Another chapter is here!

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"How did your morning training go today?" Karin asked Naruto as they sat next to one another at Ichiraku's. It was afternoon and Naruto had been given a lunch-break before he resumed training. Where better to spend his time eating lunch than his favorite restaurant with his new clanswoman?

The smell of ramen and sight of white aprons were becoming all too common for Karin after spending the last four days visiting to speak with him. Surprisingly, she didn't mind so much. Ayame made for a decent conversationalist when he wasn't around, and Naruto was often bright enough to warm her up with his cheerfulness.

Naruto scratched his cheek, revealing red prayer beads around his wrists. "It's a start, I guess. Right now he's testing me on the basics, but in a few days we'll move onto some new stuff. Gama-sensei's a bit of a pervert though."

"You shouldn't call your tutor a pervert," Karin told him. "The Hokage picked him out for you, so he has to be some kind of super-important Jounin."

"Even if you say that, he fell for my Sexy Jutsu yesterday." Naruto immediately regretted saying that when both Ayame and Karin shot him a look, the latter of whom could easily guess what it was and the former having warned him about it once before. He abruptly added, "I was just doing it to test if my chakra was working fine! Something happened in the forest that made it all wonky until it was fixed in the hospital, but I was told not to push it until now."

"Mm-hmm," Ayame let slip out skeptically. She clearly didn't buy it. "Don't let me hear you did it again."

"Yes, Ma'am." Naruto chuckled nervously at her disapproving glare. Once she looked away, he sighed deeply and turned back to Karin. "But yeah, that's about it for now. He did give me these though."

When he held up the prayer beads around his wrists she prodded them with her fingers but didn't find anything off about them. "He gave you beads?"

"It's a sealing technique," he explained. Her interest was immediately peaked. "Gama-sensei did a sealing technique that made them heavy when I'm in training to improve my body condition for the match. They change colors depending on if I'm in training or not."

"That's a surprise," she said. "I didn't know they could do that."

"It's like the Old Man said, seals can do incredible things…." Naruto looked pensive as he trailed off. "I learned a bit more from Kakashi-sensei about my Mom. She was supposed to have been good at seals too, despite being a lot like me. It made me wonder what I could have learned if she were here now, and…."

Karin felt a tug in her chest at how his voice dropped. It was still a sensitive issue, one that she knew perfectly well considering her own mother's death. She set a hand down on his knee in solace and changed the topic. "Don't you have a Shinobi Library in the village?"

"Hm?" Naruto blinked. "I… think so. Sakura-chan might have mentioned it once or twice since she likes books. Why?"

"If it's anything like the one in Grass, then it should have a library of different techniques and history books. You're only a Genin, so your access will be limited, but you should be able to check out a couple of basic technique scrolls on Sealing Arts."

His brows seemed to knit at the thought. "I thought I was done with books and scrolls when I graduated from the Academy, but I guess I can try… Do you want to come with me?"

Karin shook her head, giving him a sad smile. "I can't. I'm not a native kunoichi to this village. There are regulations in place for that sort of thing, and I'm not here on a mission that would require access."

"Oh right. I had forgotten. It's just that it's nice having someone to really talk to so I didn't remember." Karin couldn't help but think the sheepish smile he gave her was sort of cute.

Not that she told him. Instead she made small talk. Just some harmless questions to keep him entertained and learn a bit more about him until it was time for him to resume his training. She let him go with a promise to see him tomorrow and then talked a bit more with Ayame before heading back to the Petal Fall Inn.

The Anbu officers were still following her and remained stationed to watch her, but at this point she treated them as part of the background. She did nothing to give away who she was affiliated with. Nor did she give any indication she was a sensor who could detect them through the Hiding with Camouflage technique they seemed so fond of, to the point she had picked up their rotation patterns already.

However, Karin did stir when she felt Naruto entering her range several hours later. He was on the lower floor, at the service desk. She closed her book and left her room, grabbing the half-full bucket of ice on her way out. That would make it seem like she was going to get a refill as she made her way down to the lounge and stumbled across him.

"Naruto?" she said, feigning surprise. "Why are you here this late?"

"I wanted to tell you in person that I got a bunch of books for you to read," he said. "I talked it over with Gama-sensei. He said that you can't check them out, but I can take some of them home and let you read them. I have a bunch of them at my place now!"

"So you're inviting me to come over to your home at night?" That was quicker than she expected. She didn't think he'd be so willing to let someone he only knew for a few days into his home.

"That's okay, right?" he asked. "I mean, I cleaned up and everything."

"I guess it couldn't hurt." She rubbed the back of her neck as she noticed the Anbu officer watching her had shifted around to a position they could listen in better. "I can spare a few hours to help you out."

He flashed a bright smile and grabbed her hand to lead her out. "Great! Follow me."

She followed behind him until they reached his apartment. It was one bedroom, one bathroom, and a small dining area with a kitchen installed. The walls had seen some wear-and-tear, but the window gave him a great view. The wooden paneling on the floor and lower part of the walls could use some polishing as well, but otherwise it was fairly decent for an orphan.

"Naruto, I thought you said you found a few books?" Karin gestured to the aforementioned books scattered left and right over the floor. There were significantly more than a few. "I count at least twenty at a glance."

"It's just a bunch of history books." He stepped around them to where his bed was. That had a few scrolls on it. "Gama-sensei mentioned that the older ones would likely have references that were excluded in later drafts. I figured we could look through some of them for any mention of our clan. Since Kakashi-sensei has something planned for our team tomorrow in the afternoon, I don't have to go to sleep too early and can help out."

"Huh, that… might actually work." If they only crossed referenced mentions of Uzumaki in the village and old maps, they could work faster and get through them all. "Let's organize them by the oldest editions first. Those will have the most information."

[0-0-0]

Sakura climbed the stairs to Naruto's apartment the next afternoon, grumbling under her breath as she did so. Kakashi had sent her to retrieve him since he was late to the meeting they were supposed to have today. She hadn't seen him since he scraped through the Preliminaries by his teeth, after that he had been hospitalized and then checked out while she was coming to terms with everything that happened in the Forest of Death.

Her fingers found themselves brushing the shortened ends where she had cut her hair in the Forest of Death. Her mother had helped her clean it up somewhat, telling her she did the right thing when Sakura gave her an abridged version of what happened during the exam. Her mother had been a kunoichi once before, at least until she retired after Sakura had been born, so she had been proud that Sakura was willing to cut the long hair she treasured so much for her teammates.

Sakura had been doing a lot of thinking since then and her match with Ino. She owed Naruto a lot more than she realized—him, Lee, and Sasuke. Until then, she hadn't realized how much they basically did the heavily lifting for the team… or rather she didn't want to admit it to herself.

She knocked on his door once she reached it. "Naruto, open up!"

"Sakura-chan?" His voice was muffled through the door. "Hold on."

Naruto opened up and she was about to thank him for everything when she spotted someone shifting behind him, nestled beneath the covers of his bed. It was a girl, maybe around their age, with messy red hair. She sat up on the bed slowly, the sheet sliding down as a result and showing her disheveled shirt, and wearily rubbed her eyes.

"Pervert!" Sakura found herself yelling, jumping to conclusions. Her fist smacked him hard and sent him flying into the wall.

"Naruto!" screamed the girl, now wearing a pair of glasses. She threw aside the covers, revealing that she was wearing a long-sleeved shirt and a pair of short, and stumbled through the spread of opened books to get next to him. "Are you okay?"

He mumbled something too low for Sakura to hear, blinking rapidly. The girl glared at her through the lenses of her glasses. "Why would you do that to him?"

"Well, I didn't expect him to have a girl in his bed when I got here," Sakura said.

"That's no excuse for hitting your teammate!" the girl claimed. "What he does in his home is his own business! You could have at least asked first before jumping to conclusions."

"Karin-channn," Naruto slurred a bit, before shaking his head and rubbing the back of his head. "It's fine."

"No, it isn't!" the girl named Karin argued. "Even my teammates didn't do that to me!"

"I… I'm sorry," Sakura managed to say, a look of shame on her face as she stared down at her fist. "You're right, he didn't deserve that. It was a knee-jerk reaction… speaking of which, who are you and why were you in his bed?"

She checked to see if Naruto had injured his head like a mother hen, worry in her eyes quickly turning to anger as she looked back to Sakura. "I'm a member of Naruto's clan! He invited me over to do research on the Uzumaki and we ended up falling asleep! Was that worth hitting him for?"

"Your appearance didn't make it seem all that innocent!" Sakura shot back, too used to Ino's snarking to stop it from coming out beforehand. "What was I supposed to think with you on his bed looking like that?"

Karin looked away, a blush spreading across her face in embarrassment. "I'm a rough sleeper. I toss and turn a lot, and it takes a while to fix in the morning. I really didn't even want Naruto to see me like this, but I got too into researching and fell asleep before I knew it."

"It's not that bad," Naruto told her as he stood. "Anyway, what are you doing here, Sakura-chan?"

"The meeting," she said. "Kakashi-sensei sent me to get you."

"Huh?" He blinked and turned his head to the clock. Panic set in. "Crap! I'm late!"

The girls watched as hurried into the bathroom and ran the water faucet, brushing his teeth and washing his face within the span of a minute. He slipped into his jumpsuit, hopping on one leg at a time, before putting on his sandals. He grabbed a ration bar out of his cabinet last and then made for the door.

"Stay as long as you like!" He told Karin as he bolted past Sakura and jumped over the edge of railing. "See you later!"

He took off running towards the training ground the moment he landed on the street, unintentionally leaving Sakura behind. As for the girls, Karin merely glared at her as she adjusted her glasses. It was almost as if she was sizing her up, judging her for what she had done. It grated on Sakura more than she liked to admit.

Sakura turned away from Naruto's supposed clanswoman and jumped over the railing as he had done. She could still feel the girl's eyes on her as she ran to catch up with him. Was she that angry at her? Did it look that bad hitting him like that?

The thought bothered her until she and Naruto arrived to the meeting. Kakashi, Team 10, and Team 8 were there, minus Hinata. The poor girl was still in the hospital. Lee too, after what Gaara of the Desert did to him. She shuddered at the thought of him being Sasuke's opponent.

Kakashi put away his book. "Nice of you to finally join us, Naruto. Do try and be punctual next time. You won't be able to become a Chuunin if you're late for meetings."

Sakura, Naruto, and Sasuke all gave him a flat look at that.

"I was a Jounin before I started getting lost on the road of life," he said to the silent accusations of hypocrisy. "And I'm not late to the important stuff."

"…Well, I had Karin over last night," Naruto said as an excuse. "She got really into what we were doing and we ended up going at it until morning. It wore me out more than I thought."

"Woo-hoo!" Kiba cheered, breaking up the skeptical and conflicted looks that he was getting from everyone else. Guess there were no hard feelings over his defeat then. "Nice, man!"

Sakura grabbed her wrist and resisted the urge to hit him for how he said that. It was an innocent mistake, judging by how he was looking confused about everything. "Naruto meant he was doing research all night with her. There were books everywhere."

"Ah, that explains it." Kakashi huffed. "Next time, work on how you phrase that. Misunderstandings are easy to make without context and you could have made things complicated for her given she's a visiting kunoichi."

"You knew about her?" Sakura asked, even as Naruto seemed to pick up on his mistake now and face-palmed.

"We've had the luxury of meeting, but I was unaware she was in his home when I sent you," he said, before addressing everyone else listening in. "To make a long story short, an Uzumaki from the Hidden Grass found Naruto during the Second Exam and they've been looking into their clan's history. For more details, you'll have to ask Naruto."

Sasuke gave Naruto a hard look. "You have a clan?"

"Had," Naruto corrected. "I just learned a few days ago."

No one pressed him further on it. 'Had' implied past-tense, meaning they didn't exist anymore. The fact that he was an orphan only compounded the point.

Sakura was good at picking up the little clues. She noticed Sasuke's expression soured a fraction from the context. That was something he could no doubt relate to. And the fact that Naruto needed to research it at all meant there was little left, if anything.

That explains the books, Sakura thought. Naruto found History Class to be boring in the Academy, but learning that he had a clan and lost them must've been enough to get him to pull through it.

She ran her fingers through her hair, upset that she had gotten so used to hitting him prior to the forest that it was second nature. It was like that Karin girl had said, Naruto hadn't deserved it when he was dealing with all of this. She opened her mouth to apologize for his loss when Sasuke shook his head.

'It doesn't help when you aren't in the same boat,' he mouthed to her. It would have been empty condolences from someone who hadn't lost a loved one or family. Sasuke then turned to Kakashi, who had been watching them. "So, what's this meeting about? The Finals?"

"Sort of." He nodded to Asuma and Kurenai. "As you know, while the Chuunin Exams are in effect, some teams are broken up in preparation. It wouldn't do for them to go out for a C-rank mission and end up being killed, after all. Sabotage is surprisingly frequent given the amounts often being wagered on the fights."

"Makes sense," Sasuke stated. "When do we start training?"

"I'll personally handle your training starting today, Sasuke," he said. "We've got a lot of work to do so that Gaara-fellow doesn't catch you. Lucky for you, I can get your speed up to snuff in the time we have."

"What about us?" Sakura asked, crossing her arms. "Naruto has to go against that Hyuuga that hurt Hinata, and he barely scraped by because Kiba didn't watch where he stuck his nose."

"Hey!" Kiba shouted. Not that he could deny it.

Naruto pouted as well. "You think I'm happy winning like that? I don't want to be known one day as the Hokage who became a Chuunin because of a fart. If my chakra wasn't messed up back then, I would have beaten him fair-and-square."

"Please, me and Akamaru were wiping the floor with you the entire time!" Kiba claimed, Akamaru backing him with a bark.

"That's not how I remember it," Naruto rebutted. "I mean, I seem to remember you taking out Akamaru on your own after I changed into—"

"Naruto has a personal trainer," Kakashi cut in, before they kept going and came to blows again. "As for you, Sakura, this is a chance for you and the others who didn't get in to better yourselves. The teams are temporarily split apart due the members who have personalized training. Why not use this opportunity to ask Kurenai for advice on Genjutsu or reconnect with an old friend?"

The rest of the meeting was more-or-less the same, everyone talking about what to do in the interim between the matches and now. Hours later, once the meeting was done and they were free to leave, Sakura approached Naruto before he could wander off. Sasuke was already gone, eager to begin his training.

"I'm sorry for hitting you earlier," she told him. "Your… clanswoman, I suppose, was right. You didn't deserve that, or most of the other times I've hit you for being annoying."

"I said it was fine." He tilted his head. "Why are you pressing it?"

"I've… been doing a lot of thinking since the Forest of Death and the Preliminaries," she admitted. "Once the danger passed and things settled down to the point I could go to sleep in my own bed, I began to reflect on everything. Sasuke, you, and Lee… I treated you all wrong in different ways, but you were all willing to fight and die for me. If I don't make an effort to change then it means I'd be disrespecting that."

Naruto seemed to grasp what she was saying. She wanted to make a change to better herself, so that she never had to watch from the sidelines as her comrades fought and died for her. He nodded his head and smiled. "Okay then. Apology accepted!"

Sakura motioned towards the village proper. "I'm going to visit Lee in the hospital. Would you like to come with me to see Hinata too?"

He grinned. "Yeah, I should tell her about how I'm going to wipe the floor with her cousin."

"Hold up!" Kiba called, Shino by his side. "We're coming too. The more the merrier."

The four of them then departed to see their hospitalized friends, hoping to cheer them up before they threw themselves into their training for the Finals.