Chapter 7
Three years later
It has been three years since that mission with kushina and Naruto was now eleven years old and has been a chunin for three years already. Skill wise, he has progressed in both his kenjutsu and fuinjutsu under tutelage from kushina. He has also progressed in ninjutsu, gaining a mastery over fire and wind attacks while having almost mastery of lightning attacks. His taijutsu was progressing nicely as his body changed as he grew older. His muscle grew but kept his lean frame and his red hair grew longer and framed his face now. His manipulation over the Power of Destruction made leaps and bounds considering he did not have any teachers to assist him in this regard. He had mastered his blade of extinction attack as well as how to augment his taijutsu with the power. Kushina's boyfriend, minato had created an attack known as the rasengan and while he did not teach to Naruto, Naruto took inspiration from it and created a version using his inherited power. He was also able to make a version of a chain attack he dubbed his destruction chains. With these skills at his disposal, he quickly became someone to be wary of on the battlefield even if he was just a chunin.
We find out hero at one of the training grounds engaging in a spar with izumi. It had been some time since they were able to do so as the uchiha clan head, izumi's dad was pushing her to be a ninja that carried the weight of the clan and was looking to get her into the anbu.
After concluding their spar, they were called to the hokage's office by an ANBU agent. Making their way to the office, the two friends/rivals caught up with each other making their trip seem shorter especially considering the training ground they were using was the furthest one from the tower. Arriving at the tower, Naruto knocked and received permission to enter. Going inside, Naruto and izumi were met with the faces of the sandaime and yondaime hokages- hiruzen sarutobi and minato namikaze. Bowing to their leader, they inquired the reason why they were summoned. Looking at them, sarutobi started by placing two folders in front of them and stated "do you know what is in these files?" At their negative responses, minato continued "those files contain your mission reports thus far and recommendations for promotion from various jounin leaders you have worked with for the last year." This had the effect of a surprise look on the two chunin's faces. "As such, after consulting with sarutobi-sama, we have decided to promote you both to jounin," stated minato. Giving them their new jounin vests and telling them of their duties going forward, minato dismissed them and told Naruto that he would see him later.
Leaving the office, Naruto asked Izumi if she wanted to go celebrate their promotions to which, after some pondering, she agreed. They made their way to the dango shop and got some food and drink to ceebrate their promotions by themselves. Afterwards, Naruto walked her back to the gates of the uchiha compound and left her there with a kiss on the cheek which had her face go red with a blush. Saying goodbye, Naruto headed home to inform kushina of the news of his promotion.
The next morning, we can find Naruto in the hokage office to receive his first mission as a jounin. "As you know Naruto, the third great war has recently concluded but we are still getting tested on our borders by kumo and kiri had been trying something as well. Your mission is to go to the border of fire and lightning and ensure that kumo ninjas aren't trying anything in the land of fire. This mission will last about one month so pack accordingly. You will be going with Izumi Uchiha and a med nin Takeshi Hideyo and are to meet them at the gates in two hours along with your team captain." Hearing the name of his former teammates placed a smile on Naruto's face as he saluted and left the office to get prepped for his mission. He went home and told kushina of the mission and spent the remaining hour with her before leaving to the gates where he was met by his former genin teammates and his team captain who just so happened to be a jounin named himura.
Nodding to his team, they dashed out of the gates towards their destination. The first night, when they made camp, himura asked about the other members of his squad and found out that they used to be genin teammates under Mikoto Uchiha. As for the others, it was more of catching up with each other and finding out what they have been up to since they parted ways nearly five years ago after dominating the chunin exams in suna. Takeshi was awed by how strong his former teammates have become while said teammates were made aware of takeshi's progress in the medical arts. As it turns out, takeshi had become an excellent medic nin and was a licensed combat medic. The team captain was impressed with the skill of the youngsters and told them a bit about himself which wasn't much as he just told them he fought using a mix of taijutsu and ninjutsu with affinities for fire and earth.
The team arrived to the border within three days of leaving the village and both Izumi and Naruto felt that something was wrong. Unknown to them, himura also had a bad feeling about the situation. As they arrived to an outpost on the border of fire and lightning, himura went to speak to the ninja in charge to get an idea of the situation while the other members of the team mingled with the other people around in an attempt to gather any relevant intel.
The team stayed at the area for three weeks without any change happening. On the second day of the fourth week, trouble appeared in the form of two kumo nins. As it turns out, these nins were missing ninjas who were wanted for stealing some secret techniques and the murder of a few squads of kumo nin. They were accompanied by a four missing nins from kiri and a couple bandits. As they moved to the land of fire, the team of jounin engaged them. Takeshi went forward and dealt with the bandits with a powerful fire ninjutsu while izumi engaged two of the kiri missing nins while himura took care of one of the kumo nins while Naruto engaged the other kumo nin. Takeshi, engaged the other two kiri nins after finishing with the bandits.
Izumi vs two kiri nins
Izumi went on the assault against the kiri ninja who were only ranked as b-rank in the bingo books. She unsheathed her tanto and lunged at her two opponents delivering a cut on one to his right arm and pushing the other backwards. She immediately used her great fireball technique forcing the injured kiri nin to jump away while the other used 'water style: water wall' to block her attack. Taking advantage of the resulting steam, Izumi then used her speed to take out the injured nin by stabbing through his heart with her tanto. While still under the cover of steam, she sealed his body to collect his bounty. The second nin soon got to her previous location but found that she was not there and upon looking back to his partner's location, he saw the female uchiha gazing at him with her sharingan activated. Making the mistake of looking into her eyes, he found himself caught in a genjutsu. Immediately realizing that he was in an illusion, he flared some chakra to break it. However, he did not count on the fact that Izumi had used a double layer genjutsu on him. This momentary confusion was all the distraction needed as soon he was stabbed from behind by a tanto. Looking behind him, he was met with the impassive gaze of Izumi Uchiha as he fell off the blade onto the ground, meeting the same fate as his fellow kiri nin.
Izumi then sealed up his body as well and took a moment to catch her breath as while she had just taken on two b-rank missing nins so she needed a moment to regain some of her breath. As she looked around to see how her comrades were doing, she saw that himura was about even with his opponent, she could not see Naruto but was certain that he was fine while takeshi looked to be going up against two kiri nin who were weaker than her own opponents. She elected to keep an eye on her comrades and only step in if necessary.
With Naruto vs the kumo nin
As it turns out, Naruto's opponent was a high a-rank missing nin with mastery over lightning jutsus. He was known for stealing the secrets for the lightning armour from the raikage but it seemed as though he was not able to use it to the same extent as the raikage.
On the battle site, Naruto was beginning to get annoyed since his opponent used the lightning armour to constantly dodge his attacks and boost his defences. While he was able to fend off the kumo nin's attacks for now, he knew that all that can change in a single moment. He observed his opponent and saw that he was losing both chakra and stamina as it seemed he has fully not yet mastered the lightning armour to be able to utilize it yet. Seeing his opponent release his technique, Naruto knew that he had to take advantage of this moment. Using his speed, he immediately dashed towards his opponent and used his blade to slash at him, fully intending to take his head off. Unfortunately, the kumo nin shifted slightly and caused the attack to miss his head but still take his right arm off.
Seeing this, Naruto spun and used a quick fire attack against his opponent which forced the kumo nin to use the lightning armour technique to dodge the flame attack but he was unaware that it was exactly what Naruto wanted to happen. With the latest use of the stolen technique, the kumo nin had depleted his chakra levels further and only had enough remaining for perhaps one A-rank technique or perhaps a couple of smaller techniques. Naruto channelled his energy into his legs to get an increase in speed without releasing his restriction seals that he used. He also charged up his blade using wind and took off for his opponent. Caught by surprise by the sudden increase in speed, the kumo nin lost his head to Naruto as he decapitated him in a single strike causing his head to roll off his body and said body to plummet to the earth beneath them. Sealing up the head and destroying the body with a quick fire technique, Naruto moved towards where he felt his comrades were.
As he got back to where he felt Izumi's chakra was, he took notice of the state of affairs around him. He saw team captain himura standing with the second kumo nin at his feet, dead and takeshi coming towards them after having finished his bout with the two lower ranked kiri ninjas.
As the fighting ceased, the team of four moved back to the border post to recover and made plans to leave within two days time. Two days later, the team left for Konoha only making a slight stop at a bounty station to collect on their respective missing nin bouties.
When they arrived in Konoha, himura dismissed them and said that he would deliver the report to the hokage and that they were free to go as their mission pay would be deposited directly into their accounts. Nodding to their temporary captain, they left for their homes to cleanse themselves from their mission.
To be continued