the row seat directly behind him.
Naruto chuckled quietly to himself and, in the corner, Kurenai's face lit up with surprise for the second time in five minutes. The blond Genin-to-be was just happy that she wasn't fawning over the overly dramatic Uchiha.
The kids settled into a rhythm, conversations meandering aimlessly until one of the fangirls noticed Tamami around Naruto's neck and pointed. There was a great sucking in of air before the tumultuous squealing that followed was enough to set every hair on his head standing on edge. They were saved before a love-filled fawning could occur, thankfully, by their first instructor of the day.
"SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP!" The resulting silence was deafening as butts repeatedly thumped into seats. After a few tense seconds, the stern-looking instructor's face, made fiercer by the nasty scar crossing the bridge of his nose, broke into a gentle smile and his mood abruptly mellowed.
"Welcome students. I am your homeroom instructor, Umino Iruka. For the next four years, I will be your primary instructor in ninjutsu, history, and shinobi tactics - the basic lessons. More advanced studies will be addressed by another instructor during your final two years. You will address me as sensei or Iruka-sensei. My co-instructor Mizuki-sensei will join us and take over in the afternoon as your combat instructor." He paused to make sure he still had their attention, his gaze lingering on the container for the briefest of moments with a slight wrinkling of the brows.
Despite the brief pause, Naruto noticed and frowned in return.
"You will attend other classes for…"
Naruto partially listened, his eyes glancing back from the scar crossing just under the instructor's eyes to the corner again. Someone shifted their feet. He could also feel a tingling sensation between his shoulder blades, a sensation that came and went and made him want to turn around. It faded just as Iruka sensei pulled his attention back to the front of the room.
"That said, why don't we all take a minute to briefly introduce ourselves. Stand up so everyone can see you, state your name, your likes, your dislikes, any hobbies you want to share, any big goals or dreams, and any ninjutsu you know – just so I can get a feel for what I'm working with." He looked to the far corner.
"Why don't we start with you." The emo boy stood up with a whiny pout.
The fangirls cooed like it was a programmed response.
"Uchiha Sasuke, not much to like or dislike and my life is centered around finding one man in particular (Kakashi sighed at this). As an Uchiha, I favor my clan's fire techniques, and I know a couple of Katon jutsus," he sniffed loudly in a very self-satisfied manner and the herd of fangirls sighed dreamily, "…and look forward to awakening my Sharingan."
From there the process worked its way around the room.
"Haruno Sakura…" Nothing threatening, just annoying but now he had a name for the pinkette fangirl.
"Yamanaka Ino…" Naruto's eyes wrinkled in disdain again but noted her clan's mind control techniques. She would bear watching.
"Aburame Shino…" Naruto noted that the boy used bugs. That would be interesting to see in combat. Tamami shivered and absent-mindedly scratched to rid herself of the odd bug-induced itch. She hated the feel of anything crawling around in her fur.
"Inuzuka Kiba and my partner Akamaru…" Naruto's eyes turned deathly cold when the boy smirked and said he enjoyed his family's yearly fox hunt. All heads turned to Naruto, and the fiercely-rumbling fox kit nestled in his jacket, who just stared with unblinking, deathly cold eyes until the dog boy coughed and sat down.
Iruka attempted to move the group past the dog student's attempt to get a rise out of the Kyuubi vessel. The last thing he needed was the second great Kyuubi-apocalypse beginning in his classroom.
Deep in her now refurbished cage, Kyuubi memorized the dog nin's face and dreamed wonderful tortures involving making new lyre strings out of his intestines. She didn't even play the lyre… but she would learn for this.
"H-H-Hyuuga Hi-Hi-Hinata…" Her face turned a beat red when he turned around to look at her and she swayed a little, stuttering her way through her introduction. He found it cute. He found her cute. Tamami warbled again, and several fangirl coos came from the other side of the room, several hands clutching reflexively in need of fluffy cuteness to cuddle.
With the exception of a few more clan kids sharing his trio of desks, he ignored the rest as inconsequential. Then he stood and, with a final glare at the dog boy, turned to Iruka sensei.
"Uzumaki Naruto and I like training, being an apprentice blacksmith, and my nin-ken, Tatsua, who is an excellent judge of character. If she likes you, then I like you." Having decided that both Kitsune would go by Sua-chan's name at the academy, he scratched behind the fox's ear and she trilled happily (insert more female cooing).
"I dislike close-minded people that can't see me for the person I am and ignorant bullies." Here he pointedly looked at Kiba who frowned again. "Especially the smelly ones that need a flea bath." He glanced pointedly at the Inuzuka again. Kiba snarled in return but kept his seat.
"I used to have a goal but now I'm following… a new path in life and I'll see where it takes me. As for ninjutsu, I don't have a clan or family to teach me, so I train myself in genjutsu and focus on my elemental affinities." He sat down, his face emotionless through the whole litany except for the warning glances to the dog nin.
'What do you think you're doing, Kit?'
Naruto couldn't help the smirk growing on his face. 'Just wait for it, Kyuu-chan.'
Kurenai nodded as that first brush with the blond made more sense now. She was anxious to find out what he could do with genjutsu without having had a real teacher. Her palms were literally itching.
"That's very good every- WAIT! Naruto, did you say, 'elemental affinities"?" Naruto blinked in feigned shock but nodded. "As in…multiple?"
"Hai, Iruka-sensei."
'Kiiiiiiiiiiiiiit...'
He inwardly chuckled. 'Too late, the deed is done and I can't back down now.' He pointedly ignored the disapproving glare being sent at him by the fox kit snuggled in his jacket.
Iruka was gob-smacked and Mizuki had a look of open disbelief on his face.
To be fair, they had good reason to be so put out, as it were. While shinobi hadn't mastered most aspects of chakra and its uses, there was enough general knowledge to indicate that his statement, without evidence of divine intervention, was blatantly impossible. Even if he was part of the less than one-percent of shinobi that possessed three or more chakra affinities at the beginning of their career, the Law of Opposites would decree that the fifth and final element would be initially denied him simply because of the opposing affinities occluding at least one element.
For instance, Katon was diametrically opposed to Suiton, was at least hindered by Doton and ambivalent towards Raiton. Not all of them played well together despite the possibility that a combined result could occur with enough patience and chakra. It simply meant that it would have to be either brute forced or trained up since it would not and should not occur naturally.
At least not without a Kekkei Genkai to help it along and everyone knew that Naruto just wasn't that fortunate, not their village pariah.
What none of them knew was that he'd already had this discussion with his tenant and live-in caretakers during his earlier training sessions. As part of developing his Reika network, the one in his tails, Tamami had obtained several sheets of chakra paper for testing purposes. She wanted to demonstrate the differences in a way he'd remember hoping it would help him retain the information Kyuubi-sama had provided.
The first time she'd asked him to channel chakra into one of the specially treated squares, she'd made him promise to resist channeling any chakra from his tails through the Modulus Gland. He had to do his dead-level best to keep the two sources isolated, something he used a couple of trial-runs to purge his system since he often streamed chakra from both sources throughout the day in order to get used to blending the two.
After burning through his readily mixed supply, he timidly took up the square with a thumb and forefinger then pushed the smallest amount of chakra he could into it.
The paper shredded itself into tassels right before the upper left corner burst into a tiny flame the size of a candle. Congratulating him on having a ridiculously strong Fuuton affinity backed by a weak Katon strain, most likely due to the nine-tails in his gut, she again asked him to push chakra into a second sheet using only the chakra he could draw from his tails.
You couldn't have asked for a more different result, one that surprised Naruto to the current day. So why not have a little fun with his snooty classmates?
And thus the Prankster King from Hell was officially born.
"That's impressive Naruto." Iruka's voice snapped him back to his current audience. "To have one affinity and know it at your age is very good. To have two is remarkable. Three or more would put you into pretty elite company."
Naruto only shrugged as if it were no big deal so Iruka pushed a little bit. "So, tell us then Naruto. Which ones do you have?"
He calmly looked up from his fox and replied, "All of them." The gasps from the empty corners of the room were lost to the angry cries from students calling foul and Kiba yelling swear words related to farm animal excrement. Iruka quieted them down by clapping his hands together. Mizuki chose that moment to leave the room not wanting to be anywhere near the demon cur lest it contaminates him.
"Okay, not all of them. Just the core five: Katon, Fuuton, Suiton, Doton, and Raiton. I clearly can't perform elemental jutsus requiring Kekkei Genkai as I do not have one… that I know of."
Kiba took the time to voice his opinion. "C'mon sensei! Don't tell me you're buying this crap?!"
"There is one way to find out for sure Kiba." Iruka went behind his desk, reached into one of the drawers and pulled out a thin, waxy piece of paper Naruto was more than familiar with.
He pointedly ignored the glare from the tiny fox chewing angrily on his fingers as her form of displeasure.
"Come down here Naruto." A moment later, Iruka was turning him to face the class.
"This is chakra paper. By funneling chakra into it and watching how it reacts, we can tell what elemental affinity a person has. For the five prime elements that Naruto listed…"
Iruka outlined the possible outcomes then handed the paper to Naruto and asked him to push chakra through his hand into the paper. If he had been working on elemental affinities this would be a simple task. Almost as an afterthought, the Chunin instructor walked to the far side of Naruto away from the entrance – the boy presumed it was so the spectators near the door could see.
Once Naruto pushed his chakra into the paper (as he had done in his exercise with Tamami), it promptly split neatly into four strips before each reacted differently; one crumbled, one wrinkled, one burst into a bright blue flame, and the last strip turned into a soggy mess. Iruka's jaw nearly hit the floor and all of the students in the class (except for Hinata) sat there with blank stares on their faces.
Hinata clapped happily in her seat, which earned her a friendly smile from her distant crush.
Naruto handed the paper back to the instructor, who took it and stared blankly into the other corner of the room before trudging quietly back to his chair.
He figured it was a suitable prank for the crap he'd most likely receive in school expecting his stay to be no different than his time in the civilian academy. Why not liven it up especially with his new genetic advantages?
Using a Kitsune's tail to release jutsu, since they didn't use hand seals or verbal components, meant that the chakra had to be molded and shaped internally to the organ before being released. In theory, every Kitsune could develop the ability to mold all five elements, even if they only had a single tail, but that meant generalization as the appendage needed to be equally efficient at creating the desired effect(s).
Given the very cut-throat nature of Kitsune society, they tended to use specific tails to specialize in a particular element reducing the time needed to mold, for example, Doton chakra as their tails, and the chakra network inside them, tended to memorize specific molding patterns much like muscle memory or the memory foam of an extremely comfortable mattress. The more a specific tail utilized one and only one form of elemental chakra, the easier and faster it became for that tail to repeatedly do so.
Exactly like training in a primary elemental affinity.
Fortunately for what snooty Kitsune called the "Purebloods," or those Kitsune capable of manifesting more than two tails, they could afford to specialize in multiple elements making them more dangerous than the common fox youkai.
Other than developing his primary, Naruto decided he'd avoid assigning specialties to a given tail and used his extra limbs to magnify his Fuuton whenever he could. Perhaps he might find someone willing to teach him something this time around.
He would have ceased worrying about that if he could have observed the behavior of the Jounin observing his class on day one.
The instructors hidden in the corner promptly started a game of "rock, paper, kunai" to see who could call dibs on the blonde wonder after graduation. Kurenai did a happy dance as her rock smashed Kakashi's kunai in utter defeat.
Kakashi frantically signed, 'Best five out of seven?' Kurenai waved him off with an evil smirk while he pouted like a five-year-old, especially since he tried to cheat and still lost!
Iruka did his best to recover from the shock and spent the next two minutes fending off students clamoring to know their affinities. With a firm "Not today," he explained the rest of the day's schedule and his study plan for the year.
They would have different instructors for the supplemental classes (tactical mathematics, history, and biologics) but shinobi civics, survival training, and ninjutsu was Iruka's domain. Naruto was looking forward to the classes on traps (as these would help his pranking) and survival training. Tatsua and he had been spending every weekend in different training grounds living off the land and hunting game. To be honest, he just liked being away from the village since his stress dropped drastically and he could relax – he didn't mind animals trying to kill him since that was their nature. Your own villagers trying to kill you, repeatedly, just tended to rub you the wrong way.
He noticed a pattern with their "elective-only-not-so-much" periods beginning with combat mathematics and Kawasaki-sensei. Not two minutes into the class he had been accused of being disruptive and sent to stand in the corner. Looking up from his notes, pen hovering above the scroll and mouth agape, Naruto frowned and weighed the benefit of arguing over the injustice. The instructor only sneered in victory and pointed to the corner again.
The still hidden instructors observing from the corner did take note of the grotesque parody of justice, several deciding to bring the issue up with the Hokage given his overall responsibility for the academy. An instructor working to undermine a future Genin was a threat to the entire village.
Once the boy was safely facing away from the lecture, Kawasaki-sensei began to teach from the board writing as much as possible and being as vague as he could when he had to speak while teaching the material of the day. If not for the spirit seals linking Naruto and Tamami (who was scowling and trilling her displeasure at the nasty human), those classes would have been a total loss.
The growling gave the fox an excuse to keep her eyes on the instructor…and an excuse to keep receiving calming petting from Naruto. It also allowed the spirit link to channel whatever she saw to Naruto's mind like some kind of Kitsune T.V. He would later translate from memory what he "observed" into his notes.
It also gave him the opportunity to catch up with his favorite bluenette. Okay, she was his only bluenette but you get the idea.
The frustrated girl furiously scribbled as many notes as she could, glancing from the board to Naruto and back to the board again, in an effort to share as much data with him after class. She even included cute stick figures of Kawasaki sensei next to figures he drew on the board.
Naruto added the kunai and blood leaking from the stick figures after class.
During the lunch break, Naruto was outside with his back to a tree feeding bits and pieces of his lunch to Tamami (she had earned it) who was sitting on his head leaving his front free to translate notes from his photographic memory… and feed her more of his lunch. Periodically the boy would reach up to feed a bit of egg or katsu to the munching fox kit who trilled happily.
Naruto noticed a few of the Uchiha fangirls had gradually inched closer to better view the baby fox, their inner Sasuke fangirl hating the blond yet warring with the uncontrollable desire to cuddle the furry ball of love.
'Taichou, you have guests.'
Naruto blinked and looked up as the Kitsune hopped down from his head to his lap then placed her paws on his chest, her right cheek nuzzling his own.
'I will make curry beef tonight, Taichou. Tatsua is growing impatient.'
He smiled. 'I heard too much of that stuff makes a person fat.' The Kitsune glared angrily up at him; it was her favorite dish.
Naruto, who was watching the approaching trio glanced down to the kit and gently kissed her on the nose. She blinked once then ran off into the trees with a bounce and hop.
Several fan girls groaned in disappointment.
"Ano," Hinata started, "will she be okay?"
"She'll be fine. She just needs to use the little fox's room." The trio nodded in understanding. "Is everything okay?" He looked from Choji to Shikamaru to Hinata.
"Troublesome. I saw what they did to you and I don't think it's right." Naruto smiled, not a blindingly fake one, but an honest one that said he appreciated the thought.
"I appreciate your concern for me, Shikamaru-san." The Nara heir grimaced.
"None of that. The only 'San' I know is my father. Call me Shika."
Naruto nodded and they bumped fists. He was considering the Nara's comments when the actual Tatsua came bouncing out of the trees and into his lap. Without pause, she planted her tiny paws into his chest and nuzzled his left cheek, tail swaying happily from side to side. Naruto chuckled and fed her the last of his egg, switching to a rice ball for himself as he held out his notes.
He would have to pack more food if they were going to keep sharing his lunches.
"I'll stop calling you 'San' if you make sure I'm not screwing up my notes."
Shikamaru grinned and Choji stopped stuffing chips into his face long enough to grunt his approval. That lasted all of three seconds before the annihilation of all things crispy resumed.
Hinata, hiding behind and just to the side of Shikamaru, seemed terrified. Her fingers were waging furious war against each other until Naruto offered up his notes and then her face scrunched up in furious concentration as she tackled the review of her own notes to help in the comparison. This would start a new routine that would lead to the first close peer ties for Naruto, to kids his own age becoming his first real friends. This would also be his prime method of discovering that the handouts he received in every class but Iruka's were tampered with in some way making them misleading, at best, or complete garbage at worst, which was most of the time.
His respect for the scarred Chunin would grow significantly over the next few months.
Tatsua trilled happily and worked her way around Naruto's neck perch to enjoy the conversation. She liked the bluenette but couldn't figure out why she would hide her blossoming figure under those bulky clothes. The girl had good hips for bearing kits and she told Taichou as much via mental link.
Naruto, for his part, tried not to choke on his juice box to the concerned looks of his new friends.
"Ahem!... wrong pipe (cough)," he rasped out.
Over the rest of the lunch break, they would trade stories and make small comments on his notes to clarify his understanding. The three clan heirs found out quickly that Naruto was of sharp mind and, after a few days, began bringing out their notes to make their own updates on things he'd heard, while repeatedly facing the corner no less, that they'd missed. It also didn't take long to discover his sense of humor either, once you got past his abnormally strong guard, but that took a few weeks of constant engagement.
But we digress from our first day.
Notes checked and lunches devoured, the four settled in before having to return to class.
The boys found an easy rapport. Choji was easy going and generally followed Shika, the two having been close friends growing up. Hinata spent her time either staring at her index fingers (still battling) or nodding her head in agreement – when she wasn't trying to impersonate a tomato, which was often, or sneak peeks at the blond. Anytime Naruto asked if she was okay, she'd turn progressively redder leading up to him placing his forehead against hers to check her temperature culminating in her eventual escape to the Land of the Comatose, a process which would reset and resume frequently.
She was horribly shy, and Naruto found it humorous to torment her. He hoped she would grow out of it though as she had a very sweet voice and the most enchanting eyes...
~I I I~
Afternoon classes proved a bit more… stimulating.
Mizuki-sensei, although the same age as Iruka-sensei, had a different teaching style altogether.
"Welcome back students. I hope you didn't fill up too much. If you did, barf buckets are at the corners of the sparring circles."
The students glanced around to the slightly mounded rings marked with small stones around the edge and a single grey pail near each.
Mizuki spent ten minutes discussing the academy style of martial arts they would be learning. While it wouldn't preclude clan martial arts (students were in fact encouraged to use clan styles during their light-contact spars), they would be graded during their graduation exams based on standard academy katas.
Their sessions would begin with short lectures highlighting kata forms or specific technical applications before moving outside to the sparring grounds to work through exercises; Mizuki spent as little time as possible talking as he was more of a "doer."
Another period of warm-ups would follow before two periods split between basic weapon use – no, they won't be learning swords, stop asking Sasuke – and taijutsu, which included lots of repetition and two-step sparring with a paired opponent.
Naruto found the warm-up period…lacking, severely lacking. Out in the yard, they stretched limbs, torsos, and necks for ten minutes. Shoulder rotations, hip flexing, and leg stretches were standard form before running five quick laps around the training yard. To someone who ran laps around the village and battled with Tatsua when she was in full battle regalia, it was… underwhelming.
It barely made Naruto's pulse spike.
Another thirty minutes of the first kata form through practical application wrapped up the general instruction and, in those thirty minutes, Mizuki looked at Naruto's form only once. It didn't matter to Naruto as his personal instruction with Kyuubi's memories of his mother's training in the academy style proved more than enough.
What mattered was the "Uzumaki Naruto Double Standard" had been firmly set.
With his growing distaste for the academy life building on the first day, Naruto ran on autopilot through target practice with shuriken and kunai (he used his recycled weapons from his salvage efforts) and prepared to be underwhelmed yet again during sparring.
Mizuki, with the help of Iruka who was observing the outside lessons, had mentioned today would be a shorter day than normal. Both instructors had an important meeting with the Hokage and they needed time to prepare.
Mizuki had just explained the rules to the spars. It would be soft contact taijutsu, no nin-ken (Tatsua growled, er, trilled mightily as only a tiny fox kit can!), ninjutsu, genjutsu, or kenjutsu allowed. Ring outs, knockouts, and submissions were allowed. Once he asked for volunteers or challenges, Kiba leaped forward and tried to assert his alpha-male status with a bold challenge.
"I challenge the blond loser!" Mizuki smiled and the class "oooooohed." It looked like there would be some excitement after all.
Kiba set Akamaru down and rubbed his head before loping out to the ring of stone and packed earth. Naruto sighed and moved to do the same with Tatsua only to find Hinata standing nearby with her hands out, palms up, her face beet red, and her teeth worrying her lower lip. With another happy trill, Tatsua leaped into the girl's arms and snuggled in for the match, her tiny eyes locking with Naruto's (there was many an unhappy fangirl at this point).
'If you lose, I will make you suffer later at the training grounds,' the tiny Kitsune warned.
Naruto tried to play off his worry before removing his jacket and laying it on the ground.
"Careful Naruto. He's fast and his clan techniques make him stronger than he looks."
"Thanks for the heads up, Shika," Naruto whispered with genuine appreciation. He got a nod in return and a quick fist bump for luck.
His short-sleeved tee-shirt didn't hide the bracers around his wrists, and Maito Guy, the newest addition under the group genjutsu for the afternoon spars, raised his freakishly thick eyebrows in recognition taking a pensive stance in anticipation. He also wasn't the only one to notice the lean hard-packed muscle under the young lad's clothes. He moved with the strength and grace of a predator, something unusual for any child his age let alone an orphan with no recorded ties to any dojo.
To his left, Kurenai was "tsking" softly and wagging her finger to ward him off before gently tapping the middle of her chest as if to say, "Hands off, he's mine." A disappointed Guy turned back to the upcoming match with interest regardless.
Kakashi merely drooled as her finger plunged into her mesh neckline. Kurenai merely sighed in disgust and turned back to the spars.
Along the line of fangirls surrounding Sasuke, another person was taking an extreme interest in the only other class blond, if the blush on her face was any indication. He was lean, not overly bulky, but his shoulders showed signs of growth, wide and sloped up to his neck. The tee shirt wasn't tight, so it hung straight down from his chest in a straight line indicating none of that baby fat evident on most of her classmates. Even Sasuke was a little soft, not that this was a bad thing, but this boy was corded muscle. The way his forearms flexed and clenched was making her face warm and her breath hitch.
She lost her train of thought when Sakura elbowed her in the ribs to ask if she was feeling okay. With a quick grunt, she waved off the pinkette and turned back to the match. The combatants were both in the ring by now.
"Scared loser? You should be!"
Naruto sighed in disdain and took the introductory stance, left foot forward, right foot at forty-five degrees and legs slightly bent. Naruto slowly raised his hands up in a basic guard and lightly closed his fists as his eyes took in Kiba's body from the waist up to his head.
Mizuki stepped forward and extended his arm, hand in a basic open-handed chop directly in the space between the two.
"Now remember, you stop when I say stop. Light contact only and keep it controlled. Understand?"
Kiba only smirked in response. Naruto nodded once when Mizuki turned to look at him, never taking his eyes from the dog nin. When Mizuki yelled, "Kumite!" and leaped back and out of the circle, the dog boy surged forward, his hand raking across his body to disembowel his opponent.
If Naruto had been a hair slower, he would have lost more than his lunch. His underestimation of his opponent cost him his favorite orange shirt as the boy's claws slashed it apart. Realization hit when Mizuki only grinned outside the circle and that pause cost him again as Kiba connected with a right fist to his stomach, which didn't hurt a lot but did lower his head enough for the dog nin to send a knee into his nose.
Now THAT hurt.
Kitsune noses are much like dog noses, very sensitive. Naruto spun away from the whirling stink bag (his damaged nose stopped the stench and, by Kami, did this guy need a bath) and reset his feet on the opposite end of the ring. They had effectively traded places.
Naruto ignored the hoots and cheers from the Sasuke Goon Squad.
"Get used to seeing blood, even in these light contact spars people. It will be much worse in a real fight."
Seeing that Mizuki had no plans to stop the spar, Naruto reset his nose with an audible crack (many of the fan base flinched at that) and wiped the blood from his face. This, for the first time, wiped the smirk right from Kiba's grinning mug. Naruto grinned on purpose to show he had enlarged canines as well, his grin a bit more feral.
Naruto set his rear foot, the ground cracking beneath his sandal. Kiba noticed that also and flinched. Several others in the class, including Sasuke, also noticed and some of the cheers for the dog boy dwindled. Then Naruto charged.
Kiba reflexively shot out his lead leg to catch the blonde face first. Naruto slid under the leg and grabbed a fist full of jacket. Planting his lead foot and pivoting, he lifted Kiba completely off the ground and slammed him face-first into the dirt with a crunch.
Kiba yelped like a wounded animal and rolled away.
The audience, all of them on the fanbase side this time, flinched again. This time the cheering stopped completely.
When the dog nin stood with his mouth and nose (an unnaturally crooked nose) bleeding, Mizuki began to step forward to stop the fight. Kiba, seeing more red than what was on his hand and shirt, roared and leaped at his opponent going airborne.
"Kiba!" (Mizuki)
Naruto chambered his lead leg and drove it into the airborne boy's stomach keeping himself out of talon's reach and knocking some of the wind out of Kiba's sails. Using chakra on the sole of his sandal, he kept the dog nin from flying away and this froze Mizuki just at the edge of the ring; Naruto held the boy off the ground in a fully-extended sidekick by leg strength alone.
Kiba blinked in surprise fully two feet off the ground and helpless, his lungs trying desperately to refill with oxygen.
Naruto rechambered his leg then forcefully extended it while releasing the chakra hold through his sandal just before locking out. Kiba shot out of the circle, bounced twice, and rolled up against a target dummy some twenty meters away.
Kiba looked up with glazed eyes as the blond slowly lowered his leg back to the ground, the disgusted look on his face conveyed more words than the dog nin heard from him all day. He would have to find another way to make the fox lover submit to his alpha status. The war had officially begun.
"Winner! Uzumaki!"
Naruto wanted to return to his friends but Mizuki called medical assistants over to check the boys and that meant he had to stay put per match rules. The med nin, a brown-haired female in her late teens checked his nose and eyes for swelling or obvious air blockages. Seeing none and commenting on how odd that was, she motioned for him to remove his shirt, so she could disinfect any cuts.
Naruto blanched but stripped nonetheless to the gasps and blushes of almost every female at the sparring grounds (even Kurenai though he couldn't see it). Sakura was apparently immune and started stating loudly that Sasuke-kun had abs of steel even if she'd never seen them. She had faith and that was enough for her.
Sasuke, in turn, looked infinitely unimpressed by her declaration.
Training with Tatsua and working at the forge had hardened his physique and layered lean muscle on his growing frame. The Kitsune change had caused a growth spurt of almost fifteen centimeters and had already beefed up his body, which Tatsua's training regimen had hammered and reforged time and time again. His core was a solid block of bricks, his obliques showed not a trace of fat, and his shoulders, chest and back rippled and twitched with each movement.
All this and he was almost nine.
With the shirt removed, a wave of youki-enhanced pheromones washed over the med nin as she prepared to hover just over a hand's span from Naruto's gut. The nin turned a bright red and forgot what she was supposed to be checking as her eyes roamed his body. A small voice in the back of her mind wondered if she could get punished for those thoughts, her tiny conscience roaring futilely through her mind before Naruto's voice snapped her back to reality.
"Ano, am I okay? I'd like to put my shirt back on even if it is trashed."
Naruto glanced at the dog nin who was having his nose reset and stopped up with cotton balls, one of his legs twitching in pain. In doing so, he noted the many female mouths hanging open (pink cheeks ablaze) and the many jealous glares from the majority of males in his class, including Sasuke. He didn't like extra attention and today was too full of it for his liking.
The med nin nodded before kneeling enough to get close to his stomach. Running her fingers along his abs in roughly the direction his shirt was slashed, her light touch tickled Naruto and, as a reflex, his stomach tensed causing his abs to constrict further into even more solid blocks of muscle, if that were possible.
Off to the left where Shika and the rest were, Hinata crumpled to the ground. Directly in front of him, the med nin had stopped moving her hands and was simply staring. There was a squelching noise and another heady aroma caught his sensitive nose, now fully healed thanks to Kyuubi, before another med nin arrived to gently push her away.
Mitarashi Anko, standing next to her long-time friend Kurenai tried not to picture the pint-sized Gaki in the next seven to eight years. Kurenai signed, 'He's nine. Dirty hands off, Anko-chan.' Anko only pouted in return. Kurenai then promptly returned to her own pedophilic thoughts.
The female med nin resisted at first and the male med nin had to use more force. Once she was standing by the hidden instructors, the male med nin certified him as healthy and told him to put his shirt back on. Naruto happily did so and rushed over to check on Hinata, who was being tended to by a concerned Iruka sensei.
She was fine if you discounted the fainting spell and the trickle of blood from her left nostril.
Naruto chuckled as he had a good idea of what was going through her mind. Tatsua jumped back into his arms and reclaimed her perch as the remainder of the fights continued. Glancing back to the majority of the class, the ones that had gathered around the Uchiha, he could still see a few flushed faces and Ino had a similar trickle of blood leaking from her nose.
The scowl on Naruto's face before he turned back to the spar between Shino and Kaneshiro Toketsu made her flinch, shocking her enough so that her hand darted to cover her nose. She made a mental note to ask her father about the blond enigma. She was cute, right? She was also blonde. Many of the boys she knew told her as much and she hadn't been that mean to him, okay… maybe not as mean as certain others, as he hadn't come between her and Sasuke-kun. What would make him look at her that way? She had to know.
Ino hated mysteries.
Once free and clear for the day, Naruto went early to Higurashi's. He had a lot of frustration to release on the anvil.
~I I I~
About the same time, the Third Hokage was having a very interesting meeting with his Jounin and Chunin shinobi. Dismissing his ANBU and activating every privacy seal in his office, he let Iruka start the conversation.
"Hokage-sama is looking for first impressions of this year's batch of hopefuls. I will start by saying we have a promising crop, especially with a large number of clan heirs this year." Iruka retook his seat next to the Hokage's desk.
"Their basic taijutsu is rough. Some have better technique using clan skills, but we can work with the others." Mizuki stood just to the right and behind Iruka. "None stand out at this early stage."
"What about the non-heirs? I found young Uzumaki very promising." At his emphasis on the word, Kakashi turned to Kurenai again, "One more round, Yuhi-san! I'll… take over your border patrol duty at the end of the month!" Kakashi had one hand raised in a fist and his other was slowly reaching up to raise his headband.
The one-eyed nin had already been guaranteed the Uchiha survivor given his Sharingan but he saw an opportunity to push the heir with competition and there wasn't anyone else in the class he thought good enough to give him the results he wanted. The vessel was strong enough already that he could probably survive a little neglect while Kakashi focused on Sasuke. With a worthless fangirl on the team, his job would be ridiculously easy.
It was a good thing no one else could hear these thoughts.
Hiruzen's eyes crinkled in merriment at this point even as Yuhi shook her head emphatically in the negative, her long raven locks bouncing around her shoulders in irritation. Kakashi, to his credit, tried not to stare at her bouncing chest.
The Hokage injected the first of several comments, "And just what did you find promising about the boy, Kakashi?"
The silver cyclops merely shrugged. "What's not to like? He's attentive, bright, and extremely powerful. Add in the fact that he nearly broke her genjutsu," he lazily indicated Kurenai with a thumb, "…and you have almost a complete package wrapped up in one blond, muscle-bound dynamo." He figured he'd need to lay it on ultra-thick to get the Council to approve his second choice.
Many of the Jounin not there to observe… blinked. Kurenai was a genjutsu master.
Kurenai shrugged. "He detected something when he first walked into the classroom looking directly where I was standing even if he couldn't see me and then again several times during the morning class."
The Hokage blinked very deliberately and nearly dropped his pipe.
"He's not that special." (Mizuki)
"Are you blind!? Oh wait, you weren't there when we discovered he has FIVE elemental affinities!" (Kurenai)
Mizuki joined the Hokage in his next stupefied blink. The Hokage merely turned to Iruka. "Explain."
"During introductions, I asked the students to include any family jutsus they had learned to help gauge where I would need to focus next year's jutsu classes. Naruto stated that he didn't have a family or clan techniques, so he worked on building his elemental affinities. When I asked which one he focused on, he blandly responded with 'all of them'."
When the Hokage's eyes grew very large, Iruka nodded and continued.
"To verify his claim, I gave him chakra paper without explaining how to use it. I did provide a general explanation to the class on the possible results, so they would understand the outcome of the test. When he channeled his chakra…well, see for yourself Hokage-sama."
Iruka handed the used paper to the Hokage who promptly dropped his pipe into his lap. After a moment of frantic patting and blowing on his robes, the Hokage returned to the on-going discussion.
"What else?"
"His physical conditioning is almost as good as Lee-kun." (Gai)
"That is a bold claim, Gai-san." (Mizuki)
Gai frowned without his normal exuberance. "Then am I the only one that noticed his chakra weights? Your fires are dimming, Mizuki-san."
This caused the other instructors, except Kakashi, to blink in surprise. They had noticed Gai's complete professional evaluation askance his usual "bursting flames of youth."
"Those bands on his wrists and ankles are metal plates with gravity seals. He is able to increase or decrease the amount of weight by applying chakra to the seal to increase his physical conditioning." (Kakashi)
"Observant as always, my rival." The two nodded to each other in respect.
The meeting continued for several more minutes. Iruka, true to his claim as a fair instructor, tried to wrestle the conversation back to the remainder of the class believing this to be a general review of the entire class. He could not understand the focus on the orphaned Uzumaki. Oh, he understood the importance given the boy's tenant, but every child should receive equal focus if they were to succeed.
He was bit disappointed to hear about the blatant mistreatment by other instructors, something he would have never caught without outside observers. That would bear closer scrutiny. He left that meeting more disturbed than his day had started out.
Iruka just hoped the rest of the year would be less traumatizing than the first day had been.
~I I I~
A/N: Behind the Scenes: Ecology of Kitsune Chakra
In the original story, I'd left out the explanation as to why Naruto started out with such an OP ninjutsu advantage despite having a half-assed relatable reason as to why he could be so Hax. I explained it thoroughly in the latter chapters of the sequel as part of his personal training period but it makes more sense to flush it out here as it happens so folks might remember why he has access, at a reduced level, to a ridiculous amount of elemental affinities.
Remember, his Kitsune tails do not have the same level of chakra stores as his human chakra network. He would need to rely more on Kyuubi's chakra to enhance his Reika network, unknowingly weakening the seal that holds her even further.
See the Kitsune underhandedness in that? As to Kitsune use of Reika...
There are a number of Kitsune clans all centered around specific affinities. With so much diversity, their Taichou would need to be a cut above to keep a grip on everything. Thus the effort that went into designing the Kitsune Chakra network especially since humans are not meant to use Spirit Chakra.
That meant the Kyuubi needed to compromise and modify existing Kitsune anatomy when she altered his DNA, hence the new and improved Modulous Gland. Since she can't remove entirely his dependence on human Chakra because of the seal, she's found a way to bridge the two.
That does not make it an instant power-up. It's a major change and it immediately destroyed his chakra control meaning a lot of work had to go into returning to where he was before the boost. To make matters worse, he now has a third source of chakra to worry about and master in addition to mastering his natural chakra, which is now much harder to master due to the reinforcement of his chakra network and the seeping of Reika into his network, which is better suited to Kyuubi's youki than his chakra.
It's a mess and his Kitsune handmaidens can't help him with human ninjutsu.
And what's up with Kakashi's attitude?
Sucks to be Naruto right now.
~Siva'a