As lunch ended all the newly graduated preteens all filed back into their classroom. As they all agreed to work as newly appointed Team 10, the trio all decided to sit next to each other while most of the new teams still sat all around the classroom. While they sat down Iruka had entered the classroom again. He cleared his throat before speaking.
"Allright class, shortly your sensei's will arrive and proceed to take you out of here. Remember everything you have learned and here and most importantly, work together as a team." Iruka smiled before bowing. "It has been an honor teach you guys." Iruka then quickly left the classroom.
Time slowly passed as Team 10 talked amongst each other. Ino kept wondering who their sensei would be while Shikamaru stared at the ceiling leaning back into his chair carefree.
"Who do you think it is Naruto?" Ino asked. Team 10 in his past life was taught by Asuma-sensei but since they changed things up, he wondered as well. "Honestly, I have no idea" He responded. After he spoke some of the Jounins slowly made their way calling on their respective team numbers and escorting them out of the room. After team 6 was called a woman entered the classroom. "Kurenai-sensi." Naruto whispered to himself.
Kurenai was a beautiful woman. She had long black untamed hair reaching her upper back, and piercing red eyes. Her outfit consisted of a red mesh armor blouse with only the right sleeve visible and her body wrapped in what seemed to be a bandage like material.
"Team 8?" I'm your Jounin sensei, my name is Kurenai Yuhi, please come with me and we'll get started." Kiba, Hinata and Shino all stood up and proceeded to walk out of the room with their newly appointed teacher before Sakura raised her hand and asked.
"Excuse me, it seems Team 7's sensei hasn't come." Sakura asked
Kurenai grinned and shook her head. Before you could respond a man walked into the room and responded.
"You guys are unfortunately going to have to wait here for a while. He's not what you call the punctual type. Anyway Team 10." The trio looked up to see a tall man, with brown eyes, olive skin, short black spiky hair, and a beard. Naruto smiled. "My name is Asuma Sarutobi and I'll be your sensei so follow me."
Naruto was a little shocked that things seemed to remain the same like his pervious life. But things were looking up. His new sensei being the only other wind user in the village would surely help out the training he needed to do. Naruto, Shikamaru and Ino stood up and followed the man out.
The newly formed Team 10 followed their jounin sesnsei as he walked them toward a training field where he then instructed them to sit underneath a tree. The man leaned back against said tree pulled out a cigarette and lit it. They all took a deep breather together with the scent of smoke filling the surrounding air.
Ino proceeded to glare at their sensei. "You know those things will eventually kill you right?" Asuma smirked in response for taking a deep drag of the lit cigarette. "Listen here, I think after you've been in my line of work for as long as I've been, the last thing you need to worry about is a little smoke in your lungs." Asuma retorted. He took a moment to observe his newly appointed student.
Ino seemed to be annoyed at his response. She was calm but also looked to be annoyed at her new teammates. He then looked at Shikamaru. Shikamaru stared at the clouds not realizing the world around him was revolving. Didn't seem like her cared either way. Kid would need some serious motivation if he was to end up as a good ninja. He took a closer look at the kid and while it appeared the kid was out of it, he did seem to be aware of what was happening around him.
Now onto the most interesting kid of the bunch. Asuma knew what he had with Naruto. His father had personally asked him to teach the boy as he needed someone who he could trust. Someone who could look out for the kid. While his relationship with his father wasn't the best. His father never asked him of anything unless he really needed it. He reluctantly accepted and while looking over the kids file it didn't match. Naruto was supposed to be this kid with endless energy who wouldn't be able to stay still. A loudmouth who'd speak before he could think.
But he was a kid calm and just seemed to be excited on starting his journey. No idiotic remark, no jumping around. Asuma pondered to himself before speaking. "Alright." Asuma stated. "Enough lounging around." The trio all looked up towards their sensei.
Asuma flicked his cigarette to remove the clumped-up ash on the end before saying "From this day forward I will be your Jounin-sensei. I will be responsible for your training; you will take mission with me and I will be responsible for your wellbeing and survival form this point onwards." Naruto rolled his eyes for he knew what was coming next, the dreaded bell test. "That is, after you pass your final test for becoming genin." Asuma continued.
Ino raised her eyebrow in surprise. "What are you talking about, we already passed our graduation test?"
Asuma responded "Sure any person can remember a few answers to questions and learn a couple of basic justus but that shit dosent get you covered in the real world." Shikamaru shook his head. "Life is always so troublesome" He responded. Asuma continued. "Out of all 27 guys that graduated only 9 of you guys will officially be recognized as genin. The rest of the class goes back to the academy for more teaching."
Ino eyes widened. "We-we'd have to back to the academy for another year?" Asuma nodded in response. Naruto contemplated on what he should do. Blurting out the true intentions of the test surely wouldn't do any good. He truly was stuck in a puzzle.
"You know I even talked about it with Hokage-sama. Trust me when I say this, I had no intention of taking on a team at the moment, but he gave me free reign to make this test as easy or as difficult as I want so I couldn't resist." The man stated. Naruto laughed internally before speaking.
"So you're doing this because?" "I came up with something that you guys will never be able to pass?" Asuma stated grining.
"How is that at all fair?" Ino asked. "Just because you're a lazy ass and don't want a team dosen't mean we should get punished and sent back to the academy for another year. My grades were doubled of both of these losers even if you combined them"
"And?" Asuma retorted bluntly. "Let me get something clear to you blondie, that shit doesn't mean anything to me. Congrats, you can answer question on a piece of paper, tell me how you'll do when you're surrounded by enemies fighting for your life. Last thing I want to do is caring for a bunch of brats for the next five years or so."
"So, you just going to fail us then?" Shikamaru annoying asked. "Didn't have to bring us all the way out here just to tell us whatever you set that we won't pass."
"Now as much as I'd hate having to look after you guys for the foreseeable future, I have a quota to make. So" Asuma proceeded to pull out a bell from his pocket. "I don't want any last place shit kissers. I want the best. So whichever 1 of you 3 can take this bell from me within the hour, ill personally mentor for as long as you are a genin."
Naruto raised an eyebrow; he was surprised at the tactic Asuma-sensei had pulled. At least Kakashi-sensei had the decency to offer 2 bells leaving only 1 person out. Either Asuma either didn't really want a team or he was trying to really test out how easy it would to break up this team.
"So, here's what we're going to do." Asuma proceed to crack his knuckles and neck seemingly to loosen up a bit. Asuma took a note on the position of the sun. "I'm going to give you guys 1 hour. 1 hour for someone to get this bell from me, otherwise all of you go back." He then proceeded to pull out his trench knives. "But be warned I won't be going easy on any of you."
The trio all stood up. Ino seemed to have no idea of what to do and Shikamaru looking at his supposed sensei with a confusing look.
"So, let's say time starts-"
A giant puff of smoke engulfed the area. Worried that someone would try to pull something slick, Asuma released a powerful stream of wind clearing the smoke around him. Where his students were was now empty space. "Now..." Asuma said in confusion.
Before Asuma could finish his sentence, Naruto threw a smoke bomb onto the ground and grabbed both of his teammates and pulled them into the surrounding woods. When they were a good distance away Ino finally pulled out of Naruto's grip.
"What the hell Naruto, you trying to sabotage us and claim the bell for yourself?" Ino yelled at the blond boy.
"Will you just take a breather before you instantly start yelling at me" He snapped back. "I was going to tell you the real purpose of this test but if you want to go to try and take on a Jounin by yourself please go ahead." Naruto said annoyingly.
"What do you mean real purpose?" Ino retorted cocking an eyebrow
"So, you had suspicions too huh? Maybe you're not as troublesome as I believed you to be" Shikamaru stated bluntly.
"Can someone please explain to me what the hell is going on?" The blonde girl yelled.
Naruto sighed. "It's not a test as Asuma-sensei stated. It's a test to see if we'd work together or crumble and work against each other."
"Think about it Ino" The pineapple headed boy said "When have you ever seen a team with their sensei's and there's only 1 student?"
Ino raised both eyebrows in response. In all of the 3 seconds she had to think between Asuma's words, she didn't even begin to think about any of this. Yet the 2 dead lasts in the class were able to work all this out in a matter of seconds? She took a look at her 2 fellow teammates. Maybe there was more to them than she originally thought.
"So how are we gonna get that bell then?" She finally responded. Naruto shot her a grin. "Alright here's what were gonna do."
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Asuma shot a look up at the sun gauging its position. Almost an hour had passed and he hadn't even gotten a sniff of his appointed genie and he smirked. Maybe they were all fighting it out and he would have an easy day. Asuma heard the whizzing of a kunai and moved his head slightly towards the left dodging it.
"Finally!" he stated out loud. He looked towards the direction of the kunai and saw the young Uzumaki standing there alone. "So, what did you get rid of your other teammates and see what you could do against me?" Naruto did not respond but formed a seal.
"Kage Bunshin no Justu" Asuma cocked an eyebrow, how did this kid know a forbidden jutsu? 2 copies of Naruto formed out of the smoke next to him then they began charge. "So, an upfront approach, not likely to work but I admire the courage kid." The 3 Naruto's each pulled out a kunai, they probably had only a couple shots at this before Asuma would figure out the plan.
They changed their trajectory and tried to perform a pincer attack style. 2 on each side and 1 from the front. Asuma pushed his heels into the ground and waited. Each Naruto tried to pull a different movement to try to confuse the man but Asuma was no fool. He deflected each kunai from his sides with his knives and pushed the 2 clones away. He shot forward and crashed his knife against the real Uzumaki's kunai. His strength easily overwhelmed the boy's and he shoved him to the ground.
The 2 clones came back to support their boss. Fighting against 2 genin with absolutely no strategy was a piece of cake. He deflected the kunai strikes with ease before deciding to get rid of the clones and easily dispelled them with no effort. He turned to the kid who was pinned underneath his foot.
"Well, that was fun now wasn't it? That lasted what 2 minutes? I was hoping for some type of workout." Naruto grinned "What's so funny kid?" Naruto pointed his fingers over to the tree they all had sat under and Asuma looked. All 3 genin were there while the clone underneath him dispelled.
"So, you guys finally decided to show. Shame really, I was hoping you guys would be tearing each other at the bits but I guess I get some type of workout today." Asuma shrugged.
Naruto smirked "That's exactly what I wanted to hear." Naruto proceeded to surge forward while Shikamaru put his hands into the ram seal. "Kagemane No Justu" Shikamaru shouted.
Asuma smirked and noted his posistion. He jumped back from the shadow the tree cast. "You don't think I take notes from my students:" He yelled. Naruto continued to charge at him and raised his kunai to attack. As Asuma raised his knife to deflect he found himself unable to move.
"What the fuck?" Naruto kept running and threw the kunai at him. Asuma unable to move braced for the hit that never came. He waited and waited and waited before opening his eyes. He cocked an eyebrow and saw nothing but a smiling Naruto in front of him.
"I can't believe that actually worked "He yelled in disbelief. "You'd think a Jounin would have better situational awareness." Asuma looked underneath him and found himself caught in a shadow. He looked towards the opposite side he was facing and saw Shikamaru there. He looked back towards where he thought Shikamaru was and found it was nothing more than a henged Naruto.
"How in the hell did you manage to think of something like this?" Asuma asked. He was taken aback, something so simple he fell for. "It was simple really, we just worked as a team." Naruto said smiling.
"That was really impressive Naruto." Ino slowly came closer. "How do you make clones that can take a couple hits?" Ino inched in foot by foot with her ready to activate her family's technique.
"Technically not allowed to actually tell you that" he responded smiling"
"Guys while I love the bonding, I can't hold this forever." A bead of sweat steamed down Shikamaru's forehead. Naruto pulled out another kunai and held it up to the man's neck.
"So, all of us pass, right?" Naruto asked
"Or you gonna force me to forcibly walk you to the Hokage's office and pass us and who knows, maybe I'll find a way to embarrass you in front of Kurenai sensei. I saw the way you looked at her earlier." Ino said smirkingly.
Before Asuma could respond he disappeared before being replaced with a tree log. All of them were taken aback.
"Y'all really think something so simple would work on me?"
Shikamaru released his Justu and looked up above him. There stood crouched on a branch was their teacher.
"Damn." All 3 genin muttered. Asuma jumped off the branch and waved Ino and Naruto over. "Nice strategy kids but you forget, I didn't just earn my rank by being good. Don't ever comment on my situational awareness again." He said lighting another cigarette. Ino wrinkled her nose at the sight. "I'm letting you know now though, if you ever try to pull that mind justu shit on me and try to embarrass me in front of Kurenai I will make it my personal mission to make all of your lives living hell."
Ino took a step back in fear. "You all pass by the way. While you didn't see my trick, I like the effort you worked out to use a strategy."
Naruto and Ino cheered in happiness. "So, since we passed were done right?" Shikamaru responded rubbing his neck as well.
Asuma sighed, Shikamaru was so lazy. "Yeah, were done here. But let me take y'all out to eat, consider it a gift for officially graduating."
Shikamaru sighed heavily "Whatever."
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
After a busy day and a nice lunch with their now official sensei. All 3 genin left the restaurant with. Ino smiled, while annoyed with the choice in the restaurant she couldn't help but feel overjoyed. "Well, that worked out pretty well right?"
Naruto and Shikamaru both nodded. Shikamaru yawned "Alright I think I'm going to go home and finally take a nap."
"Fine" Ino retorted. "Just remember we gotta be back at the training field 8a.m. sharp just like Asuma sensei said. Now if you excuse me, I am going to go tell my parents" She giggled as she ran away from the pair.
"Alright later Naruto." Shikamaru nodded to the boy before walking away.
Naruto stood there smiling. It was the first time he was truly happy since what happened. He sighed a breath of relief. Things were going to be different now, sure there were going to be rough spells but he wasn't going to fail again. Things were finally looking up for the boy. He yelled in excitement.
He could hear Ino yell from a way away. "Not cool Naruto!" He kept laughing, he felt joy for the first time in a while.