Naruto, Ino, and Shikamaru walked into the medical room where the medic ninjas had carried Choji and found that he was unconscious and hooked up to a couple machines.

Naruto was the first to react and grabbed a nearby medic ninja by the coat. "Hey, why's he hooked up to those things?!"

The guy was shaking a bit out of fear. "H-he put himself in a rough state and is suffering from multiple bone fractures, internal bleeding, and severe chakra exhaustion. We used a multitude of medical ninjutsu to fix the physical problems and those machines are feeding him different medications to help his chakra levels return to normal. Now please let me go, you're kind of scary."

Ino gently removed Naruto's hand from the guys coat and smiled kindly. "I'm sorry about my friends actions, we're all just a bit on edge right now. Thank you for all of your help in healing Choji."

The medic ninja nodded as he smoothed out his coat. "No problem at all, it's my job and he's a very kind person. If you'd like to wait here he should wake up soon."

All three of them nodded and sat in three chairs that were provided to them.

For the next hour the three genin sat In silence that was only interrupted by the sounds of the machines as they worked to heal their friend. When Choji woke up he looked to the three with a smile then he started to remember what all happened and lowered his head in shame. "I'm sorry Naruto, you gave me your advice and I still lost. I failed you."

Naruto spoke up with a smile. "Hey now, where's all of that determination I saw out there in the arena?"

Putting a hand on the Akimichi boys shoulder in an attempt to comfort him the blonde boy spoke. "I hadn't known about the fire until it was too late and she's obviously been trained by many strong shinobi so while you lost it doesn't mean you failed anyone let alone me, that strength of will you showed out there has earned you not only my respect but that girls as well."

Choji smiled with a small blush. Ino decided to mess with him a bit. "Awwww, do you have a crush on the Kumo girl?"

Before the Yamanaka heiress could pick on Choji any longer the door opened to show Choza with a big smile on his face as he walked in. "My son, I'm so proud of you, you really embodied the Konoha way out there like no other."

Choji's smile changed from embarrassed to truly happy then it changed to a frown. "I'm too weak dad, I need to grow stronger than ever before if I'm going to be the heir and future clan head I need to be. I need more training so I can protect our clan and village like I'm supposed to."

Choza grinned as he patted his sons shoulder. "Don't worry my boy, once you've recovered I'll train you as long as you want. Plus you have such amazing friends here that I'm sure can help you grow stronger as well."

When the Akimichi boy looked to his teammates and Naruto all three of them nodded. Naruto smirked. "I'll do everything I can to help you out Choji, your will and determination will take you far and you'll need all of it to go through the training I'll give you."

All Choji did was grin back and nod. "Bring it on Naruto, After I'm fully recovered I'm going to want that training."

Before he could answer the door was opened by Zabuza. He looked over to Ino with a nod. "Hey kid, your fight is gonna start soon."

The girl stood up and hugged Choji. "Wish me luck, I'm seriously going to need it if that Yugito girl was anything to go off of."

Choji chuckled. "You won't need it but good luck out there, I know you can do it."

Naruto stood up as well and bumped fists with Choji. "I've got to go as well, right after her fight I'm going against that Gaara guy and I have a feeling that I'm going to have a pretty tough fight with him."

Choji nodded. "Yeah, he's got a dark feeling around him. Just be careful, he absolutely destroyed Lee and he's our fastest and physically strongest genin in this village."

Choza spoke up here. "Wait, did you just say that this Gaara guy took out the genin training directly under Might Gai to learn all of his ways was destroyed?! And you're going to fight against him?!"

Naruto nodded and was forced to quickly catch a small pouch. "Within that bag are my clans specially made food pills, take one of these when you're low on chakra or you're tired and you'll be fully recovered and able to fight on for longer periods of time. But be careful because consuming more than three a day can harm your body far more than it could help it."

Naruto nodded. "Thank you, I swear that I'll be careful and if I think that I'm too far outclassed then I'll surrender."

Choza smiled in relief as he nodded. "Thank you, good luck."

With that the two blondes left Shikamaru with the father and son duo. On their way to the contestants box Ino stopped her fellow blonde and looked him in the eyes. "Before we go any further I need to tell you something."

Naruto stopped and listened. "I know that your hyper focused on avenging the Uchihas in Sasuke's place because of your promise to him but I don't want to watch you slowly isolate yourself from everyone who cares about you just so you can spend that extra time training yourself into a grave. What I want to say is that I love you, we may only be thirteen but our lives aren't really expected to live past our mid twenties being ninja and all, and Sasuke's death put it into my mind that we aren't even guaranteed to make it to our teens. What I'm trying to say is…"

Naruto shhhhhed her with his index finger resting on her lips. "I know exactly what you are trying to say and yes I love you too and would love to be with you. Now, how about we go back up to the contestants box and wait for you to be called down for your fight."

When Ino nodded Naruto removed his finger and kissed her before leading her to the seats where they got to see the end of April and Kankuro's fight where Do surrendered due to being poisoned by a couple senbon shot out of the puppet that Kankuro was using at the time. "Winner! Kankuro of the sands! Next up is Ino Yamanaka of Konoha vs Samui of Kumo!"

Ino smiled as she stood up then jumped down and flipped before landing gracefully. Samui jumped down as well but she landed in a 'superhero landing'. Naruto analyzed the girl and on first glance wasn't much to worry about, average in every way except her Tantō which with the way it was positioned suggested that she was right handed. After using his chakra sensory he discovered that she was quite the lightning user. Signaling to Inoichi Naruto got the information to him and had him give it to Ino via mind ninjutsu.

He could see the exact moment In got the info by the way she moved into a different stance. As soon as the proctor called out HAJIME Ino jumped back mid way through a series of hand seals. The moment she landed she finished the final hand seal and called out the name of her jutsu. "Yamanaka secret jutsu: body switch no jutsu!" The Yamanaka heiress dropped to the ground with a thud and 'Samui' turned too the crowd. As soon as her mouth opened to speak she stopped and grabbed her own head while screaming. "GET OUT OF MY HEAD!"

In an instant Ino's body twitched then she sat up gasping while Samui was trying to regain her bearings.

As the two girls stood up all the way they got into their own stances again and Samui unsheathed her Tantō before running at her fellow blonde female.

Ino jumped back again and threw six shuriken at the Kumo girl who deflected them pretty easily.

As Samui got in close she sliced at Ino and she ducked down where she landed a quick jab at her opponents gut before she spun around behind her. Being as quick as she was physically able to be Ino attempted to use her built up momentum to spin kick the other girls back but she was just quick enough to spin around and catch her by the ankle and toss her to the side.

Naruto watched on as In fought long and hard to get this win and she was amazing, using everything she could from her weapons to her jutsu to the environment around her to get any advantage she could but she was outclassed by this Kumo girl who was faster, stronger more skilled, and had a calmer mind, her only real advantage was the area since she knew the area far better than Samui she was able to keep up for now.

Ino would fail if she didn't do something quick and she knew it so she used an experimental jutsu that she'd been working on all month. Going through the hand seals she called out the name of her jutsu. "Yamanaka secret jutsu: Mind blast!" As soon as Samui was in range Ino's just hit her. The jutsu was a thin layer of chakra that was invisible to the naked eye blasting out of her in a spherical shape all around her and sent anything it touched flying backwards. As soon as Samui was down In was on her, snatching to girls blade off of the ground and put the tip to Samui's throat. "Yield to me or die."

Sighing Samui did as told while muttering about how 'uncool' this all was.

Ino was named the victor and on her way back to the top she passed by the Gaara person who smirked as he looked at her but he never said a word. Getting the feeling she didn't want to be near him for too long Ino moved faster and got up the stairs quickly, stepping into the contestants box just in time to see Naruto jump off of the box for his fight.

When the blonde avenger landed he activated his chakra chains which came out as two different chains in the same shade of blue as his eyes with spear heads on the ends. As soon as the proctor said HAJIME he sent the chains forward with a mental command.

Gaara watched impassively as the chains moved forward with his arms crossed, the chains came from inches away from his face when a wall of sand blocked the two chakra constructed weapons.

(In the Kage box)

'Rasa' looked over at Hiruzen. "I do believe your genin just discovered why my son has never been hurt during his missions."

Hiruzen nodded. "Yes but Naruto is nothing if not resourceful and cunning. If anyone is going to defeat young Gaara it would be him."

(Back in the arena)

Naruto thought back to the preliminaries where Lee was able to break through the sand with his speed and started to make up a plan before he smirked and sent chakra to the storage seals on the back of his hands allowing the water in them to pool around his feet.

Flying through hand seals he shouted out his jutsu. "Water style:Twin rising dragons!" From the water came two dragons made of the life giving liquid that flew at the sand user. As the twin dragons came in close proximity to Gaara the sand rose once more only to be soaked and become slow and sluggish.

In this moment Naruto used another jutsu called Wind style: gale force winds that sent the sand genin flying before his sand could protect him.

The blonde quickly used his chakra to catch up to the boy and round housed him into a quickly created shadow clone that donkey kicked him into another clone. This just continued until the sand was forcefully dried by Gaara's chakra and it defended him from another kick.

Looking at Gaara anyone could see that his sand armor was shattered and falling off of him along with a few bruises here and there.

Deciding that he had enough Gaara started forming a large ball around himself. Naruto immediately felt the malevolent chakra coming from within that he knew to be Bijuu chakra. "Damnit! He's going to release Shukaku!"

Kurama spoke up. "Remember, if it comes down to it you can use my chakra now so do what needs to be done. Plus if he does release my little brother you have that perv of a sage around to seal him away."

Naruto nodded and started charging up the Chidori in his right hand. As soon as it was completely charged Naruto added chakra to his feet and sprinted towards the large ball of sand.

(Kage box)

A seemed impressed. "That's the original jutsu of your jounin Kakashi Hatake the Chidori, I didn't know that you were still having your jounin teach assassination jutsu to genin even with the war over Hiruzen-dono."

The third hokage shook his head. "This was not on my orders Lord Raikage, Hatake-san had taught this to Naruto of his own violation. His excuse for such a thing was that the boy is planning to go after Itachi Uchiha so he wants him to be as prepared as he possibly can so he trains him harder than he's ever trained even his old squad back in ANBU from when he was the captain."

Some of the ANBU behind the Kages cringed at the mere mentioning of the training and all of them felt sorry for the boy.

(The arena)

Naruto dodged sand spikes that came out of the ground at random intervals until he reached the ball of sand and thrusted his lightning coated hand forward and through the sand where he felt his hand pierced flesh.

Within the span of a few mere seconds he felt blood dripping from his hand and then heard Gaara from within his large ball of sand. "I-i-is that… blood?! AAAAAAHHHHHHH!"

Naruto jumped back just in time to dodge the sand spikes coming out of the ball. Instantly Naruto noticed sakura petals falling from the sky, Kankuro and Temari coming down from the stands where they carried an injured Gaara out of the arena, and the shinobi from sand and sound start fighting ninja from the other villages.

No matter how much he wished for it not to be true the invasion has begun.

XXXAN: hello everyone and welcome to the newest chapter of one difference changes all. Next chapter will start off with the invasion, we'll be seeing it from a multitude of POV's so be ready for that.Alright now on to the harem, it's going to be Ino, Temari, and Tayuya. I've mainly chosen her as the final member because of biginferno's review where he asked for her on the reasoning that Naruto could give her a better life and I agree. So big shout out to you and I hope you decide to write your own fanfics, I'd love to read them.