A/N: It's alive! It's alive and... It owns nothing. Before we begin and in light of some discussions I had over some reviews, I'd like to remind everyone that this is AU-ish. Things will change and if I write something that isn't canon (be it worldbuilding, character, techniques or whatever), there is a reason. If you'd like me to give a general warning as to what I'm changing, I'll put it up in my profile. It will be spoilers but meh. I hope you enjoy.

A/N: This is the beginning of a rather long training arc that spans for several chapters. I know it is too long. It does contain important plot and character points though. If anyone feel like pointing to me what could be removed/cut short, by all means do so in a PM/review.

Naruto woke up with a start as his alarm rang twenty to four. The blond reined in the temptation to smash the black little box that was aggressively blaring in his ears. It took a minute for Naruto to recognize the grey walls surrounding him. He was in cell number two hundred twenty-four, his new home for the time coming. The blond rubbed the sleep out of his eyes and stretched. His muscles were sore. His, Naruto Uzumaki's muscles, were sore. It was not normal. He did not feel particularly sick, nor different but his muscles were sore. It had never happened to him before. It seemed like his personal definition of "training into the ground" did not match ANBU's own vision.

Naruto had trained, in his opinion, quite a bit and quite hard during his days in the Academy. It had been done without much guidance but the blond had followed the advice of Iruka and the instructions of scrolls. He had run, punched, kicked, done push-ups, sit-ups, and other whatever-ups. He had drilled taijutsu katas.

He had been doing it all wrong apparently and his new teachers had all given the boy a new perspective on the meaning of hard work. Tiger, especially, had enjoyed picking apart all the blond thought he knew. And Naruto was certain his sergeant knew how to write pain with the kanji for training. The boy only hoped gains would come soon but he had little doubt.

Naruto rubbed his eyes again and sighed as he looked again at his room. He did not know what he had expected but it certainly had not been a tiny prison-like cell in the middle of an underground bunker. After what Dragon had told him, Naruto had waited for… Something. He did not know what exactly but it was not this.

Life was decidedly intent on pummeling him with lemons and it was getting old. He knew his existence was ruled by Unfairness personified and that she was laughing at him somewhere but he had hoped there were limits. Naruto tightened his fists. Dragon had promised him a place in a family if he only could win it. The blue-eyed boy could bitch a whine about how it did not work like that for other, normal people but it would not achieve anything.

Dragon had promised and his very first promise turned out to be true. His instructors were nothing but dedicated to training him. The boy suddenly shuddered. His teachers were all different and some took more apparent pleasure in seeing him suffer than the rest but they were committed. The boy could not say anything to that. With enough determination, Naruto would make lemonade, he had no doubt. And Naruto Uzumaki had the determination to spare.

The blue-eyed boy hopped off his bed and directed his feet toward his bathroom. Each cell was basically a square room with a rather comfortable bed and a table, with one bathroom with shower, toilet, and sink adjacent to it. It was really minimal comfort but comfort nonetheless. Naruto relieved himself and stepped under the shower. The hot water relaxed his muscles and it truly was heavenly. The blond was really surprised he was hurting even if only a bit; it was not something he had ever experienced.

Naruto shook his head and hurriedly finished his shower quickly. He had been warned that the supply of water was limited; he had to be efficient. ANBU agent could not enjoy a long shower on their working days, it did not work like that. The shower was more to finish waking up than to clean himself. He had scrubbed himself sparkling last evening after the training.

Naruto clothed himself in another set of the training outfit he had been provided with, donned his mask, and eventually exited his cell, leaving it open. He had nothing to steal and had been assured that stealing did not happen anyway. It meant out immediately if someone was caught, plus a black mark on the person's file: inability to ever make jonin and retrogradation if the thief was one already. They did not deserve their rank if they were caught stealing or left enough evidence to be tracked down anyway.

The blond boy entered the refectory to see a few people, the vast majority wearing animal-themed masks, the rest wearing one like Naruto's. The boy walked up the counter where breakfast was served.

"Hello!" Naruto exclaimed with enthusiasm. ANBU or not, there was no reason to be grumpy in the morning after all. The boy had not talked loudly -it was barely four in the morning after all- but loud enough to attract attention all the same.

"Hello," answered a buffalo-masked operator from behind the counter in a monotone. "Cell number?"

"Two twenty-four."

The agent noted something in a register before turning back to the masked blond. "Here is your breakfast." The buffalo-masked operator said, giving Naruto him a tray with a very green looking shake of something in a glass, a bowl of something, and an apple.

"Good day to you," Naruto said

"Yes, yes, good day." The ANBU waved slightly.

Naruto frowned but said nothing. Maybe this particular operator was grumpy at four in the morning. Or maybe it was because Naruto was merely a recruit. The boy shrugged; it would come soon enough.

The boy sat at one of the long tables and looked at his tray. Given the meals of the day before, he would definitely not become fat. Naruto had not expected ramen but ANBU lifestyle seemed very… Cost efficient. Very soon, the boy was faced with the first challenge of his day: eating with a mask on. Naruto drew a bit of his chakra and molded it through the monkey hand sign. Chakra shaped itself around his face in a partial transformation and the blond could lift his mask from above his mouth without being seen. Tentatively, Naruto plunged his spoon in his bowl and shoved it in his mouth. He identified yogurt, dried nuts and fruits, cereals, and something else. A note of something sweet, no more than a touch, tickled his tongue.

Naruto's eyes widened under his mask. It was chocolate. The porridge was sweetened slightly with chocolate. The boy nearly choked from the surprise: ANBU was rich if it could afford that. Naruto had tasted chocolate only on rare occasion; it came from far away in the south and was expensive, way too much for little old him. Naruto immediately withdrew his previous mental statement about cost efficiency: breakfast with chocolate was definitely a luxury.

The blond ate with gusto, drank the weird green potion, that he frankly could not identify if his life depended on it but tasted quite good, and devoured his apple. Naruto was done in a matter of minutes and put the tray back to the counter, receiving a nod from the operator behind.

Naruto took his cantine from his belt and gave it to the operator. "Can I ask you to fill that?"

The man grunted but nodded and came back a second later with Naruto's cantine now full of water.

"Thanks, buffalo-san, good day." Naruto bowed and waved cheerfully as he departed, mentally readying himself for what was coming for him.

"Yeah, yeah, good day," came the response, a bit too late.

Naruto exited the refectory and created one clone who immediately went for the library. He had worked on the rank marking of ANBU mask yesterday but had not memorized everything to the standard of Cat so had to go again today.

It was tedious and only very mildly interesting but Naruto had no choice. Cat had promised him lots and lots of pain if he wasn't able to recognize an ANBU mask instantly at the end of the week. Today was already Monday so Naruto had time but given the vibes the agents were giving, he was definitely not procrastinating.

The real Naruto hurried down the hallway toward the start of the "Warmer" where he met Tiger, Cat, and Dog waiting for him. The blond bowed.

"Hello sensei. I hope I'm not late."

"You aren't. We monitored you and you were efficient enough for a recruit. We need to get some out of bed sometimes so you did better than some," answered Tiger. "How does your body feel?"

The blond scratched the back of his head. "Uh, my muscles are a little sore."

"Only a little?" Tiger asked, a strange edge in his voice.

"Ha yeah. It's weird because I've never been sore before," answered the blond without thinking too much.

Naruto immediately regretted saying that as he felt the waves of pure, unaltered malice and anticipation coming from Tiger. The blond gulped.

"Training is going to be so good." The male operative muttered while chuckling like a corroded door hinge, his usual monotone turned into a psychotic whispering.

"Ne, Sarge, can I have the real him today?" Dog asked, the same vibes of utter viciousness radiating from her frame.

"No, he is mine," cackled Tiger again, this time rubbing his hands.

"Quiet you two, he is not a toy you get to break, we're not T&I." Cat intervened.

"That was my second vow," answered Dog distractedly.

Naruto recoiled and shuddered as he felt large tears roll off his eyes, tears that somehow spilled from the eye-holes in his mask. "Someone save me." The blond whimpered.

"Alright, enough. Naruto, one clone with Cat, one with Dog, and the real you with me. Don't try to switch with a shadow clone, they don't make it up the Warmer. Go."

Naruto nodded, whipped his crocodile tears, and crossed his fingers to cast his jutsu.

"Shadow Clones Jutsu."

In a puff of smoke, two copies appeared and ran to the ANBU they were attributed to.

"We need to work on silent casting, you're way too loud blondie," remarked Dog, who was cleaning her ear with her pinky.

"I'll handle that but not today," answered Tiger before Naruto could express himself. "Now let's go."

Cat and Dog disappeared with their clone in tow and only Tiger and the real Naruto stayed.

"I'm going to run the Warmer like I do normally. If you try and follow me, you'll probably fail and exhaust yourself but it's your decision. Your first goal is to run. You don't walk, you run. Your second goal is to never stop. Your third goal is to make it in three hours. See you at seven fifteen." The ANBU said in his normal unflappable monotone before taking off at a speed Naruto could not hope to match.

The blond sighed, took a deep breath, and stretched a little. Five minutes later, he felt ready enough to attack the Warmer. Naruto engaged himself on the ramp, immediately feeling the intangible weight settle on his shoulders. As he started running, he realized his body was seemingly heavier than normal. Naruto wasn't sure what exactly the fuinjutsu manipulated to make him feel so but it had to be one fine piece of sealing art.

Falling into a comfortable pace, the boy thought back to the day before. Training had been hard but satisfying. The weirdest thing had been processing the transfer of memories given by his clones. He had been sitting in a lotus position, assimilating the meditating clone's experience with the process and trying to emulate it. Naruto had realized two things.

First, the experience transfer was not seamless; it felt like dredging old, jumbled memories at the forefront of his mind. Naruto would readily admit he wasn't an unsurpassable genius but he wasn't an idiot either. Trying to remember how to do something you did not really do yourself was confusing. The blond hoped the process would smoothen over time.

Second, meditating was incredible. Naruto had immensely enjoyed losing himself in the raging flow of his own chakra. It was an exhilarating ride, as internal and mystic as it was, and it was fast. Naruto loved going fast. It was weird at first to simply relax and let his chakra carry him rather than forcefully direct it but when the boy had realized the fun that could be had in simply riding the flow, he had let go without too much trouble.

Tiger had complimented him on getting it so quickly but had chalked up a good part of Naruto's success to his lack of proper chakra control. The blond did not have too much of an ingrained reflex of absolutely controlling his life energy, so it made meditating easier. In turn, knowing his own chakra flow would help Naruto develop his control better.

Then, around noon, the clones learning chakra control with Dog and kenjutsu with Cat had eventually dispelled, feeding Naruto's mind with conflicting memories of trying to stick on a slippery slope while swinging a wooden training sword. His arms had spasmed as they automatically wanted to repeat to swinging motion again. It had been one freaky second.

The blond rapidly lost all precise notion of time. He wasn't too worried about making it in three hours; he was running after all, quicker than Tiger and he had been walking the day before. For maybe one hour, the boy jogged up the Warmer at a steady pace. Suddenly, the pressure he felt on him considerably lessened and he accelerated. This was the respite he needed to complete the run under the three hours mark. The blond passed a few shinobi as he ran faster.

For a while -Naruto could not be more precise- the pressure was gone and his body stopped weighing more than normal. It allowed the boy to reach the next segment of the course easily, where gravity once again seemingly doubled.

The course alternated between sections where gravity was normal and the air flowing and sections where gravity was definitely doubled and the air felt like jelly. They were random in length and began and ended without any warning. Approximately two hours in and Naruto was once again breathing hard and feeling his legs burn. The shinobi he had passed had caught up to him and passed him, showing no sign of exhaustion. Naruto understood he was missing something here but he did not know what.

The blond mentally shrugged as he wrestled with his breathing to bring it under his control. It was only the first time he was properly running the Warmer; he would figure it out eventually.

Eventually, an exhausted Naruto reached the exit door. He had not even the beginning of a clue on how long he had run. Tiger was waiting for him, arms crossed on his chest.

"Three hours and ten minutes, Recruit. You fail."

Breath ragged and legs burning, Naruto did not even have the energy to feel contrite. Hands on his knees, the blond nearly collapsed when Tiger hauled him by his shirt.

"A soldier never sits," the ANBU drawled in his monotone. "They stay up and stand straight. It's better to recuperate anyway."

The masked blond nodded and tried his best to calm his heart and regulate his breathing.

"What is the most important thing for a soldier to have, Recruit?"

Naruto panted but looked up at his sergeant. "Endurance." The answer had been given to him just yesterday.

"Why?"

"A soldier must… Be able to alternate between slow… Long situations and short… Intense ones."

"Correct. Now Recruit, how does a soldier achieve that?"

Naruto started and opened his mouth to answer "training" before he considered the question carefully. He had taught Konohamaru how to prank by deconstructing one lone, complex problem into many simpler ones. It was something Naruto prided himself in because it allowed for the careful planning of the best pranks. Yet when Tiger had given the boy his spiel on endurance and whatnot, the blond had assumed it was all about training. Apparently not.

The obvious answer was training of course but it was an answer any run-of-the-mill ninja would give. Naruto was in ANBU now and the animal-masked shinobis were supposed to be anything but run-of-the-mill.

So, training thought Naruto. The boy turned the answer in his head. It was general and absolutely not helpful. The boy needed to look deeper into it. What was underneath the run up the Warmer? What was its secret?

"Sergeant, can I ask you a question?"

"You are in training, of course, you can," answered Tiger immediately.

Naruto felt himself grin behind his mask. "There is something I don't get about running, sergeant." The blond said before he realized how stupid that sounded.

Tiger absolutely did not chuckle at the masked blond's claim. "So you are telling me you don't know how to run?"

Naruto's cheeks reddened behind the blank porcelain and he rubbed his head in embarrassment. "There is a trick to running the Warmer, sergeant." The blond mumbled, pouting.

Tiger's not-a-chuckle stopped and the ANBU nodded. "It is a good observation and there is a trick yes but I won't give it to you yet."

"What? But why!"

Naruto barely had time to raise his arms to block the punch that threw him on his back.

"What did I say about outburst? Get up"

The blond grumbled silently about slave-drivers and crazy instructors, stood back on his feet, and took a big gulp of fresh air, massaging his right forearm to numb the pain.

"I won't give the trick to you because it is for you to figure out. If you want to join ANBU, you need to be able to take a problem apart and solve it."

Naruto kept rubbing his arm for a second, the pain vanishing slowly, and thought of his instructor's words for a second. The blond grinned.

"But if you face a problem you can't answer, it makes sense to seek help."

Tiger nodded. "Good. You're starting to learn. I still won't give you the answer but I'm not your only resource." The ANBU said in his unflappable monotone. "Also, do not forget that sometimes, you'll have to solve a problem alone because support is too far away to help," finished the man.

Naruto nodded. It was true. ANBU did run the very rare solo missions of Konoha. Everything else was done in team. The blond suddenly impacted his open left palm with his right fist. Tomorrow, he would simply run with another Recruit. Maybe they had cracked the code already and Naruto could possibly deduce it by observing them.

There was also the library. Maybe there was something about running in there. Naruto shook his head. About endurance training actually. The goal was to train his endurance to a new level. The blond was supposed to be a stamina tank yet somehow the Warmer was affecting him like none other of his run did. He had to think about it.

Or he could ask Cat and Dog but if Tiger was not answering, they probably wouldn't either.

"Alright, it's been five minutes, let's go," beckoned the masked man.

Naruto nodded and followed the ANBU to the training ground of the third company. Other ANBU were already doing things that ANBU did: training themselves to the ground in a very extreme manner. It was seven in the morning and the blond could already see blood flowing. He shuddered a little.

"Create a clone for meditation training," Tiger ordered the boy who obeyed immediately. A second later, a clone was sitting in a lotus position on the ground, regulating its breathing.

The man beckoned Naruto over a training dummy. It was a wooden construct in the vague shape of a human with four arms. There was a pump and a complex hydraulic mechanism inside that allowed for the dummy to flail widely and randomly at a potential user if they were in range. The arms were weighted with lead, ensuring that any hit was painful.

The day before, Tiger had made him do eight-counts until Naruto was literally drenched in sweat, alternating with jogs around the training ground and short pauses. They had worked one hour on his kihons -apparently, katas were useful for mental strength but not much for combat application- to ascertain Naruto's basic technical level before going back to physical exercises.

"Today, we'll begin training your taijutsu for real."

The blond deflated very slightly. He would have preferred ninjutsu. Ninjutsu was cool. Ninjutsu would go so well with his mask and his -yet to come- cloak. It took a second to remember he was in ANBU and that ninjutsu certainly would never be flashy. Naruto knew as well that his taijutsu was subpar. Not terrible by any mean but it needed training.

The blond was abruptly hit by an idea. Maybe he would be taught some super taijutsu style? Naruto started to nod excitedly but said nothing, not trusting his voice not to "burst out" and not wanting a vicious punch from his instructor.

"First, we will establish something clearly. What you learned in the Academy was not a martial art." Tiger declared in his monotone.

Before Naruto could question the man, the ANBU simply continued. "What you were taught was a combat sport. You practiced punching, kicking, blocking, and moving in a safe environment. You had rules and you sparred with a partner."

The boy nodded. He could accept that, for the simple fact that it was true.

"You're in ANBU here, so we'll have none of that shit," said Tiger, his voice containing a sudden edge.

Naruto started slightly at the curse word but stayed silent, rooted by the rare intensity and seriousness coloring Tiger's tone.

The man coughed in his hand before continuing. "You'll train your kihons against a punching bag that'll actually punch you back and you'll see that our kumites are the real deal. We bleed, we break bones, and we sweat and the only rules are the referee's words."

The blond gulped at the prospect of having to break bones before his mind unhelpfully supplied to him he was the one who would have his bones broken for a while if he were to spare against Tiger. No, not to spar; to fight. Naruto gulped again.

"Now, there are many styles of taijutsu but they can be classified in two big families. Some are called external and rely on breaking the opponent, while the others are internal and rely on using the opponent's strength against them. Foolish men go around and pretend they have the best style of all. They are all liars. The best style to exist is the ANBU style. Do you know why?"

Naruto shook his head no, still muted by Tiger's scary tone.

"Because it was invented by our founder and it's a style called whatever works to kill the bastard in front of me."

A small part of Naruto's supplied unhelpfully that it was a very long, impractical name and for one second the blond nearly exploded in laughter. It passed quickly when he was blasted with a wave of something that froze him. His breath caught in his throat and the word seemingly disappeared around him. The only things left were the yellow, animalistic eyes of a predator staring him down. The eyes of the Tiger.

For a second, Naruto thought he was going to die and his life flashed in front of his eyes. The rewind did not progress far as a powerful punch socked him on the side of his mask, hard enough to make his head spin just as his legs gave out under him, taken by a swipe. The attack shook his fear-induced trance.

"What the hell?"

Naruto had to roll out of the way of a kick that still grazed his sides painfully. Before he could get up, Tiger grasped him by the shoulder and socked him again in the chin this time, nearly knocking him out, before the ANBU lifted Naruto by the front of his shirt. In a flash, the ANBU twirled a kunai in his free hand and plunged it in Naruto's upper left leg. The man watched as Naruto tethered on the edge of consciousness for an instant before the pain of the stab suddenly flared and was registered by his brain.

"Argh!"

The grip of Tiger tightened on Naruto's shirt and the ANBU approached his head from the blond's to whisper in his ear.

"Whatever works. No hesitation. The enemy is distracted by the ridiculous name of your taijutsu style? Pulverize him. He is downed? Pulverize him again to make sure he is fine dust. He is? Then stab him to make sure the dust is dead." Tiger all but menacingly growled into Naruto's ears, causing the blond to subconsciously gather his limbs in a fetal position.

"Got that, recruit?"

The blond gulped audibly and nodded frantically. The ANBU removed the kunai from Naruto's leg, wrenching a small grunt of pain from the blond and signed a few mudras until both the man's hands glowed green. The cut, despite being relatively deep, was already sealing itself.

"You're a jinchuriki in addition to being an Uzumaki. The cut will not stay open long," explained Tiger, his clinical monotone back in place.

Naruto was going to ask how his instructor knew before he remembered the man was his instructor. Of course, he knew of Naruto's abilities.

Which was funny really because Naruto himself, while being aware he healed unnaturally quick, had not known until five seconds ago that it was due in both parts to his heritage and the demon in his guts. A minute later and his leg was good as new.

"Thanks, sergeant." Naruto thought safer to thank the man properly. The ANBU was the one responsible for his injuries in the first place but it only meant he could inflict them again and leave Naruto to bleed by himself. The blond did not really know if he was supposed to be angry at the lesson. The way it was delivered was brutal sure but it was effective. If Naruto got one thing from today, it would be that "anything goes". It was a painful lesson but the blond had always learned better when it had some form of impact on his body.

He had learned the explosive tag very, very quickly for example.

Tiger looked at his charge and cleared his throat. "Now the first step to fighting deadly is knowing how to move. Whether you want to stand your ground and punch your opponent into oblivion or dodge, you need to be solid on your legs and capable of switching quickly between rooting yourself to the ground and dancing around."

Naruto accepted the explanation. He was no taijutsu specialist. If the man wanted him to learn how to move, he'd learn how to move. He'd have loved to learn some ninjutsu, of course, but he did not want to run the risk of getting stabbed again. Ninjutsu would come in due time and taijutsu would do.

"How do I train that, sergeant?"

Tiger fished something from under his cloak -it was just as unnatural as Konohamaru's scarf- and threw it at the blond. It looked awfully like a jumping rope. Naruto sputtered, looking at the object in his hand. He was not going to rope-jump like some little girls did in the park, right? That'd be too embarrassing.

"Jump," ordered the ANBU, deadly serious.

Oh Flame, he was! For a second, the blond considered throwing the rope back to the man and asking for ninjutsu training instead but started jumping when he saw the gleam of a kunai. Right, whatever works.

Naruto-clone followed Cat back into the same dojo another version of him had been the day before. This clone jutsu was useful but incredibly confusing sometimes. Once again, the woman agent unsealed a wooden sword that had the same shape as a chokuto. Using a real blade was just asking for the clone to dispel itself by accident.

Cat presented the clone with the wooden sword. "The same as yesterday," said the ANBU simply.

Naruto-clone nodded and took the training sword. Today, he would once again learn how to step correctly. Apparently, using a sword was more about moving right than waving your sword arm around. If one could move quickly enough, they could surprise their opponent. Naruto-clone was only holding the fake chokuto to get used to having a weight in his hand.

Cat had shown the previous him an easy strike to associate basic displacement with sword movement but the ANBU had told him that as long as Naruto could not move to her liking, he would not learn anything more advanced.

She had ended her presentation with a very convincing demonstration where she had struck a training dummy with the exact same strike, moving fast while doing so; very, very fast.

The boy took a simple stance, his right foot shifted slightly in front of him, his sword held vertically in front of him, the tip inched forward. The chokuto was mainly a one-handed sword with a blade shorter than a katana's. Apparently, they were used within Fire Country for various reasons, the first being that a katana was just a little bit too long and encumbering to fight efficiently in the country's dense forests. The chokuto's shorter blade limited the risk of it being caught by stray branches To minimize the risk, the style Naruto was being taught the basics of emphasized thrusting rather than slashing. It was a style that was quite useful in narrow places in general, like say, the hallways of a noble's palace an ANBU had to assassinate for example.

The katana was mainly the weapon of the samurais from Iron Country, a place that did not have the same forests Fire Country had and way more of the iron ore necessary to forge all kind of blades.

Naruto-clone pushed with his left foot and stepped in, trying to synchronize the extension of his arm and his thrust with the fall of his right foot. The impact was supposed to increase the strength behind the entire strike. The blond replica breathed out deeply and returned to his previous position. It was a bit more than four in the morning and he would do it until dispel.

Naruto-clone, second iteration, followed Dog back to a room that was already the blond's worse nightmare. The exercise seemed innocent enough at first; how difficult could climbing a round slope be. Even without one's hands, even if the slope was slippery, it had to be a piece of cake, right?

Wrong, very wrong, of course. The rocks tilling the floor were so perfectly smooth, the blond's sandals could find no purchase. Dog had obviously told him the day before that chakra was the key to success but Naruto had yet to figure it out what exactly he was supposed to do. The point of the exercise was to use his feet only and not his hands but then what? It was difficult enough to even send the chakra to his feet but how was he supposed to manipulate it once it was there?

Of course, the blond had tried yesterday to climb simply by pushing formless chakra out of his feet, it had not worked. The only result he had obtained was that, if he pulsed too much chakra in one go, he would be blasted off his feet. It had potential has an attack but it did not help him climb.

Not to mention that Naruto-clone was a chakra construct itself. The fact he had difficulty manipulating chakra while being made of chakra was beyond weird and opened metaphysical questions he absolutely did not want to think about. The original would be killed if he dispelled too soon. Or roughed up at least.

Focusing in the swirling life energy within him, the blond directed it to his feet and pushed through the soles of both his feet and shoes. How could he climb? Slowly, he lifted his right foot and stepped up the slope, only to slide down.

Naruto-clone sighed. If Tiger and Cat were guiding him with an iron hand, Dog was different. The ANBU, a girl Naruto was certain, was unhelpful. The blond did not know if it was a test of some sort - possible - or if she was simply not interested. The boy scowled a bit under his mask. He certainly hoped it was a test. She had been ordered to be a teacher after all. The replica turned to the ANBU who was sitting on the edge of the large bowl-like room.

"You wouldn't have a clue for me, Dog-san?" The blond asked, a little peeved and mildly hoping annoyance wasn't showing in his voice.

The ANBU shrugged. "It depends. A clue about what?"

Naruto stretched his lips in a forced smile under his mask before remembering the ANBU could not see it. "About this exercise." This time, annoyance had been clear in his tone.

"What is your question exactly?" The teenage girl answered, nonplussed.

"How does that work?"

The ANBU hummed and drummed the fingers of her right hand against her mask. "I told you, you just have to push chakra and stick, newbie."

Naruto-clone just gave the ANBU a deadpan look behind his mask. "And how do I stick exactly?"

"With chakra."

The replica felt a vein throb on his forehead.

"That's not an explanation."

"Not my fault you're too stupid to get it."

The blond sneered before he clicked his tongue. "Tch. You're just like everyone else." He mumbled before turning his back to the ANBU.

She was like all those teacher at the Academy who would not pay attention to him when he would ask a question or send him out because they deemed his questions stupid. Of course, Naruto could not have expected all three of his instructors to be different. That two of them would teach him properly was already good, he supposed.

"What do you mean like everyone else?"

"You answer nothing. Whatever, I'll figure it out," answered Naruto-clone while waving the question away, not turning to look at the girl.

Again he focused on his feet. How could he climb? He had to think outside of his usual box here; he could not use his hands and he did not have access to any kind of tool here. According to the instructions given the day before, he had to stick to the tiles using chakra. Easier said than done given he had no idea how to mold his chakra to make it sticky.

From what he knew about hand signs, he would go with Snake but it was not like hand sign theory was an exact science. It was just as much superstition as it was tried truths so Naruto could not be sure he would obtain any kind of result.

"Sticky sticky sticky…" Mumbled the clone, absorbed in his thoughts. "Like glue maybe?"

It was an interesting idea but he had no clue on how glue worked nor how to imitate it with his chakra. The clone rolled his eyes; if only the stupid ANBU would answer his questions. Focusing his mind again on the glue idea, the blond explored it mentally for a minute before deeming it useless anyway. When people glued two things together, the idea was that those two things would not come apart. His objective was not only to stick to a surface but to also climb it. If he glued his foot to the wall, it would contradict the second part of his task. Gluing his foot only to un-glue it a second after seemed highly inefficient. Still thinking, the blond tried his best to imagine other options.

"Or hooks. Many of them," said the clone to himself, still whispering.

The clone kept himself from facepalming. Hooks weren't going to help him, chakra was not solid after all… The clone once again had to fight his instincts to slap himself. Of course, chakra could be solid, he was tangible proof of it. The blond groaned.

Suddenly, the fact chakra, which was supposed to be an energy, had a solid state, baffled him completely for a second and caused his mind to swirl with the implications of this realization. The blond had not really realized what it meant to create a shadow clone. Energy was not supposed to be solid, right? He had been too limited in his imagination apparently. What could he do with it? And what were the other possible states of chakra? The clone lost himself in his thoughts before a cough from the ANBU called him back to reality.

"What are you doin' you newb? You are supposed to climb."

The blond bristled for a second before he clicked his tongue. "I'm thinking and maybe I have something so if you could just…" Naruto-clone waved his hand for a second, searching for his words. "I don't know, just keep ignoring me, that'd perfect." The boy eventually huffed.

The ANBU appeared nonplussed again -it was difficult to tell with the mask and cloak- and shrugged before returning to whatever it was she was doing. Reading a little book with a blue cover apparently. The blond cocked one eyebrow as he saw what he thought was a ripple of some sort on the cover but ignored it as it disappeared almost immediately.

Going back to his musing, Naruto-clone breathed in deeply. So hooks it would be. In a sudden second of brilliance, the blond decided to get rid of his shoes to avoid shredding them. He nearly slapped himself again when he remembered the shoes, like everything else when it came to him, was made of chakra.

"Urgh, whatever," muttered the blond, intent on not dwelling on the weirdness of it all, and focusing on the chakra he had pushed in his feet. He needed tiny little barbed needles, hundred, thousand of them. His plan was for the hooks to sink in the smooth surface and hold his weight.

Several hours later and his brow marred with sweat, Naruto-clone realized that his endeavor was easier imagined than done. He had tried to form the hooks he had in mind but they were too large and too jagged: they broke the tiles rather than sink into them and left marks. It had prodigiously angered the ANBU which had of course angered Naruto in turn. If the girl did not want to give him an answer then she had to accept him experimenting. That had shut the masked teenager up and she had allowed Naruto to continue after stating another rule: the goal was also to not break anything.

Suddenly, it was noon and a clock rang to signal lunch was served in five minutes. It was time for Naruto-clone to dispel. He was nearly out of chakra anyway.

Lunch looked a bit like breakfast. Tiger led Naruto to the cabin in the training ground and gave the boy a bento, a bottle of green liquid -the goo, as it was called by other ANBU- and a fruit. The bento was simple: rice, some meat, and vegetables. Naruto was honestly too hungry to be picky so he ate his greens without complaining. He had tried the day before and all he had received for an answer was a punch to the face anyway.

The blond made short work of the food, eating in silence like the other masked ninjas. He was not too keen on speaking anyhow. Any time spent to save his breath was time well spent, especially after spending the larger part of the morning jumping rope, jumping rope on one foot, jumping rope while slaloming between hula-hoops, jumping rope while dodging kunai or any kind of rope jumping Tiger could come up with. There were a thousand of ways to jump rope and some were really impressive.

His lunchbox finished, the blond sat in a lotus position near the meditating clone and, after nudging his replica to tell him it was time to dispel, plunged in the flow of his own chakra.

Receiving a shadow clone's feedback while meditating was a strange experience. As he was following and flowing with the stream of his chakra, Naruto felt a sudden surge in the river. The chakra of the shadow clone returned to him. This was the funny part, as the sudden addition of life energy quickened the flow. Then came the experience from the meditation; Naruto, already meditating felt like he was doubled within his own self for a second.

The memories of his clone infused the yin part of his chakra and strengthened it and as Naruto was bathing inside, he was thrown in a literal loop of him flowing with chakra within him flowing with his chakra...

Then the integration ended and the flow calmed down and with it the dissociation between his own present situation and his clone's.

Soon after came the memories of the clone taught kenjutsu then the experiments of the clone "taught" chakra control. With all this came mental exhaustion, excitement, annoyance, and many other feelings that were alien yet his; feelings that dissipated quickly and yet again balanced the yin attuned part of his chakra.

For one hour or so, Naruto just drifted along his life energy. The blond had been the first surprised that meditation, an activity quite antithetic to his preferred ones that usually included lots of motions, was so easy for him but the reason was quite simple. It actually included a lot of movement, only of a different kind. A movement that was internal, within himself, reserved for him. The blond honestly liked the ride.

He felt a hand touch his shoulder and opened his eyes. Tiger motioned with his thumb toward the training ground. Naruto breathed in deeply and stood straight, stretching himself. It was time to go back for more torture. After five minutes of stretching his body to reheat it, Naruto approached the ANBU, who was standing near one of the dummy. It was a construct of wood and metal, with four arms with way too many joints and a head painted to resemble an Oni. In Naruto's honest opinion, it was convincingly intimidating.

"You'll learn to dodge now. I'll activate the pump and the dummy is going to move hard, fast, and randomly," explained Tiger before pointing at the extremity of one of the wooden limbs. "This is lead. Lot of it. If you're hit, it'll hurt, a lot."

Tiger fished within his cloak a strange, leather helmet and a piece of plastic. "That," began the ANBU, holding the helmet high, "is to avoid concussion and that," continued the man while showing the plastic object," is to avoid losing any teeth. You wear both for the time being."

Naruto eyed the two pieces of gear and shrugged. If wearing the helmet prevented the loss of a few brain cell, he would wear it. The boy slipped the teeth protector under his mask and in his mouth and donned the helmet. It was bulky, obviously padded to maximize protection, and slightly uncomfortable but Naruto did his best to ignore it.

"Take a stance and shadow box for a minute to get used to what you're wearing. Be on guard, I won't warn you when I start the dummy." Tiger ordered the blond.

"Hai," answered Naruto simply, his mouthful of plastic keeping him from saying much.

For a minute or two, the blond shadow boxed the harmless wooden mannequin before he suddenly heard the telltale sound of high pressure water running within canalizations. As abruptly as advertised, the dummy flung one arm around, almost catching Naruto in the rib. The boy rose one arm to block the punch and grimaced under his mask.

It would hurt.

His eyes widening, the blond stepped back and rotated his body, presenting his profile to the now aggressive construct, dodging a vertical sweep that would have clubbed him on the head. With an angry sounding mechanical hiss, the rooted golem whirled, its four arms flailing like the chain of a kusarigama. The arm Naruto had just narrowly dodged caught him in the stomach and sent him flying two meters back.

His breath short and his abdomen aching, the blond heard Tiger's yell to "stand and go at it". The blue-eyed recruit took a second to think about his situation. He had not expected the dummy to be this quick. He would need speed and explosivity to escape the hits; something he had worked on for most of his morning. Naruto steeled his mind and, as much as he could, his body. Time to see if rope jumping was a good way to learn.

With determination in his steps, the boy entered the range of the dummy once again and immediately feel in a stance while keeping himself on the balls of his feet. Jumping rope was all about rhythmically springing up. The rhythm was only as complicated as one wanted it to be.

Right, left, up, and down, the blond weaved, ducked, and jumped around the mercurial training golem, receiving punishment more than once as he lost awareness of one or more arms speeding for him. Suddenly, the boy was sent sprawling, his chin hurting, his teeth dancing the gig, his eyes rolling, and his skull vibrating.

The blond hastily took a few step back to get out of reach. It would hurt a lot.

Before he could compose himself, he felt a hand push him firmly in between his shoulder blades, thrusting him once again in the maelstrom of flails that were the dummy's arms.

Barely catching his breath, the blond had to take one strike directed at his head on his right forearm and another one directed at his left ribs on his left elbow. Pain exploded in his left arm and Naruto swore he could hear his bones creak. The blond sneered and growled, his features set in granitic determination.

It would hurt a lot but he learned better that way, right?

Beaten black, blue, and bloody, Naruto was thrown on his bed, close to seven hours later, by his instructor. Tiger had made him fight the training dummy from hell for the entire afternoon, varying the pressure -and thus the speed of the attacks- at random. When the boy had collapsed, beaten into a pulp, the ANBU had cut the water flow and allowed Naruto to leave the training ground.

The boy had collapsed halfway down the Warmer, after two hours of a wobbly, exhausted run-walk. Tiger had picked his charge up and simply dropped him on roo two twenty four.

Through the haze of pain, exhaustion, and sleepiness he bathed in, Naruto did not hear the man's whisper as he left.

"So, what is the assessment?" Tiger asked to his two subordinates after dropping his blond charge in his room.

Cat decided to answer first. "He has no particular instinct for the blade itself but he… Well, his clone works hard enough. He won't redefine kenjutsu but he will be dangerous. And he got the basic step already. It shows excellent coordination."

Tiger nodded and turned toward Dog who shrugged.

"His chakra control is terrible and he doesn't get vertical walking."

"I see," said Tiger before stopping, thinking about his ANBU's precise words. "What do you mean he doesn't get it?"

Dog shrugged again. "I told him to stick with his chakra but then he asked me how he was supposed to do it. A bit stupid if you ask me."

"Are you sure you understood his question?" Cat interjected suddenly.

"What'd you mean?"

"He is not stupid, so he asked you a question you didn't understand. Either because he formulated it wrong or because you didn't want to understand."

Dog clicked her tongue. "Tch, what is there to explain in the first place? Tree walking is the basic, if he doesn't get it he doesn't belong here." The teenage ANBU proclaimed in a mix of annoyance and haughtiness.

"He was recommended by Dragon-sama in person-" began Cat before Tiger interrupted her.

"He can run the Warmer in a little more than three hours and he spent five hours boxing the dummy." The male ANBU spoke in a monotone, reducing the two other ninjas to a stunned silence.

A minute of absolute stillness later, Dog croaked in disbelief. "What?"

"You heard me. For his first time against a dummy, he lasted five hours before I told him it was over." Tiger explained to his subordinates before taking a deep breath. "And I pitted him against Ashura."

This time, it was Cat's turn to flounder with her words and express her strangled astonishment. "S-sergeant! Ashura is the second most dangerous of the training model! No recruit goes against one!"

"No standard recruit, no. He is anything but standard. It was a test of his capacities, both mental and physical. He is unrelenting and as much as his mind is quick, he truly learns by doing. He is still not done memorizing standard ANBU marking but I drilled him with rope jumping and he had it down in an hour."

Both female ANBUs listened to their officer, still wrapping their mind around what the man had just told them.

"Is he a Gai-wannabe?" Dog asked eventually.

Tiger shrugged. "Possible. Possibly much more. Now Dog, next time he asks you a question, you answer it. Are we clear?"

"Hai, Sarge."

When the morrow came, Naruto woke up feeling sore, hurt, battered, and frankly not in any shape to get out of bed. He got out still because he had a hunch Tiger would not see things the same way the blond did. It took careful movements and patience and several wince of pain but Naruto successfully dragged himself to his bathroom, where his mirror unkindly reflected his bruised self.

The hot water of the shower considerably alleviated the pain and once the blond was fully awake, he realized he was not tired. His body hurt, sure, but there wasn't the veil of exhaustion weighing on his eyelid nor binding his limbs. His muscles and his wounds were simply not yet healed and causing him a pain he wasn't used to.

The trip to the cafeteria was quick and much like the day before. Buffalo-san did not talk much despite the still enthusiast greeting the blond gave him and the food was just as unidentifiable as the day before albeit tasty. This time though, Naruto sat with two other recruits, their blank masks identifying them as such.

"Mhh… Hello." The blond greeted as warmly as he could.

One recruit just nodded and focused back on their meal, not interested, while the other returned the greeting with a monotone "good day".

Acutely aware that time was passing, Naruto wolfed his tray of food ghoulishly and was nearly finished before he spoke again.

"Excuse me, senpai?" The sudden question from the blond made the two other recruits left their head. "Is it okay if I run the Warmer with you two?"

The silent one shrugged, apparently not interested in the least while the other simply nodded. "Sure."

Naruto smiled behind his mask and bowed his head. "Thank you senpai." Preparing himself to finish his food, the blond was hit by a sudden bout of inspiration. "Uh I… Know fuinjutsu, a bit of it," began the blond.

This caught the attention of the two recruits and the one who had done the speaking inched forward. "Yeah?"

"If you need a sealing tag or something, I can do it. To repay you for running with me, you know?"

"You know explosive tags?"

Naruto positively grinned behind his mask and fingered his chest with his right thumb. "Eh, of course, I do, 'ttebayo!"

"What yield?"

"All three range," exclaimed the boy proudly, referring to the low, medium, and high ranges, the three classifications in Konoha for explosive power.

The two older recruits looked at each other, their hands twitching for a few seconds before the loquacious one turned once again toward Naruto. "We check the quality first and if they are any good, we'll bank on this favor, sure."

The boy gave the man a thumb up and gulped down what was left on his tray. The two older recruits followed seconds after as Naruto met with Tiger, Cat, and Dog. The blond was given the same set of orders and his clones, with an addition of one also going to the library for personal research, disappeared where they were supposed to.

"Ready to go?" The taller recruit asked the blond as they finished their warm up.

Naruto nodded firmly. "Lead the way."

The rest of the week went by in the same fashion for Naruto. He would wake up, still bruised from the taijutsu training, a bit before four in the morning, eat a breakfast made of various stuff he could not really identify save the fruit juice, send clones to work with Cat, Dog, and in the library and jog up the Warmer with the two older recruit he now called senpai.

He had been left in the dust rather quickly on the first day but had somehow caught up to the two ANBU in training during one of the easy parts of the run. He had thought they had slowed when in fact he had accelerated. He had deduced running faster during the easy portion of the Warmer was not the trick to gain on your time. Then, gravity had doubled again without warning and his two senpais had left him in the dust.

It was the day after, on Thursday, that the blond came to realize regularity was the key. The reason the start of the Warmer was a high gravity portion was in order for the runners to set a pace. A pace, Naruto had come to understand, was not simply a speed; it was an amount of effort put into running and it included breathing. When a rhythm was found, it was best to keep to it rather than mess it up by accelerating or slowing down.

The realization came in handy for all his other activities. The lessons with Tiger were intense, painfully so, but satisfying nonetheless. The man held nothing back and ran the boy through the proverbial gauntlet. The positive side of things was that the blond could already tell he had progressed. He was lighter on his feet thanks to rope jumping and much more conscious of his immediate, personal space thanks to the dummy.

He had not sparred the four-armed monstrosity though. Tiger had pitted him against easier, two armed golems.

Being punched repeatedly by the weighted arms of the mechanical dummy was an excellent motivation to increase his dodging. The very random motions of the Machiavellian invention kept him on his toes and taught him to stay aware. Knowing how to breathe efficiently also helped greatly.

His kenjutsu was coming along as well. He had gotten the stepping technique taught by Cat down and now he had to combine it with moving much like he did during his taijutsu lesson. As of now, he still often tripped on his own feet with each attempt. It was a new way of moving that was yet to become natural for him.

The blond had finished learning the ANBU marking with two days to spare and could now differentiate what each color, symbols, and other flourish meant. He had immediately been tasked with learning the ANBU sign language.

His other clone sent to the library had looked around, hoping to discover an idea on how to stick to a surface. Among the many things Naruto's replica had found, one book on insect and spider, written by an Aburame in collaboration with an Uchiha, validated the blond's general idea of hooks.

The problem was that he had yet to manipulate his chakra finely enough to create them and so was stuck to sliding down the bowl over and over again. He had tried to ask Dog again about a hint, anything, and to his surprise, the teenager had tried to give the boy some clue.

The discussion had been long before the ANBU had truly understood what Naruto needed. The boy wanted to have a feel of how the chakra was supposed to be molded. Frankly, Dog had been stumped for two days before giving the boy a small ball of uncooked bread dough on Friday.

Naruto-clone had spent an hour just playing with the sticky yet malleable material before concluding it wasn't the most efficient way to go at it. Replicating the biology of spider was much more difficult but Naruto expected more efficient results.

At noon, the boy would eat in the training ground after integrating the meditating clone's memories. After lunch, he would meditate himself for one hour in order to assimilate the memories of his four other clones before going back to whatever Tiger had in store for him, often until nine in the evening.

The meditation exercise was bearing fruits as the headaches had greatly reduced over the week and the integration process had become actually more and more efficient. It was also something the blond definitely enjoyed. Knowing the way his chakra was flowing within him made him feel whole in a way he could not really explain.

The constant training had turned into a demanding but not unpleasant routine for the boy and Naruto was at a loss for what to do when Sunday, his resting day, came suddenly.

A/N: I hope you enjoyed. Training, I think, is difficult to write and this is the reason this update took so long. Even in the best fics, training can feel to me like a grocery list. The author check things off of it but there is no real learning. While I'm not sure my chapter isn't just that, I hope it is at least entertaining. Thanks to all who answered the poll about the ranks. It is very close so ultimately, I'll use a mix of English and Japanese. Finally, I read a review stating the similarities between my work and "From Academy to ANBU". While it certainly kickstarted the writing, if I must give back to Caesar what belongs to him, then "ANBU boot camp" was also a big source of inspiration. Go read both, they are worth the time! That being said, similarities won't stop there but they are in now way a disguised attempt at plagiarism. Just remember that a lot has been written for Naruto and that absolute originality does not really exist. Best writing.