The Start of Something

Naruto wasn't afraid, really! You can he's the bravest person in his class (except when it comes to ghosts), but–

The boy flinched when he felt someone grabbing his right shoulder and the boy quickly pulled out a kunai, as his breath quickened up. He was about to slash at the person grabbing him when he heard a familiar voice.

"Naruto, you're in big trouble!"

The boy who was hyperventilating earlier calmed down when he heard the voice of his favorite teacher. Although, he still feels uncomfortable at the hand that was on him. He didn't reacted that much since Iruka-sensei was one of the people he's good with.

However, the feeling of being touched still scares him...

The tan man begins to scold him, then quickly yet gently, drags him back to the academy.

...Seconds Later...

Naruto finds himself seated next to Hinata. His eyes lingered at her making the girl flinch before looking away with a red face. He did however capture the girl whispering "Sorry" to him when she had done that.

He had observed that the young Hyuuga doesn't like to be stared at which is really weird since their clan specialize at staring.

What a very weird girl...

"..."

"Why do I have to be group with the likes of you!"

A shout was heard and the blonde forgot that he was in a group with a fellow loud mouth blonde who was glaring at him and a black haired boy who was sleeping.

Naruto let out a snort at Ino but frown when the Hyuuga besides him looked ashamed when the light blonde haired girl had said that. This made the boy frown and shouted back to the girl, "Hey it isn't our fault that you are in a group with us three, y'know!"

The girl growled in response but softened her features when she turned to the girl with midnight blue hair, "I didn't mean you, Hinata. I like you but those two!" she pointed at the Nara and Uzumaki who are now playing shogi (with Naruto very much losing of course). "Are dumb and lazy!"

In response to those insults, Shikamaru let out a bored yawn. "If you're too busy shouting like a banshee then you wouldn't get a grade with this project that we are doing right now." said Shikamaru as Naruto and Hinata begun building their diorama.

"Is arts and crafts really important in being a ninja?" complained the blonde boy with whiskers in his cheeks which the girl with lavender eyes (Naruto had recently noticed that her eyes were more of a lavender color than silver white, though those orbs still resembles the moon) nodded in response.

Ino's right eyebrow twitched in annoyance and she was about to hit the Nara when said boy decided to help with their project. This made the blonde haired girl more annoyed but she let out a sigh and just started helping out her group.

Naruto let out a sigh, as he walked around the village. He felt the glares making him grind his teeth, 'Don't act out, don't act out...' were the words he repeated over and over in his head. Fifty five more steps to the east and he would be out of their sight and he would be free–

Suddenly he felt a presence on his back and a large hand grabbed his arm. His eyes widened in fear, all his sense are more open as the unknown person turned him around. The blonde flinched when he saw a man with a bottle of beer in his hands. Then, the man raised it before bringing it down fast to Naruto's head.

The preteen's eyes widened and with no hesitation, he pushed the man off him with all his might. The man staggered back surprised, and Naruto didn't wasted anytime to start running away.

He run and run, as flashes of mobs chasing him had surfaced in his head. The boy clenched his teeth, 'Is it really worth it to be hokage to these people!' he angrily thought but realization came to his face, 'Hokage...' his mind trailed off, as he slowly stopped running when he finds himself in the woods.

All his life, he wanted to be hokage so that people will admire and acknowledge him but now he's not sure anymore. However, a dream can't be cut that easily since the blonde shook his head and a determined look appeared on his face.

'I'll be hokage! I'll show them that I am Uzumaki Naruto!'

There were still doubts in his mind, but without his dream of his– He wouldn't be Uzumaki Naruto.

...An hour later...

The blonde haired boy was in one of the training grounds of the village. He was still ruffled by the encounter earlier that's why he decided to blow out some steam. He was punching the tall wood pillar with his bare fist, not caring about the bones in his hand breaking. He isn't afraid to get hurt, also his body had developed a high tolerance to pain.

The boy continued punching until he sent a hard punch causing the bones of his knuckles to crack as blood begins to sip out. Despite being wounded, the blonde was smiling at the damage he had done to the wooden pillar.

It wasn't fully destroyed, but still that's still a lot of damaged.

Though, his frustration isn't gone yet so he was about to punch the wood pillar once more when the end of his hair stood up making him look to the left. His eyes narrowed, slowly he reached for his pouch and–

Clang!

An awe escaped from his mouth when the shuriken he threw had been deflected. Then, his lips curled up into a smile as he saw the person who entered the training ground and he couldn't help but say–

"Hey wanna spar!"

"Back again, Naruto!" greeted Tenten as the Uzumaki entered the store, noticing the boy's dirty clothes and she stared at the boy with worry. "Looking battered up there, do you need a med kit?"

At her question, the boy shook his head and waved his hand at her, "I wasn't hurt that bad while sparring so no thanks." he grinned at her and the brunette was about to say something when the store's door opened and there enter a brunette with white pale eyes.

"Tenten, Gai-sensei is asking us to meet at the training grounds now." stated the newcomer making the girl scratched the back of her head in embarrassment.

She sheepishly laughed, "Oh, I forgot about that." then she stared at Naruto, "Quick boy, buy something now because I'm gonna close the shop." is what she said to the blonde haired boy who nodded in understanding.

The boy quickly grabbed what he needed like paper bombs, new set of kunais shurikens, ninja sandals and etc.

After gathering the things he had bought, Naruto placed it on the counter as the brunette quickly checked it out. While the girl do that, his eyes drifted to the older boy who was blankly staring at a wall.

'Same eyes as a certain Hyuuga that I know.' thought Naruto, although he was snapped out of his musing when the Hyuuga boy spoke.

"Would you stop staring at me, loser."

Silence filled the room, only the blonde's grinding teeth was heard as he glared at the older boy. "Why you–" he was about to give the arrogant prick a piece of his mind when Tenten shoved the two large paper bags containing the things he had bought.

"Here you go, Naruto!" said the girl and this forced the Uzumaki to just shut up then leave the store. Although, he gave the arrogant Hyuuga one last glare before walking out of the store.

'What a bastard...'

...3 Hours Later...

The boy was running again with a large mischievous smile on his face. He had did the greatest prank of all time which is doing 100 pranks on the village in one day! He had done a lot of trouble to both people and ninja which explains why some of the shinobi from different clans were also chasing him.

He had pranked the Inuzuka by throwing stink bombs on their compound, the Nara by hiding their shogi boards, the Akamichi for replacing their huge food supply with healthy granola bars, and etc.

The boy stuck out his tongue at the people chasing him, snorting at the fact that they–grown adults–can't catch a troublesome boy like him.

(Meanwhile: The third hokage let out a tired sigh, as he watched every shinobi and citizen in his village get prank by the young blonde haired boy and to see them failing on chasing an academy kid made him a little disappointed at how easily the boy did all that. Maybe, he should do a security check in all of Konoha and increase the guards too.)

Naruto whose stamina isn't running out yet, decided to hide by using henge to turn into a random civilian. Watching as the many ninjas passed by him, a smirk appeared on the boy's face and he turned around to not be late in class.

He still has some pranks there that hadn't activated yet.

"..."

It was history class and it seems like Iruka-sensei hadn't know the chaos that the blonde haired boy had caused yet. Although, the chuunin will find out eventually when the boy's next prank will commence.

Earlier, the people in the academy were surprised since he had an hour early before class schedule which is something he never did. Anyway back to Iruka-sensei who was now distributing scrolls to the class. The man was gonna discuss about how Konoha was found.

"Ok class, these scrolls contain key information for today lesson. I hope you can follow through since this lesson will be on your quiz on Thursday."

Some students in the class groaned in unison, seemingly uninterested in a 'boring' history lesson and even less enthused with the idea of a quiz. Only a handful of students did not appear to be phased by the instructor's words.

Their teacher begins to distribute the scrolls, but raised an eyebrow when he saw Naruto smiling in an innocent manner which made the man raised an eyebrow.

"Naruto if you planted something, I'm gonna–" he begins to say which made the blonde haired boy raised his hand in defense.

Naruto denied his accusation, "I haven't done anything, Iruka-sensei." is what he answered with a sincere manner which made the man accept it, although the man was skeptic but carry on nonetheless. A few more seconds passed by until the blonde's teacher finished passing out all the scrolls. Iruka-sensei then walked back to the front of the classroom, holding his own scroll.

"Okay, now open up your scrolls and let's start our review." He said, opening his scroll, which prompted the other students to open theirs. Although, there were some groans but the brown skinned man ignored them. "You'll take me after you take your quiz." snorted Iruka then shook his head, as he continued. "Now, focus your attention on the words highlighted in each paragraph—"

To bad for the teacher, he got interrupted by a group of chuunin who literally broke down the door.

"FBI open up!"

The room was filled with silence, as everyone stared at the one chuunin who said that. Nobody said a word, as the poor chuunin turned red.

"I don't know what came over me to said that!"

Before anyone could muster a word, Naruto started to laugh out loud and this made the ninjas who had barged in earlier turn their heads towards the blonde who smiled innocently.

"Nice weather we having, y'know."

Birds chirping were heard outside and it took the group of chuunins a few minutes before running towards the blonde, only to trigger the trip wire that the Uzumaki had set up in the last row. Stink bombs were thrown and Naruto made his escape with the group of chuunins plus Iruka on his tail.

They left behind a stinky classroom with children having a hard time to breath. Then, a person entered the room and a surprise look came over her in seeing some of her classmates almost passing out. Then, Ino noticed her and let out a shout.

"Hinata, please inform a teacher about this since Iruka-sensei decided to chase Naruto!"

The Hyuuga raised an eyebrow at what the light blonde haired girl was talking about when she finally noticed the green gases that had filled the room. She let out an 'Oh', now knowing what was wrong. She didn't caught the smell of the stench since her nose is clogged from the slight cold she have.

She was lucky, indeed, that she had been in the nurse office when the blonde's prank had happened. Although, that wasn't the reason she got delayed on her way back to the classroom. While walking back she finds a granola bar on the floor, thinking that somebody will look for it, she decided to place it on the lost and found box that was near the principal's office.

Yeah, still lucky...

Naruto glanced at the clock in his classroom, reading nine o'clock. He then turned his attention towards the other students sitting down at their desks.

Everyone was quiet.

This was a rare moment, to not have at least a single student making some type of noise. Eh, it was sometimes his fault why the class is rowdy but today is the day of their graduation exam, so he kinda gets it. Then, he heard his teacher calling for the attention of the whole class.

"Ahem." Iruka-sensei cleared his throat, drawing attention towards himself. "The graduation exam will be divided into three parts. The first part is a written exam based on the information that I, and the other academy instructors, have taught you over the years of basic shinobi theory and history. The second is a test on your efficiency with weapons. The final test will be an exhibition of the three required jutsu: Substitution, Transformation, and Clone Jutsu. Does anyone have any questions?"

Everyone remained quiet and their teacher waited a few more seconds before nodding his head which made the blonde haired boy confused until the man said decided to begin the first part of the graduation exam.

"Then let's not waste anymore time, shall we?" Iruka-sensei said as he reached into desk and pulled out a collection of papers. "You will have one hour to finish this exam."

With that said, the exam that will ensure Naruto's next step to his goal or will he fail? Well, he'll find out the answer to that after answering this exam.

"You failed Naruto..." is what the blonde's favorite teacher had said and the boy felt angry; a protest was about to come out in his mouth but decided to calm down.

A growl escaped his lips, "Oh, why is that?" he asked and the teacher sighed.

"Your test results are poor," stated the man as he gave the Uzumaki his test paper. "and you failed to do the clone jutsu."

Naruto took the paper and his eyebrows rose up, not believing at what he was seeing. "This isn't my paper." then anger filled him and his teacher stared at him with shock. "Also, failing a clone jutsu made all of you decide that I can't be a ninja? But what about me doing another jutsu that is higher than that stupid jutsu!" he asked with his eyes narrowing. "I did failed the clone jutsu, but showing my weapon skills and doing the two other jutsu plus the alternative jutsu that I had used aren't really enough! Then, there's the fact that my test is sabotaged again!"

The blonde let out a growl, his eyes glaring intensely at Iruka-sensei before finally deciding to storm off.

'To think after working that hard, I'll pass this exam!'

Tears filled his eyes, but he didn't allow them to drop. The boy just walk down the hall, until he decided to run. He was embarrassed and he wasn't thinking rationally. He was desperate, really desperate that he decided to take on Mizuki-sensei's test so he can pass.

Only to regret it later on...

...To Be Continued...