Chapter 21
Training

Land of Frost
Forest Clearing

Naruto took the back paths and stayed away from the roads in order to get out of the Land of Lightning and into its only land neighbour the Land of Frost which contrary to its name was rather temperate but Naruto thought that it was probably due to it being summer and the country would become miserably cold in winter.

Naruto had been trekking for the forest as he had enough of crowds and cities in the Land of Lightning, but as he had made his way through the more rough forest he noted a lot of differences between the trees here compared to the Land of Fire's own trees. The trees in this land were tall and thin with thing leaves and even some that did not have leaves but instead had spikes on them as well as there being a lot more of them whereas in the Land of Fire there trees were gigantic but there was less of them due to the sheer size of said trees which could hide entire platoons among their massive branches whereas the branches for the trees here could barely support birds and other small animals.

It was during his trip through this strange forest that he discovered an abandoned cabin, it was completely intact but just there was no one inside the food had rotted and it was full of dust but there was two beds one large and one smaller there were also children's toys and even some money which said to Naruto that people left execting to come back but something had stopped them.

Naruto decided to clean it up and live in it because he wanted to train with the Ranton that he just obtained because unlike the first time with the Hyoton Naruto did not have a Haku to train him, so the only teacher he had was the scrolls of Jutsu that he took.

And that was his current situation, though he was on a timetable due to wanting to get Samui out of the grasp of the Yotsuki Clan he also needed to make the proper preparations.

So far he had not been caught stealing Kekkei Genkai but the moment it got out that someone was doing that he knew he'd have a huge bounty put on his head and every Kekkei Genkai wielding Clan would be aiming for his head.

He had put all his belongings in the cabin and was outside in the cold but not freezing air with one of his Ranton Ninjutsu scrolls open on the ground in front of him.

Naruto stood with his legs spread wide in the horse stance, a basic fighting stance that almost every Ninja knew about, he was going through a Hand Sign sequence very slowly memorising what he read in the scroll though the boys' eyes were closed as they went about repeating the sequence over and over again.

"Ranton: Laser Shot!" He finished the sequence one more time but this time he used Chakra and had the Water Element in his right hand and the Lightning Element in his left. He held out both of his palms facing a tree away from him as lightning crackled and formed in it.

The Lightning that was formed then stopped crackling as the Water Nature was applied and made it more 'fluid' for lack of a better term and then after settling into a ball of liquid lightning it shot forward and pierced right through the tree and the one behind it and the rock behind that tree, each time it passed through something it also burnt them from the sheer heat of lightning.

"Yes! Wooooooooop!" Naruto opened his eyes and let out a noise of pure joy as the Ninjutsu went off successfully the first time he managed it since starting to practice.

'The Ranton is so different compared to the Hyoton, even though I haven't fully absorbed all of the Chakra it's still really hard to get the balance between Lightning and Water right.' Naruto thought as he walked over to the tree he shot the beam through and inspected the hole it made.

"Wow, this is good." He said as he felt the burned back on the inside of the tree.

It had completely burned through the tree cleanly, there was no roughness but a completely smooth hole. It was the same for the other tree and rock behind if Naruto kept the Jutsu going he imagined he could have put a hole through everything he aimed at.

"Now onto the next one!" Naruto said excitedly like the child he is.

This was the most fun part of getting a Kekkei Genkai practising in making the Chakra and obviously using the Ninjutsu itself, he had a lot of fun practising the Hyoton with Haku back in the Land of Water and even here alone it was still fun if a little lonely.

Haku was cool and calm but had a playful side and Naruto liked his company a lot, Naruto had wanted Haku to come travelling with him but of course, Haku was the Clan Head of the Yuki Clan now and as such he couldn't leave his Clan to go wandering around the world with him.

While in the Land of Lightning he had obviously met Samui and he really liked her but due to that damned Tsuki Fuin on her, she would never be able to run away from the Yotsuki Clan while she had that Seal on her. So Naruto had to leave her with only a promise, though he at least managed to reduce the effects of the Seal by basically stopping it from being used to torture her and get it to stop suppressing almost half of her Chakra so she would be able to use more Jutsu before running out.

"Right the next one is Ranton: Laser Circus, their favourite one." Naruto commented as he crouched down and read over the details that he had copied from their own library of Jutsu.

This Ninjutsu was far more complex and powerful than the simple one he used before, this one involved creating a larger amount of 'liquid' lightning then shooting multiple beams out and of course, the most difficult part of the Jutsu was manually controlling each beam.

Naruto could see why this Ninjutsu was the most used by the Bofu Clan, it was relatively low on Chakra usage along with the fact that it could hit multiple opponents or even be concentrated into a single powerful beam.

"Well, I want to get to those Ougi Ranton as soon as I can so I need to get all these learnt first." Naruto said aloud as he stretched his arms and stood back up straight.

If there was one thing Naruto took to heart during his lessons with Hiruko and later with Haku it was that he shouldn't even think of attempting the advanced Ninjutsu without having a solid base in the basics of using the Kekkei Genkai and trying a powerful Ninjutsu would probably drain all his Chakra and send his body into shock since he was essentially flooding it with Chakra he had never used before.

"Basics first." Naruto remembered Haku's words during their short training together.

A Short Distance Away

In the forest of thin trees, a White-haired man was leaning against one of the trees while watching the boy and the cabin, he had 6 Kage Bunshin placed at various points around the cabin that this Naruto was currently squatting in, partially to keep a full eye on the boy but also as a defensive measure to make sure no one would approach.

"Wow," Jiraiya said as he watched the blonde boy use a Ranton Ninjutsu which if Jiraiya was correct about his parentage should be impossible.

Jiraiya had been trailing the boy ever since the meeting at the Inn in the Land of Lightning, for the first few days it was boring just watching him run cross country avoiding any roads and people in general but then of course the boy stumbled across an abandoned cabin, no doubt it used to hold some small family who fled because of a battle or got scared of the amount of Ninja passing through the Land of Frost.

It was a depressing scenario that Jiraiya had seen happen far too many times.

"Ranton, huh does that mean he's just a member of the Bofu Clan or a bastard?" Jiraiya mused to himself watching as Naruto went through the motions of practising a Hand Sign sequence.

"He looks just like Minato though." He started arguing with himself.

'Could it be a random mutation? I know that Minato has an affinity to Lightning, Water and Wind while from what Minato told me Kushina had affinities of Water and Wind. And Ranton is the combination of Lightning and Water after all maybe it could be a freak mutation, rare but not impossible.' Jiraiya reasoned out in his head as he felt Naruto's large Chakra flare-up in preparation for using a Ninjutsu.

"Nearly kid." Jiraiya commented as he watched the boy's hands produce a huge ball of Ranton Chakra which then fizzled out the moment he tried to fire it outwards like the previous Ninjutsu he used.

This was how Jiraiya spent the rest of his day just watching the young blonde repeatedly practice Ninjutsu then running back to that scroll and trying again and again until he got it right.

'Definitely a physical learner, unlike Minato who only needed an hour max to learn any NInjutsu.' Jiraiya thought as the boy kept practising.

Namikaze Minato was Jiraiya's first and only apprentice and the greatest Ninja that Jiraiya knew, he was a genuine genius when it came to learning any of the various Ninja Arts. Minato was a sponge that absorbed all information and teachings half the time Jiraiya did not even need to teach him half of the time as the boy would experiment on his own.

'I suppose it's true what they say brilliant parents does not mean brilliant offspring.' Jiraiya thought as he watched Naruto try again.

By the time the sun went down the kid had managed to learn and use 5 different Ranton Ninjutsu which Jiraiya was impressed by, he was half expecting the kid to give up when he kept failing on the second one but the blonde boy persevered and eventually got it working and he kept practising until he could use it well.

Jiraiya did not know how long Naruto would stay here so he decided that he would give the boy 1 more day of training then he would approach him and find out if he really was Minato's son.

Elsewhere
Land of Waves

The Land of Waves was a country just off the western coast of the Land of Fire it was far enough away to be considered its own country but it was a small island unlike

the huge ones in the Land of Water, as such it was rather poor despite its good position between the Land of Fire and the Land of Water.

It was here where two men were sat high in the tree branches looking over a poor village, it was very typical the civilians were dirt poor and had hard lives because they all would do physical labour all day for the richest man on the island a man by the name of Gato who ruled over the country like he was its Daimyo.

The actual Daimyo of the Land of Waves was exceedingly corrupt and more concerned with drinking sake, eating lavish meals and taking beautiful women from their villages and making them join his large harem.

There was a certain part of the Land of Waves which was ruled directly by Gato, the village was poor but overlooking it on a hill was an extensive estate with huge gardens with ponds and all kinds of luxuries and at the centre was a huge custom-built mansion, it was made out of marble mined from the Land of Earth and the grossest expression of wealth that the two Ninja standing in trees had ever seen before.

"So this is the target?" A bored voice asked, this was a man in his mid-twenties he was dressed in dark colours and had a mask covering the bottom half of his face. His spiky hair was silver in colour and oriented to his left side and he had two dark grey eyes. He also had a tanto sheath horizontally at the back of his waist.

"Yes, Gato is known for having an actual treasury full of money, jewels and other valuables." The other man said he was leaning against the tree's trunk looking over the huge estate in the distance, he had spiky blonde hair and prefered navy coloured clothes though he too had a mask covering the bottom half of his face.

"I still don't understand why we have to rob a petty tyrant Sensei?" The silver-haired man asked as he read from a small orange book.

"I need to amass wealth for a project I'm working on, so we need someone rich but not truly important." The other said.

"And taking out Gato will improve the Land of Waves as well Minato-Sensei." He said snapping his book shut and standing up.

"If there were fewer men like Gato then the world would be a better place, we are doing a lot of people a favour taking him out Kakashi." Minato replied as he pulled out a three-pronged kunai which had a seal on the handle.

"And piss a lot of people off, Gato is a well-known smuggler." Kakashi replied as he bent his knees slightly ready to jump.

"Yes." Minato replied as he looked over the estate with his electric blue eyes.

"Are you still thinking about that message from Jiraiya-San?" Kakashi asked suddenly knowing what was on his Sensei's mind.

"It's probably nothing, Naruto should be in the Land of Whirlpools with his family, he has no reason to be in the Land of Lightning." Minato said cooly, obviously not liking the topic.

"He could have run away, it's a rare occurrence but even so." Kakashi offered up.

"Enough! We'll find out soon enough when Jiraiya-Sensei makes his move." Minato's voice was cold and cutting now.

"Okay." Kakashi gave up on talking about the topic, ever since Uzumaki Kushina's death his Sensei had changed.

"We do the usual tactic, take of Gato and I'll go for his wealth." Minato ordered as he crouched down ready to jump.

"Go!" Minato said and he was gone in a flash.

Kakashi sighed then followed his mentor by jumping off the tree right towards the huge walls that encircled Gato's massive estate.

'I hope that the kid is his son maybe Minato-Sense will go back to the man he used to be.' Kakashi thought as he easily got over the wall and took stock of the security situation.

Kakashi knew Gato had a small army of Mercenary Ninja but the Land of Waves had no Ninja Clans and basically received the scraps from the Land of Fire, basically Ninja who was too weak to stay in the same country with Clans like the Senju and Uchiha.

2 Days Later
Land Of Frost
Naruto's Cabin

Naruto was rather proud of himself, yesterday he had finished with all the basic Ranton Ninjutsu and now he was moving on to the more advanced Jutsu he was really excited about getting into these Secret Techniques that were kept separate from the others.

"Today's the day." He said happily as he grabbed the scroll from his pack and walked outside.

It was very early in the morning, Naruto was an early riser and while he slept like a log he was almost always woke up with the sun.

Naruto opened the scroll and looked at the first Ninjutsu on the scroll; Ranton Ogi: Rankiryu which just sounded like the coolest Jutsu name ever.

"This is gonna be so cool." Naruto almost squealed but held himself back.

He put the scroll on the ground and unfurled it more to show the Hand Sign sequence that he had to practice and to his surprise, it was actually rather short just Rat-Dragon-Hare and then Tiger which was tiny compared to some of the other Ranton and even Hyoton Jutsu that he learned.

"Looks pretty simple." He commented as he read over just what the Jutsu was supposed to do.

"Oh! It acts like a traditional storm instead of the liquid lightning that I've been using so far!" Naruto was surprised he expected all of the Ninjutsu of the Bofu to just be that but it looked like the Ranton could be used in a more traditional way of producing storm clouds and lightning.

"Right!" Naruto stood up and began going through the Hand Signs slow but faster than when he was learning the other Ninjutsu.

'Okay, I have to mould the Chakra differently for this Jutsu instead of going for majority Lightning Chakra with less Water it's the opposite for this Jutsu, more Water Chakra with less Lightning.' Naruto thought as he made the Hand Signs again and again.

"Ranton Ogi: Rankiryu!" He called out and used his Chakra, if the Ranton: Laser Circus was 70% Lightning and 30% Water then the Rankiryu was like 60% Water and 40% Lightning.

It was a delicate balance but one Naruto had already gotten used to due to having both the Ranton and Hyoton which both used Water Chakra.

"Yes!" Naruto said as he opened his eyes and saw the black clouds form around him sparking with lightning.

He then manipulated the clouds and made a ring around himself probably only 5 meters in diameter but even so the Jutsu was under his control. So Naruto decided to test the limits and he kept spreading it further and further out soon enough it had enveloped the entire clearing and cabin and then even out into the trees.

"What the!" He felt something poof within the clouds and it disrupted his concentration and the Ninjutsu failed and dissipated back into harmless air and water vapour.

"Did I just absorb Chakra!? But from who!?" Naruto was alarmed, the Rankiryu could absorb Chakra to make itself self-sustaining but he never expected anyone else to be out here.

"Who's There!" He called out and prepared a kunai and a handful of shuriken ready to launch them.

"Damn Kid! That was surprising." A familiar voice said from behind him.

"You!" Naruto spun around and saw a familiar white-haired man leaning against the cabin.

"Hey!" He called and waved at Naruto.

"What are you doing here!? Why are you following me!?" Naruto demanded answers as he held back the desire to pelt him with sharp metal.

"I'm here because of a favour." He said as if it answered both of Naruto's questions.

"What does that even mean?" Naruto was not happy.

"I have a cute little Student and he asked me for a favour, to scout the Land of Lightning for changes since he got news about the Bofu and Yotsuki." Jiraiya revealed.

"But then imagine my surprise when after meeting someone at an Inn with a very familiar look and name, he changed his favour to following you around," Jiraiya told him as he began to walk over to Naruto.

"Why!? No one knows me!?" He said and held out the kunai towards Jiraiya who was still walking over to him.

"He does, if I'm right." Jiraiya said with a strange smile on his face, Naruto could not place just what that meant.

"What do you want!?" Naruto finally asked the most important question as Jiraiya stopped barely a meter from the blonde boy.

"What's your Mother's name?" Jiraiya asked him with a very serious tone.

"Why'd you wanna know?" Naruto however was stubborn even when faced with Jiraiya's serious face.

"Because it's important to me and my student." Jiraiya answered no longer playing around the subject.

"..." Naruto remained stubbornly silent as he watched the older man stand across from his with his large arms crossed.

"You're not gonna let me go until I give you an answer are you?" Naruto asked.

"No." He gave the answer Naruto was expecting.

"Kushina, there are you happy?" Naruto finally said.

"So I was right." Jiraiya muttered looking somewhere between happy and sad at the answer.

"Right about what? Why is it so important?" Naruto questioned him.

"I was right about you being the son of my student Namikaze Minato." Jiraiya said to him.

That shocked Naruto so badly that he dropped the kunai and shuriken.

"What!?" He shouted staring at Jiraiya with wide eyes.

"You're Uzumaki Naruto son of Uzumaki Kushina and Namikaze Minato. Last we heard about you was that you were safe in the Uzumaki Clan village after your mother died." Jiraiya said sadly.

"Yeah and I left." Naruto said still in shock from the revelation.

"Why?" Jiraiya asked him curiously.

"I have something I need to do. You taught my Dad?" He asked curiously.

"Well, I never really needed to teach him anything he's a genius after all." Jiraiya answered noting the hungry look on Naruto's face.

"Did no one ever tell you about Minato?" Jiraiya asked curiously.

"Back then the only thing anyone would ever tell me was that he's a dangerous Ninja who stole the Hiraishin from the Senju." Naruto answered him.

"I see." Jiraiya realised that the Uzumaki were probably keeping Naruto from any information about Minato in order to make sure

he was loyal to the Clan first.

"..." Both sides were quiet now as they contemplated the new information they were both given by the other.

"I think we have a lot to talk about Naruto." Jiraiya finally said after the silence stretched out between the two of them.

"I guess so." Naruto agreed with a nod.

So Naruto gestured at Jiraiya to go into the cabin he had been staying in. Naruto had all of his important things sealed away so Jiraiya wouldn't find or see anything incriminating, so Naruto didn't mind the man going in first.

But Naruto could not help but feel like he had set something huge in motion, he never would have thought that he would meet anyone related to his Father outside of the Land of Fire but someone was and he didn't know what to do know because he still needed 3 more Kekkei Genkai to complete the Chimera Jutsu handed down to him by Hiruko.

AN:

Here you all are chapter 21 for your reading pleasure, hope you all enjoyed it.

Things are getting spicy now, Akatsuki on the move, Jiraiya finding Naruto and Minato and Kakashi doing shady things.

Look forward to the next chapter on Monday probably.

Translations:

Ogi-Secret Techniques

Ranton Ogi: Rankiryu=Storm Release Secret Technique: Demon Dragon Storm