A/N: Long time no speak!
We have a new chapter!
I'm only sad right now that I don't have a Switch, otherwise I'd be able to get more inspiration for this with Rise.
In any case, do read and review, would you kindly? And keep it classy!
…
[Southern Hi no Kuni Hunting Ground, a.k.a. "Giant's Garden", several days later]
The tranquil sound of birdsong mingled with a hiss and crackle as a slab of meat on a spit dripped fat and grease onto the open flame while Naruto sharpened a knife with a whetstone. He and Taeko sat around the campfire, waiting for the slab of Aptonoth tenderloin to finish cooking, keeping an ear on a tea kettle on the nearby hotplate. He wore his hitai-ate as a gorget under his segmented Yian Kut-Ku armor, while Taeko wore hers as a belt.
Ever since the manhunt for Mizuki and the rescue of Hyūga Hanabi, it was a waiting game for Iruka to recover from his injuries. Naruto had seen the teacher himself in the hospital; from what he'd seen, Iruka had taken a good beating from Mizuki, though he'd apparently given as much as he'd taken in that fight. Had it not been for his earlier attempt at rescuing Hanabi, the six of them would not have survived the fight against the traitorous teacher. The doctors said he'd recover within a week, which gave everyone time to register for their hitai-ate and to put their information on record.
As to Hyūga Hanabi, the girl was just happy to see her sister again━she seemed a little wary of him however, though it very easily could have been less for him being a Hunter, and more because he was a stranger. Nonetheless, she showed up at his doorstep to give him a big box of medicinal tea and a promise for lower-cost sessions at the clan spa as thanks. While he didn't know what the big deal was for spa sessions, Naruto knew that the tea was a high-quality blend after thoroughly enjoying one sip.
While Iruka took the mandatory leave to convalesce, Naruto took the opportunity to sign up for a Guild quest to keep his skills sharp and blow off steam. His go-to weapon was a Switch Axe made almost completely of bone, which was propped up on the log next to him. It had a hard bone axe-head, bracketed to a bone rail, with a large, steel blade folded over on a hinge on the back. Near the steel knuckle bow and on the spine was a large phial that was used to power the Switch Axe's mechanisms and enhance his attacks in sword-mode. It was a brutal, but versatile weapon that Naruto had taken a liking to after trying.
"I think it's ready, Meowster," Taeko noted, sniffing the roast.
Naruto stopped sharpening his utility knife to lean forward for a closer look, inspecting the tenderloin with an appraising eye as he smelled the salt and spices he'd used mingling beautifully with the savory fattiness of the tenderloin. He pulled out the fork and eating knife set from his utility knife sheath to cut open a slit in the meat, checking the color inside to find juicy red under a thin, browning layer of pink. No hint of the tenderloin's original marbling was left, the fat having long melted away into the sea of tender, juicy red.
"Yeah, I think it's time now," he said, nodding in approval shortly before a wet rumbling sound was heard nearby.
"You can join in, by the way," Naruto sighed exasperatedly, throwing a pebble at a square piece of green cloth in front of a large tree by the campsite, hitting the person behind. A low "ite!" was heard from behind the cloth.
"C'mon, I know you've been following me since yesterday!" Naruto added, his patience running thin, "While you're here, you may as well join us for lunch."
After a few seconds of silence, Naruto watched as the blanket fell to the floor to reveal a little boy with a cocky smirk on his face. His attire consisted of a yellow shirt with the village's crest emblazoned on it, and gray, knee-length shorts; his neck was covered in a long, dirty blue scarf, and his brown ponytail was held up by a sort of gray helmet.
When they first met, Naruto had witnessed this little boy making a failed 'assassination attempt' on the Hokage. He'd wasted no time in accusing the Ryōshinobi of bungling his attempt on the old man's life, to which Naruto defended himself by rightfully pointing out that the boy had tripped on his own scarf. The boy was adamant that the failure of his plan was anyone's fault but his own, which prompted Naruto to pick the boy up by the collar and shake him for good measure. At that point, his teacher had walked in and revealed the brat to be the 'honorable grandson' of the Hokage—a notion that Naruto didn't believe until he saw enough similarities between the two to believe him; he even had a faint hint of the Hokage's burning tobacco smell.
The boy wore that same smirk on his face when he taunted Naruto, claiming he wouldn't hit him due to his connection to the Hokage. Naruto smacked him for his arrogance; he'd held back enough of his strength to avoid killing him, of course, but it still knocked him out. Since then, he'd been doing his best to ignore the 'honorable grandson' as he went to the Bounty Board to find a harder job than 3-star quests.
"I guess I shouldn't be surprised," the boy proclaimed, strutting towards the campsite as Naruto carved up a small corner of the tenderloin, "Only you could catch me this easily!"
"It wasn't that hard," Naruto countered, serving up the cut on a bamboo skewer for the younger boy, "You kept hiding at the last minute, and you keep hiding in boxes that belong in the wrong places. Gotta hand it to you though, I didn't think you'd follow me all the way to the Guild Headquarters…on the other hand, I managed to lose you long enough to prepare for my hunt and get a good night's sleep." He handed over the skewer. "So now that you're here, why don't you tell me what you want?"
"I want you to teach me, boss!"
The declaration came so suddenly that Naruto twitched for a moment as he poured tea. "...What?"
"I want you to teach me!" repeated the boy, gratefully receiving his cup.
"I really don't have anything to teach," Naruto replied, cutting a hunk of meat for Taeko.
"Oh, c'mon, boss! I'm sure you'll be a better teacher than Ebisu-baka!"
"It doesn't bother you that I'm with the Hunter's Guild too?" Naruto asked, carving a piece for himself.
"Nope!" answered the honorable grandson, "In fact, why should anyone have a problem with Hunters? You guys take on really scary monsters, and come home to tell stories about it! If anything, it makes you guys at least as cool as a Shinobi!
Naruto looked at the younger boy as though he'd grown a second head while savoring the juicy, slightly spicy flavor of the tenderloin. "Either way, I can't teach you anything yet; I'm getting ready to go on my hunt after this."
"Can't you teach me anything?" pleaded the younger boy.
"Why don't we show him something, meowster?" Taeko suggested, "We can just finish this hunt tomorrow, nya."
Naruto sighed in exasperation. "What's your name, anyway?"
The boy puffed up his chest with pride. "It's Konohamaru, like the village…and one day, I'm gonna be Hokage!"
Nodding in approval, Naruto looked to Taeko. "Do we have a mirror in the tent?"
"Nya, we do."
"See if you can get a big one, I want to see how well he handles this."
Taeko smiled, scampering back to the tent as Naruto searched his pockets. "I'm going to teach you a jutsu I basically created myself. Now watch…"
Naruto flew through hand-seals before disappearing in a puff of smoke. In his place sat the same blonde that he'd used to mess around with Iruka during the Henge no Jutsu test, her hands covering what little modesty she had left with a come-hither look on her face. After a few seconds of watching, he dispelled the jutsu, much to Konohamaru's disappointment.
"…and this is the Oiroke no Jutsu," Naruto challenged, taking a sip of his tea, "Now you try."
Konohamaru wasted no time as he ran through the hand-seals, before he too disappeared in a puff of smoke. What Naruto saw when the smoke cleared triggered a gag reflex in his throat as he nearly choked on his tea, and Taeko simply stood in place, a horrified expression on her face. What should have been an attractive young girl was instead a fat, ugly man with a mustache, horrendously thick lips, and a bald head with a top knot.
"Well? How did I do?" asked the man.
Wordlessly, Naruto waved in Taeko, and took the large mirror gratefully from her paws before showing it to Konohamaru…who promptly averted his eyes in disgust, before dispelling the jutsu. "Take your time."
As Konohamaru caught his breath, Naruto searched his satchel. "Not a loss, you just need more practice."
"How is this gonna make me stronger?"
"Well for one thing, it's practice to make your Henge no Jutsu even better," Naruto countered, pausing in his search, "And let's be honest, when was the last time you ever saw a garbage bag shaped like a box?"
At this, Konohamaru flinched as though he were stabbed through the heart.
After finding what he was looking for, Naruto pulled out a magazine titled "Fiery Ladies" with an athletically-built woman on the cover; the fact that she wore bone and scale bikini armor suggested that she was a Huntress. Much of her body consisted of layers of wiry muscle under the taut, sun-browned skin of a Rai no Kuni native, with tan lines under the scant amount of protection she wore. Her most notable feature however, were the intricate, light blue cloud tattoos that swirled around her shoulders and upper-back; her hair was platinum blond, and her eyes were of a reddish brown, which complimented her subtly feline features. Overall, she had the look of a woman who would have looked beautiful even if she'd slogged through the mud of a pig pen.
"This is just the start, but if you can get better at trying to transform into her, you'll get better at transforming into anything else," Naruto told him, helping himself to more tenderloin, "The key here is to get as many details as you can in your head when you do the Henge. In this case, you don't have to be perfect, you just have to get as many details right about her so you can make your own Oiroke no Jutsu form. Look into the mirror every time you transform, that way you can see if you got it right."
With that in mind, Konohamaru went to work; every iteration of the woman was wrong on many counts. Sometimes parts of her body were overly-emphasized, other times she wound up bald, instead of with a full head of silvery hair on her head, and once she was envisioned as a sickly albino Felyne; whatever the case, every attempt to transform into her turned out wrong. And yet, with every attempt, Naruto noted that the younger boy would get just a tiny bit better: the covergirl's skin started coming out consistently as a healthy brown; her body measurements got closer to the original source; and Konohamaru was able to dial down her feline features.
After nearly an hour of attempts at trying to transform into the covergirl, Naruto invited the boy to settle down next to him, the tenderloin having been finished nearly ten minutes prior. "So why are you dead-set on being Hokage so soon?" he asked, offering Konohamaru a cup of tea.
"Because I want people to know who I am," answered the younger boy, gratefully accepting the cup.
Naruto regarded Konohamaru with a raised eyebrow as he unwrapped a honey cake from the ration kit. "You do know there are other ways of doing that?"
"It's the best way I know how," admitted the younger boy, "Anytime people talk to me, it's always 'honorable grandson' and never by my name; like they respect my grandpa, but they don't really respect me…like they don't even see me. Well I'm tired of all that! I wanna prove to them that I'm not my grandpa…that I can be a great Shinobi too. And that's why I want to be Hokage now!"
"I'll be honest, you've a long road ahead of you on that end," Naruto noted, "Besides, you're not the only one that wants to be Hokage."
Konohamaru looked to Naruto, wondering what he meant.
"Honorable Grandson!" called a voice from behind.
Naruto and Konohamaru looked in the direction of the voice to find the speaker practically trudging through the forest towards the campground. His slender form was dressed in the typical indigo Konoha shinobi uniform, sans the flak jacket; he wore the hitai-ate as a bandanna on his head, and a pair of round sunglasses that would not be out-of-place on an Aburame obscured his eyes.
"Him again?" Taeko moaned.
"I've been looking everywhere for you!" scolded the older man, "When I couldn't find you, I heard that you've been following this…this ruffian and his mangy fleabag to the lair of those barbarians from the Guild!"
Taeko hissed angrily at the man, who Naruto recognized as Konohamaru's teacher, Ebisu. What made him especially recognizable was mostly because he seemed like the kind of Shinobi who would rather be mean to the Hunters than to thank them for keeping the village safe from monsters..
"Shut up, Ebisu-baka!" Konohamaru shouted, "I'm learning more under Boss than I have under you!"
"Honorable Grandson, I've been entrusted by your grandfather to teach you how to be a Shinobi the right way!" Ebisu countered, "Instead, you're wasting your time with this hooligan and his dirty fleabag!"
"We're over here, y'know?" Naruto fired back.
"This doesn't concern you, caveman!" snapped the teacher, before turning his attention back to Konohamaru.
"Oh yeah?" challenged the younger boy, "Well when were you going to teach me how to do this?"
Konohamaru flew through the hand-seals and disappeared in a puff of smoke; when it cleared, Naruto noticed a mortified expression on Ebisu's face as he beheld the form that the younger boy had taken. She was a naked young woman in her late teens that shared Konohamaru's brown hair, blue eyes, and pale complexion. She wasn't particularly stunning like the covergirl, as she was more on the adorable side with a softer, more petite form reminiscent of a cute little sister. Her straight hair was cropped at the bottom of her shoulder blades, and her eyes seemed to sparkle with life. It impressed Naruto that the younger boy was able to get the idea behind the jutsu well enough to create his own Oiroke no Jutsu manifestation.
"I'd call this progress!" she teased, before the jutsu was dispelled.
"What a perverted jutsu!" Ebisu barked, ignoring his bloody nose, "Honorable Grandson, if this is what he's been teaching you, then you shouldn't be learning from him! I promise you, my way is the quickest way to your dream of becoming Hokage!"
Naruto snickered in response, setting down his tea cup. "Now that's a lie, and you know it."
"And what would a low-born barbarian associated with the Guild know about what it takes to become Hokage?" Ebisu challenged.
"None whatsoever," Naruto admitted simply, ignoring the barb, "But I'm pretty sure if he were here, Pops would have slapped you upside the head for making big promises like that. I've seen your type in the Hunting Hall; the kind that talks a big game and can back it up…looking at the way you carry yourself, I know you can back it up. I've been around veteran Hunters long enough to see that you've probably been active for, what? Ten, fifteen years after graduating the academy? And even after that, you kept chipping away, staying sharp and staying smart…in that way, you're like a lot of Hunters I know, and I respect that."
"Meanwhile, I know of one 'low-born barbarian' who did way better than you. I don't know why people in Konoha refuse to admit it, but everyone in the Guild Headquarters knows that Namikaze Minato, the Yondaime Hokage, had Hunter blood in his veins. He was a Ryōshinobi kid that was adopted and raised by Pops himself, probably to be the best Hunter that the world has ever seen; and from the stories I've heard, I believe he could easily have been the best. Instead, he chose to enter the Ninja Academy, became a Shinobi, and eventually became Hokage so he could make life better for both the Hunters and Shinobi, and that's why I really respect him."
"And you think you can follow in his footsteps just because you made his decision?" Ebisu asked mockingly, his arms folded across his chest.
"Nobody said I couldn't," Naruto countered, "I mean yeah, I wanna be Hokage too, but at least I'm not kidding myself about there being shortcuts along the way. I know I'll have to work and train hard, so that I can survive all kinds of things that'd break even the toughest Hunters and Shinobi. Yeah, it's gonna be a hard road, but that just makes for a better story to tell my kids, don't you think, Konohamaru?" At this, he turned to regard the boy in question. "So do you still wanna be Hokage?"
Throughout the exchange, the boy in question was stunned to silence; any hesitation he had left melted away into a stern determination. "You don't scare me, I'm gonna train harder and fight smarter, and be Hokage before you!"
Naruto smiled at the younger boy, offering his hand to shake. "I'll hold you to that…though when we fight for the title of Hokage, I expect to hear really good stories from you."
Konohamaru accepted the handshake. "You won't be disappointed."
…
[Hi no Kuni Guild Headquarters, a.k.a. "Hiyōsai", Naruto's Apartment]
Hiruzen stood in the spacious interior of Naruto's empty apartment; the differences between this one and the one he stayed at in Konoha were night and day. In Konoha, his studio apartment was a concrete dwelling with very basic modern conveniences like a refrigerator, a TV set, and an oven range and toaster. The furnishings were spartan in appearance, a simple steel frame bed, a metal shelf with books, a plastic-topped table, and a simple couch in front of the TV; signs that Naruto only lived there. The only personal touch he added was the planter with tea lilies at the windowsill that he kept watered whenever possible.
The one he was standing in was built on top of a bakery, and had a more rustic and traditional build with leeway given to more modern conveniences and appliances. The walls were made of water-hardening concrete faced with fireproof brick, and the flooring was made of thick wood planks that had been sanded, oiled, and polished smooth. Every piece of furniture in this apartment was made of a combination of bone and wood, from the hand-carved bed frame to the shelves. He could see blooming chrysanthemums and healing herbs in a planter at the windowsill, ready to be harvested for tea at a moment's notice.
"Nice place," noted a shinobi in the same room. The sleepy-eyed man's disheveled silver hair was held up by the hitai-ate, he wore like an eyepatch over his left eye. He wore the indigo uniform and green flak jacket of an active-duty Shinobi over a body built of wiry muscle. "You said he had an apartment in Konoha too?"
"Shirohige rented it for Naruto while he attended the Academy," supplied the old Kage, "It looks like he comes back here to get whatever he needs before a Guild mission."
"So what are we doing here?"
"My father once told me that you can tell a lot about a person by the place they call home," Hiruzen explained, "I get the feeling that he's only staying at that place in Konoha, but he doesn't consider it a home. But here? I would much rather live here when I retire again. So tell me, Kakashi, what you think this apartment tells you?"
"Well, I can see he's very meticulous about his preparations," answered Kakashi, eyeing a workbench with a coarse grinding wheel, several grades of whetstones, a polishing kit, and a few hand-tools spread around an iron Greatsword. His gaze soon traveled to the wooden dining table with a set of vials, a kettle that smelled of medicinal tea, and a jar of Vigorwasp honey. "Though I wonder how his Hunter skills will translate to life in the Shinobi world."
"You're thinking of giving him the test?" asked Hiruzen.
"Best way to see if he's got it in him," replied the Shinobi, "You said he's already gone out on a hunt, how long do you think it'll take before he gets back?"
Hiruzen stroked his beard in thought. "I believe that the average Hunt lasts two, maybe three days at minimum…though if it's dangerous prey, maybe a bit longer. I expect he'll be back in time for Iruka to recover and issue team assignments."
"What monster is he hunting?"
…
[Giant's Garden, the next day]
Naruto and Taeko settled down on a tree branch, enjoying strips of honey-barbecued Aptonoth jerky while keeping watch for bandits and monsters.
Nearby, they could see a large monster feasting on a freshly-killed carcass upwind. It had a slender, feline appearance with a long neck, a slender, muscular tail, and cat-like ears on its head. It walked in a quadrupedal stance with its sword-like wings as forelegs, which betrayed its nature as a Pseudo Flying Wyvern, and was covered in pitch black fur and scales, but the webbing between its wings were tipped with a band of red against a background of black. It wouldn't have been clear to the naked eye, but Naruto knew that there were retractable, blade-like spines near the tip of the tail, which could easily turn it into a flail at a moment's notice. In all fairness, it was a fine specimen, but Naruto was not looking for a Nargacuga…not that he felt confident he could take one on anyway.
The client was a researcher that wanted a measure of how healthy the ecosystem was for the hunting season, which was why Naruto was given a bonus for every large monster he saw along the way to their target, and the locations he'd spotted them in. To that end, in addition to a signal flare, he bought a map and a marker to record his findings. So far, the Nargacuga he'd spotted was located on a dot not too far south of Konoha, but it wasn't the only predator Naruto had seen along the way—just the most recent one. The first was a turf war between a Jagras and Izuchi pack, their respective alphas locked in a battle over hunting grounds. The two packs were so engrossed in their turf war that the Aptonoth herd they were fighting over had taken the opportunity to flee.
The second encounter was of an Anjanath making its rounds in the forest. It was a healthy-looking beast to be sure, with vibrant pink scales, and steel-gray down feathers, but still not the one he was looking for. Last he'd seen of the Brute Wyvern, it was heading in the direction of the turf war he'd seen earlier. That guy's probably eating well right about now, Naruto thought wryly to himself.
After travelling deeper into the forest, Naruto saw a Pukei-Pukei landing in clearing not too far away, its big, googly eyes scanning the forest floor for fruits and nuts to grab with its overly-large tongue. While Naruto was certain he could use the poisoned weapons later on, he didn't want to waste time and energy on a creature he could very easily take on later…not when his prey was higher up on the food chain.
The Nargacuga crawled away to stalk the forest for its next meal. After finishing their rations, Taeko climbed onto Naruto's back; the Ryōshinobi focused chakra into his legs, soaring through the air as he sprung off the branch they were sitting on. The tree-hopping technique was as much a godsend to the regular Shinobi's tool kit as it was to the Ryōshinobi's, allowing the user to cover large swaths of territory; when in combination with a Slinger or Wirebug, it allowed for unprecedented levels of 3-dimensional movement. Once, he'd heard of someone using the technique in combination with a Wirebug to set themselves up to enter the Heavenly Blade Dance, cutting into the monster's hide like a spinning wheel of death with every pass.
As he soared through the skies with Taeko, Naruto was able to get a good look at how the current Hunting Season was going to play out. At the start of his expedition, he was able to gather some high-quality bones to make new weapons, along with two more Wirebugs to help with the hunt. He was also able to spot the same herd of Aptonoth that escaped the turf war at a watering hole, and saw that every individual was big enough to satisfy any monster, and there were plenty to satisfy demand for wild-caught Aptonoth meat. So far, every sign pointed to a very bountiful Hunting Season.
After nearly an hour of searching, Naruto spotted their target at the forest floor. Reaching into his satchel, he found what he was looking for; a small, glowing, fist-sized insect with wings, its form hunched over, like a crescent moon. Naruto threw the Wirebug into the air, allowing it to fly as it trailed silk; in a display of strength disproportionate to its diminutive size, the bug then yanked on the Hunter-Palico duo with enough force to completely redirect their trajectory in midair.
As he righted himself in midair, Naruto landed on a branch, lowering Taeko from his back to pull out a pair of binoculars from his satchel to have a look at their target. Like the Nargacuga from before, this creature was a Flying Wyvern, though her bipedal stance identified her as a True Flying Wyvern. She was covered head to toe in green scales with a white underbelly, and her back and her wings were covered in pads of quills. Both ends of her were dangerous, from the spike at the tip of her chin, to the brush of large needles at the end of her club-like tail; even the ridge of her wings had a bank of blades. His client wanted a living Rathian without her tail cut.
"Yep, that's our target alright," Naruto noted, pulling the Switch Axe out of its holster "You ready for this, Taeko?"
"I was born ready, nya!" answered Taeko, pulling the sheath off her cleaver.
Naruto and Taeko hopped from branch to branch in pursuit of their target, splitting up when they got near. Naruto initiated the fight by swinging the blade of his Switch Axe across the wyvern's face; the Rathian let out an ear-piercing roar of anger, Naruto recoiling to protect his ears. As soon as he regained his bearings, he rolled under a swipe of her bladed wings to chop at her legs.
After kicking him away, the Rathian re-oriented herself to face Naruto and performed her signature backflip, hoping to catch Naruto with the tail whip to slash at him with envenomed needles. Her target vanished in a puff of smoke, and in his place was a log that had been shattered by the tail whip, and as she landed, Naruto ran up a tree trunk and vaulted off of it, bringing the blade of his axe down on the target, hitting her in a wing. The Rathian hopped backwards, taking a deep breath as she landed before spewing forth three fireballs from her mouth, every shot barely missing Naruto as she tracked his movements. As he got close, she batted him away with another swipe of her armored tail, leaving the wyvern an opening to take an even deeper breath than before. Before she could spit out another fireball, Taeko jumped off a nearby tree to kick the Rathian in the head, redirecting her aim; it was larger, brighter, and hotter than the three before, and its explosion was much more violent.
As Taeko landed near her master, Naruto was able to get back up.
"Everything ready?" he asked.
"Nya! All we need to do now is wear her down!" Taeko confirmed.
"Then let's get to work!"
The battle between the Rathian and the Hunter-Palico duo continued, until finally the Flying Wyvern let out an angered roar. Throughout the fight, Naruto had fought with an interplay of Silkbind Attacks using his Wirebug and Switch Axe, and the simple jutsu he learned in the Academy…it was an aggressive style that smoothly transitioned between his weapon's sword- and axe-modes, trying to avoid taking unnecessary hits while building up power in the phial. At the same time, Taeko did her best to help her master, either by supporting him with healing tools or distracting the Rathian to set up openings for him to attack the Wyvern in sword-mode.
At the same time, the Rathian was able to put up a good fight for a greenhorn Hunter like Naruto, having been able to get in a few hits herself. While she was not normally an airborne fighter like her male counterpart Rathalos, the Rathian was still very dangerous in her own right. She fought with bites and tail-swipes, but also gave herself breathing room with volleys of fireballs and the occasional high-explosive fireball; she even worked in her signature envenomed backflip whenever she saw an opening.
After nearly an hour of battle, the Hunter-Palico duo stood across from the Rathian as she let out a roar of frustration before charging in. Naruto leaped over her, transforming his Switch Axe into sword-mode, and grappling onto the Rathian with one Wirebug while driving the tip of his mechanical sword into her back. Mechanical whining and hissing could be heard as pressure built up in the blade before it exploded in a Zero Sum Discharge, throwing Naruto off her back; as he sailed through the air, he released a second Wirebug at the target, and watched as both hovered around the tired Wyvern. With the Rathian too tired to fight back, Naruto leaped onto her back, and grabbed both Wirebugs, their Ironbind Silk strands holding strong onto her wings and her legs as he took control of her like a marionette.
"Taeko, hurry!" Naruto shouted, as he struggled to keep the Rathian under control.
"This way, Meowster!" Taeko answered, running around the Wyvern.
With great effort, Naruto controlled the Rathian's legs with the Ironbind Silk strands, forcing her to turn and follow Taeko with every step. As she ran ahead, Naruto manipulated her legs to walk a short distance before kicking a wound in the Rathian's back, forcing her to reflexively run forward and into a shock trap that Taeko had planted up ahead. With their prey paralyzed from high-current electricity coursing through her body, Naruto pulled a pair of ovoid glass vials from his satchel, somersaulted over the Rathian and threw both into her face. The Tranq Bombs worked quickly as the Rathian breathed in the cloying smoke from the contained liquids, her legs buckling as she slumped to the ground fast asleep.
Taking a breath of relief, Naruto walked around the Rathian's sleeping body to admire their catch. Throughout their fight, he saw that she was no stranger to battle, though judging from her softer features and the vibrant colors of her scales, she was less a regal "Queen of the Land" and more a young warrior-princess. And for a moment, he thought he felt a measure of exhilaration mixed with the anger in her eyes…as though she'd finally found a worthy opponent.
"She's really pretty, don't you think?" Naruto noted.
"Nya, she is!" agreed the Palico, "She's gonna make a good mom one of these days when the Guild lets her go."
Naruto nodded, pulling out a hand-sized bamboo tube out of his satchel and pointed it to the sky. With a heavy tug on the string, a tiny rocket was launched from the tube before exploding high in the sky as a light green flare with a loud 'bang' that could be heard from far away.
Their mission was done, which called for a celebration when they got back to the Guild Headquarters.
…
[Hi no Kuni Guild Headquarters, Naruto's apartment]
Hiruzen and Kakashi had watched from the crystal ball as Naruto and Taeko got onto the Felyne-pulled cart with their prey. It was an intense fight in the old Kage's mind, having to watch as the Hunter-Palico duo took on a Rathian; they had taken their fair share of damage from the battle, but they'd emerged victorious.
"Not bad," Kakashi acknowledged, "It's not easy taking on a Rathian at his age, let alone coming out of a fight with one alive."
"So what do you think, Kakashi?" Hiruzen asked, "Will you do it?"
The one-eyed Jōnin nodded. "After seeing what I've just seen, he's earned a chance at the bell test."
…
A/N: Now we're done; this chapter was still pretty canon in the beginning, but I wanted to show Naruto's progress as a Hunter.
Please give NorthSouthGorem and ravenking64 for giving this story a read and review.
…
Vocabulary/Translations
Ryōshinobi━It's a combination "hunter" ("ryōshi" "猟師") and "shinobi" ("忍び"), and is used in this story to describe the half-Hunter half-Shinobi people like Naruto and Minato.
…
And like in "Hunter Effect" if you have a Hunter that you'd like to show up here, (if only as a cameo), here's the following info I'd like you to enter…
Name:
Race: Human or Wyverian (They're the only races we see doing any active hunting)
Gender: No transgenders, please! I highly doubt MonHun-planet or Naruto-verse would have the technology or techniques to do so.
Sexual Identity: Gay? Straight? Bi? Omni?
Age:
Height: In centimeters (please make it believable)
Weight: In kilograms
Body Type: Slim, Muscular?
Skin Color:
Eye Color:
Hair Color:
Notable Features: Tattoos, scars, amputations, etc.
Personality:
History: Just a little of what they've done before going to the Shinobi Nations, like what was the biggest monster they killed, or where they come from. That, and what they've been doing while in the Shinobi Nations, and how long they've been there. Optionally, if they were born in the Shinobi Nations, you can identify if they're one of the few Ryōshinobi (Hunter-Shinobi hybrids) in existence. And like in the body measurements, please make it believable.
Guild Branch: Don't tell me who the Guildmaster is, I want to know which Guild Branch in the Shinobi Nations they are active in: Hi no Kuni? Rai no Kuni? You can even have them based in Mizu no Kuni during the Bloodline Purge if that's what you want.
Guild Status: Are they still active? If not, then what do they do now? Are they Guild Knights?
Handler: Do they answer to a Handler, a receptionist, or the Quest Board? If they answer to a Handler, give a brief description of them; name, gender, personality.
Hunter Rank: Are they Low- or High-ranked? Master-ranked perhaps?
Equipment: Just what weapon they normally use, and the armor they wear
Knife: Describe the knife they carry (this is optional)
Palico Name: Name your Hunter's Palico
Palico Description: Describe the physical appearance; tail length, fur thickness, eye color, etc.
Palico Equipment: Describe the Palico's weapon, gear, and armor
Palico Personality: Describe the Palico's demeanor
Voiceover: Who is their voice actor in Japanese or English? (this is optional)