Disclaimer : I don't own Naruto or this idea as it is a challenge fic by Narutoenthusiast.
Chapter Five
"Naruto you are to rigid relax your shoulders a bit" Hayama instructed.
Clang, Clack, Clang
"Tomaru keep your guard up" Hayama says.
Clack, Clang, Clang, Clack
"Boys that's enough bring it in" Hayama says stopping the spar a few minutes later.
Both Naruto and Tomaru ran up to where their sensei and third teammate Fuki stood underneath a tree in Training Ground 23. It was like most of the training areas in Konoha a wooded area with a few good sized clearings and a couple of smaller ones in it. This was the last training ground available to his team as the others had priority. Still, it was a good area to train in for what Hayama wanted to teach them for now and by the time they required different elements to train with there would be openings at other training grounds.
Naruto looked at his team. They had started training a week ago with the first order of business being chakra control. Naruto had pretty much exhausted what he could gain from the Leaf Floating exercise and had gotten to the point where he had at least five leaves on his head, arms, back of his hands, palms, torso, back, thighs, legs, and the top of his feet. He wanted to move on to more difficult exercises but being an academy student meant he was limited to mostly academy student or civilian means of training.
Learning the Tree Climbing exercise gave him a small boost to his chakra control. Naruto already worked out how he could modify the exercise to see even more benefits. He immediately came to the conclusion combining the Leaf Floating exercise with Tree Climbing would pay the most dividends, but all that had to wait until he mastered Tree Climbing. After a few days none of them had yet to get all the way up the tree. Fuki was the closest being she had the smallest chakra reserves, Naruto thanks to all his hours working with the academy level exercise had enough control that he was a third of the way up his tree just behind Fuki, Tomaru had yet to make it half way but was improving every day.
The next thing Hayama wanted them to work on was kenjutsu. Hayama himself was a swordsman and wanted his own team of swordsmen/swordswomen thus he took his new team to a shop run by an old friend. Izo Harustuchi was a war orphan both of his parents dying in the 2nd shinobi world war. He was a retired chūnin a veteran of the 3rd shinobi world wars and an all around good guy. His store wasn't as good as say the Higurashi Weapons Emporium or a few other notable stores, but he made dependable weapons that were affordable.
He bought each of them a katana although Tomaru wanted a bigger zanpakto despite not being of sufficient height to wield one. Naruto also had to admit he secretly wanted a bigger sword, but kept quiet since Shirakumo-sensei was paying out of his own pocket. This was something rare to Naruto as normally no one gave him anything so he treasured the sword his sensei bought even if it was a rather cheaply made mass production model. Sensei said he would help them pick out better swords and pay half for it if they were serious about continuing to learn kenjutsu. So far all of them gave the hour reserved for kenjutsu practice their all even Fuki whom didn't want to weild a sword initially.
Naruto had learned a little about his teammates in their introductions given before their team test. Tomaru was an energetic kid of civilian background. He had an older sister that worked as a waitress, a little brother just starting out at the academy, a baby brother not even a year old, his father was a maintenance worker, his mother a bank teller, and his dream was to be Hokage. It was a grand dream one Naruto once held and it allowed him to bond a little with his male teammate.
Fuki was an orphan and had joined the academy with her friends Ami and Kasumi in hopes to escape civilian life. She was also a member of the Sasuke Fan Club as Naruto remembered her and her friends bullying some of their weaker classmates. The girl didn't seem to have much in the way of skills, but she had been working hard to get better so far so Naruto would withhold judgment of her for now. So far they got along well enough to get through whatever training sensei had planned for them for the day.
"I called you all over early, because I think you are ready for your first mission" Hayama says.
Naruto and Tomaru grinned broadly since they had been eagerly anticipating their first mission.
"What do you think it will be sensei? Do you think we'll travel to a distant land and rescue a princess from a bad guy looking to take over her kingdom" Tomaru starts.
"No way Tomaru, it would probably be something like fighting off hordes of bandits trying to rob civilians on their way to the capitol" Naruto says.
"No way we're going to be rescuing princesses and fighting bad guys who would destroy the world. We will be hero's and then the Hokage will have to recognize my brilliance and make me his successor!" Tomaru shouts.
"No way they'd probably give missions like that to teams of jōnin. It's got to be bandit elimination or perhaps we have to capture a missing-nin" Naruto says in rebuttal.
Hayama and Fuki could only groan. Naruto's suggestions were more realistic even if far fetched for a newly minted gennin squad, but Tomaru was prone to flights of fancy. The two would often bicker about what their first mission would be. He almost chuckled as he imagined their faces when they finally received their mission for the day.
"Okay that's enough guys let's just go and get the mission already. If you two keep squabbling over what mission you think we'll get the real missions will be all gone by the time we get there" Hayama says.
He gets the desired result as both boys quiet down and follow their sensei and teammate out of the training grounds. Thirty minutes later Hayama had filled out the necessary paper work and gotten their first mission. They headed back outside as Naruto and Tomaru were eagerly awaiting what their first mission would be. They walked to a park a few miles away from the Hokage Tower.
"Okay guys … and gal, your first mission is to pick up the litter and place it in these bags" He says handing each of them a stick and a green garbage bag.
"What? What kind of mission is that?" Naruto asked with Tomaru behind him shaking his head in agreement.
"It's the kind they give fresh out of the academy gennin like yourselves" Hayama says.
"Awww … come on sensei can't we get something better than trash pick up. A civilian could do this, so why are we stuck with it?" Tomaru whined with Naruto this time shaking his head rapidly in agreement.
"That's enough you two! Look I know it's crap work, but you are new gennin and as new gennin fresh out of the academy these are the types of missions you receive. I had to do this, the sannin had to do this, even the Hokage back in the day had to do missions like this for awhile before they got to do the cool stuff. Right now your time is supposed to be spent mostly on training, learning new skills, and getting to know each other so you can better your teamwork. I promise if you work hard in a few months I will think about getting us a higher ranking mission okay" Hayama says.
Naruto and Tomaru didn't like it but they nodded in agreement. Fuki had sat back and watched her two teammates and while she didn't want to pick up trash all afternoon she also didn't think they were ready for anything like what Tomaru or Naruto were suggesting. She was hoping to put off the more dangerous missions for as long as possible.
"Okay then get to work! The longer you stand around complaining the longer you don't get to do any of those cool missions" Hayama says knowing it would serve to motivate the boys.
Naruto and Tomaru had already turned to start ready to finish the mission as quickly as they could when a thought popped into Naruto's head. Turning around to face his sensei Naruto noticed both his teammates had stopped to see what he was doing.
"Umm sensei … what are you going to be doing while we are picking up trash?" Naruto asked as he noticed his sensei didn't have a stick or bag in his hand. The other two were also curious now that they noticed the same.
"Me, well I'm going to be sitting right here reading this book while I supervise you three from a safe distance" Hayama says as he sits down on a bench book in hand.
"What that's not fair! Why do we have to do all the work while you get to sit and read a book!" Tomaru shouted.
"Well my little gakuto that's life as a shinobi. Life isn't fair, but cheer up if you ever get your own team one day you can let them do all the work while you sit back and do nothing" Hayama says and then dismisses them as he begins to read his book.
It wasn't that book, but it had a little smut and a decent mystery. He was into the mystery and detective type novels and if they had a little adult material it was all the better, but he didn't actively search for it. He did have an Icha Icha and a few other smut types hidden away at home, but he'd never bring those out in public. I mean what kind of man would he be to read that type of material out in public around his students? A sorry one if you asked him, but he wasn't anyone's moral police so he wouldn't say anything to those that did.
"Hey Naruto, I bet I finish my section faster than you do!" Tomaru shouts.
"Your on pal, loser buys lunch!" Naruto shouts back.
Fuki could only shake her head at her teammates. Tomaru was far to exciteable and a bit of an idiot at times. The past week they had been together Tomaru was always trying to challenge her or Naruto to cement his position as strongest of the group. While she ignored him for the most part Naruto would accept his challenges.
'It could be worse' she thought with a mental sigh before getting to work herself.
Two hours later Team 4 was done with their first D-rank mission and all of them were happy about it. It took so long because in their haste both Naruto and Tomaru would overlook and miss some trash they would have seen if they were being more thorough so they had to go back and do it again and again and a few more times. In the end it was Fuki that won and both boys had to pay for her lunch, which she made very expensive for the purpose of teaching them a lesson.
After they had lunch at a fancy sushi restraunt they went to collect their pay They each went their separate way after receiving their pay. Hayama went to find his girlfriend, Tomaru went home to brag about his first completed mission to his family, and Fuki set off to find Ami and Kasumi. The three of them were a bit of an oddity as despite Ami and Kasumi not becoming full fledged gennin they had managed to keep their friendship. Naruto had no reason to hurry home or any real friends to find so he thought he'd walk around a bit perhaps head back to the training grounds and do a little more training. He was passing a barbecue restraunt when he saw Team 10. Naruto waved to them and kept going to the nearest training ground.
"Who was that?" Ino asked.
"Troublesome, his names Naruto don't you remember he was in our class at the academy" Shikamaru says never taking his eyes off the fading form of Naruto.
Ino just shrugged. "Don't remember" she says before picking at her salad some more.
"What's the matter Shika? *chew* It looks like you don't like the guy" Chōji Akimichi says in between bites.
"It would be too troublesome to explain" Shikamaru says dismissing his friends concern as he to went back to slowly eating his food..
Naruto was kneeling in an unused training ground panting hard from his training. 'That makes five minutes the longest I can keep up my jutsu. It should be long enough to finish most fights I'll get in for awhile, but it's no where near good enough. What have I been doing all these years to only be able to sustain it for five minutes at a time. I should be able to do this for hours by now' Naruto thought.
His training with his bloodline had been hard. The first issue he had was developing moves for his bloodline since he didn't know of anyone else with his particular bloodline. So far all he had come up with was a recreation of something he saw on a cartoon one morning. The second issue was in sustaining the original speed based jutsu as despite all his training it tore at his muscles if he prolonged it for more than five minutes and that really really hurt.
'I either need to find a new way to come at this or find other skills to train in. Perhaps I can ask sensei about finding out what my elemental alignment might be when we meet tomorrow' Naruto thought.
Looking towards the sky Naruto saw it was getting late so he decided to go home and get some rest.
Gakuto - student, follower, students and pupils
Hello everyone! I hoped you enjoyed the latest chapter of Speed Unlimited. I would like to apologize to everyone whom has taken the time to review. I appreciate each and every one so don't think I'm ignoring you, but until whatever this bug is that's messing up the review reply function is fixed I won't be answering you directly and I'm not the type to do so in an A/N. I again apologize and hope things are fixed soon so that I can respond to all of you once again.
So again thanks for reading, sorry for not answering your reviews, and keep reading okay. Until next time dear reader :) For those looking for a good challenge look up Narutoenthusiast, Challenger, or Dracohalo117.