I see that I have forgotten to put the disclaimer up the first few chapters. I should shame myself.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. That right belongs to Kishimoto-sensei.
Well, I am back again with a grand new chapter. I said that this chapter would be about Naruto's past, but I didn't get to that yet. Hell, I don't even think that I will get to that in the next chapter. I have got so much to write before that. I have decided to give my own twist on the sound/sand war. I don't want to spoil what is going to happen this chapter, so you will just have to read it :D
This chapter takes place a few days after the previous chapter.
I got about one or two reviews last chapter and that surprised me a lot. Was the chapter so bad? Please tell me, because maybe I can improve my writing that way. Reviews mean a lot to me, so please tell me if you liked it or if you have critique. I am open for new ideas too, so if you have something on your mind, let me now;)
I hope that this chapter is good enough. I wrote it during the spare time I had….and that wasn't much. I hope that you enjoy the chapter.
"Hello": regular talking
'Hello': thinking
'Hello': Inner Sakura and Kyuubi talking
Don't forget to R&R ;)
Enjoy
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Control
Standing on one of the highest tree branches of the big tree, Naruto was able to oversee a lot of the favourite village. The village was crowded, because the finals of the chuunin exams would be upon them soon. Most people that came to watch the exams were already in the village and according to Jiraiya most of them had come from the hidden village of sand. Even the kazekage was supposed to show up. He trembled at the thought that there were now even more shinobi in the village like that Gaara fellow.
Crack!
Naruto heard the sound and he knew that it wasn't good. He looked down and raised an eyebrow. Wasn't he supposed to be standing on a tree branch right now? Then why was it gone? Even though he was a shinobi, he wasn't able to fly. So he did what would happen to everybody who was standing in nothing but air…he started falling down.
"You have got to be kidding me! Why did it have to break at a time like this!?"
Jiraiya stood up slowly while stretching out his arms. Letting out a yawn, he started to look around. Everything was a bit unclear at the moment. He could see that he was sitting under a big tree, but he didn't know why he was there. His eyelids were still heavy as he had just woken up because of a loud scream. And he was having such a great dream too. A lecherous grin started to appear on his face as he thought of what was about to happen in his dream.
Snap!
"Damn it! That hurt!"
Now there was that scream again. Just where did it come from? He was sure that he didn't imagine it. And there was another sound too. Was it the sound of a tree branch breaking? As a shinobi he had to be able to distinguish sounds from another, because that might save his life in a life or death situation. When he heard the sound again, he was sure of it. Tree branches were breaking. And what would be the most logical place to find tree branches: trees. Knowing that he was standing under a tree, he looked up, hoping to find out where that sound was coming from.
"What's that?" He said with a frown on his face. Something was coming his way and it was coming fast.
Naruto hit another tree branch it just like the rest it broke too. Why did he have to climb all the way to the top? The tree was very big and there were branches everywhere. This was going to leave some scars later. He looked down and saw that his teacher was awake again. Even better, he was looking towards him.
'Thank goodness, Ero-sennin is going to catch me. I am going to hear him laughing all day because I fell out of a tree, but it is better than hitting the hard ground at this speed.' Naruto thought while falling. The man was getting bigger and bigger and he knew he was almost there. He closed his eyes and waited to be caught.
Jiraiya saw the blur getting bigger and bigger and he just couldn't make out what it was. His eyes widened when he realised what it was. This had happened to him many times before. "Shit, it's bird crap!" He shouted while jumping out of the way.
There was a loud sound and the dust from the ground was up in the air. The frog tamer waved the dust away with his hands and walked forward. His eyes widened when he saw the huge crater in the ground. "What the hell!?"
Bird crap wasn't supposed to leave a crater right? And the crater had the form of a human being too. That wasn't normal, was it? The dust now completely disappeared from the crater and he had to raise his eyebrow when he saw something orange in the crater. 'Orange bird crap?'
He picked the orange stuff up to see the bird crap up close. He had seen a lot in his long life, but he had never seen something like this before. "Let's see, orange, blue, yellow. This isn't bird crap, that's for sure. Now why does this look so familiar?"
"Let me go, Ero-sennin!!!"
Jiraiya dropped it and took a few steps back. There were only two people in the world who called him like that. One of them was dead, so this could mean only one thing. "Naruto?"
The boy stood up and hit the frog hermit on the head. "Why didn't you catch me, Ero-sennin! I could have died, you know?!"
The sannin couldn't help but grin. "Sorry, sorry. I mistook you for some bird crap."
Something snapped inside of Naruto now. He knew that something was wrong with his teacher, but this…He was sure that he didn't look like bird shit. Was the man making fun of him? Of the man who was going to become hokage of the village hidden in the leaves? Jumping up, he hit the man on the head again. "You senile old fool!"
Jiraiya was laughing like he had never before.
"Stop laughing Ero-sennin! This isn't funny!"
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Naruto sat down on the ground. He had bandaged his left arm. He needed to do it to stop the bleeding. Why couldn't he have a normal teacher? One who would have just caught him? It had probably already healed now because of his special healing powers.
Training for such a long time was certainly taking its toll now. It was way past lunch time already and he had been training since this morning. Normally that wouldn't be a problem for the boy, but the training he had to do was very boring. The only things he was allowed to do were water walking and tree climbing.
"Ero-sennin, I don't want to do this training anymore!" He said with a boring face. After that he let out a long yawn and fell with his back on the ground with his hands behind his back. He closed his eyes and was getting ready to sleep. Nothing could be more boring that doing something you were already very good at.
The white haired man sighed and hit the boy on the head. "How many times have I told you not to call me that anymore, you baka! You should be glad that I am training you, you know. I could just walk away."
"But Ero-sennin!" Naruto whined. "You have already taught me the summoning jutsu. I am strong enough to beat everyone now! Why do I have to do stupid chakra control training? I hate this so much!"
Jiraiya shook his head. Nothing could get through that hard head of his. "Haven't I told you this more than a thousand times about now? Your chakra control is very bad. Why do you think that I wanted to teach you how to walk on water?"
"Because it is pretty funny. Who would have imagined that I could learn how to walk on water! I had only seen this on television before. I always thought that the faked it, but now I know that they could really do it." Naruto replied with a big smile on his face.
"No, you fool!" Jiraiya hit the boy on his head now. "Don't you ever listen to something I say?"
Naruto could feel the bump on his head. The man had hit him on the head more than once today and it was getting really painful. Sure, he was used to being hit by Sakura, but somehow that didn't hurt so much anymore. If Sakura hit him, he would feel pain, but happiness too. A blush started to appear on his face when her name came to his mind. He shook his head and walked over to the sannin.
"Then why did you learn my how to walk on water, Ero-sennin?!" Naruto asked while jumping around the white haired man like and hyperactive kid of five years old.
Jiraiya couldn't take it anymore. The boy was being so annoying today. "Just calm down for a while will you?!"
The spiky haired boy stopped jumping around for a while. The man in front of him was getting really pissed off right now. He sat down with his legs crossed and took this chance to rest for a bit again.
"Jeez, can someone tell me why I am doing this again!" The white haired sannin said after letting out breath. "But as I was saying. The water walking was about the same as the tree climbing that Kakashi taught you. You remember that one, do you?"
Naruto nodded. "Yeah, I can still remember how many times I fell out of that tree. That was really painful! I can still feel the bumps on my head."
Jiraiya smiled now. "Haha, that's good for you, kid. Now, how were your team-mates faring with the tree walking?"
Naruto sighed and turned around to hide his blush. "Sakura-chan was much better than me and she made it up in one go. But that's Sakura-chan for you, she really is amazing." He said in a dreamy state.
No matter how much the boy tried, he wasn't able to hide his blush and Jiraiya could see through it perfectly. "You really like that Sakura-chan of yours, don't you." The man said with a grin on his face.
Naruto turned around very quickly and saw the man grinning at him. "Yeah, she is something special. It is too bad that she only sees that bastard as potential lover. And to make it even worse, Sasuke doesn't even look at her and it is making her sad. I am going to kick his ass when I see that bastard again!"
Jiraiya's lips curled into an honest smile. It was great to see young love again. Even when the girl didn't see him, he still wanted her to be happy. He ruffled his hand through the yellow hair, which infuriated the boy a bit. "What's the deal, Ero-sennin?!"
"You just remind me of someone." He turned around and walked away. "Don't give up on her..." He almost whispered.
"I won't. That's a promise! I never give up. That's part of my ninja way!" The boy answered to his surprise.
Jiraiya grinned one more time before he sat down on a rock. They had been training inside one of the forests surrounding Konoha, so there weren't any chairs available. "We are getting off track here, kid. So what about your other team mate?"
"Sasuke-teme," Naruto found the ground very appealing all of a sudden. "He was much better at the tree climbing than I was too. Sure, we completed it around the same time, but he was just much better at it. While I was very tired, he was still able to go on. I just can't take it! I need to get stronger than that bastard. That way he will finally acknowledge me and Sakura-chan might fall in love with me!"
Jiraiya nodded. This was exactly what he was expecting. When he had found the boy a few days ago…no that's not right….when the boy found him a few days ago, the boy seemed very bad with his control for some reason. He just thought that it was because he was a lousy ninja, but the boy did look familiar for some reason.
While the boy was learning how to walk on water, it was apparent that something was wrong. When he called the boy to come over and mold chakra for him, the reason became clear. A very complex seal started to appear on the stomach of the kid. It was the same seal he had seen so many years ago. He didn't believe it at first, but when he took a good look at the boy, it was unmistakable: the blonde unruly hair, the bright blue eyes, the hyperactive personality. He was the son of Arashi. And that was the seal which was used to contain the demon fox.
The seal was made to contain the Kyuubi, but to protect the boy too. Jiraiya had been a seal master since a long time and he had taught Arashi everything he knew about seals. Because of the seal he would be able to tap into the power of the demon when he got older. But it was true too that his control over his chakra would get harder because of the seal too. His own chakra and the chakra of the fox had started mingling with each other the whole time, so it would be hard to control that.
But something was off. He had taken a good look then and saw that there was another seal around the one his father planted on him. It was seal with an uneven number, while the seal of the fourth was a seal with an even number. It was common knowledge that an even seal and an uneven seal don't mix together. They just oppose each other and the control would get even harder.
After that he had taken a good look on the added seal and his eyes had widened when he realised that this was a very difficult seal to perform: the five pronged seal. This was a seal to disturb one's chakra flow and it was used on extremely dangerous prisoners to stop them from escaping in the past. But the last ones who knew this seal were himself, Tsunade and Orochimaru.
He had figured that it had to be the last one, because he knew that Tsunade hadn't been in the village for a long time and he knew that the snake was somewhere close. It was one of the reasons why he himself was here. He had been monitoring his former friend for some time now and he had followed him to the fire country. He had also heard that he had encountered Anko and team 7 in the forest of death.
He had performed a technique of his own then to erase the five pronged seal. The boy had been able to walk on water after that. His control had become a lot better. That five pronged seal had messed up his chara system.
His control was improving very much, especially the last few days. After the boy had learned the summoning technique, although he could still get better at this technique, he had started to train the boy in chakra control. There was still much more room for improvement, but Jiraiya couldn't deny that he was impressed with the boy. He hadn't expected the runt to improve so fast.
"That's what I have been expecting, Naruto." He said while staring to the sky.
"What! Are you saying that I am weak!?" Naruto shouted after he stood up again. He ran over to the white haired sannin and continued to scream. "I have been training for so long and you say that I am weak! I am sure that I can defeat the bastard now!"
"Shut up!" Jiraiya said and to his surprise the boy really did shut up. "I didn't say that you are weak. I just said that I expected your control to be not as good as the control of your team mates."
This confused Naruto a lot. "What do you mean?"
The old man sighed and patted the empty space on the rock next to him. Naruto got the picture and sat down next to his new teacher. To his surprise the man grabbed two bars of chocolate out of his pouch and gave he gave one of those tasty bars to him. Naruto didn't wait for a second and took the bar with a smile on his face.
"You are pretty bad with your chakra control because of the seal on your stomach." He pointed his finger down to the place of the seal. "One of the most powerful creatures that has ever walked to planet was sealed within you, Naruto. This monster fox is made completely out of demonic energy. It is just impossible for a normal someone to be able to withstand all that demonic energy."
Naruto, who had just finished the chocolate bar, moved his right hand to his stomach with a downward face. "So, you are telling me that I am not normal."
"I am telling that the fox had to be sealed inside of a baby, so that the chakra of the beast and the chakra of the baby would be able to mix with each other. This way the human, in which the beast was sealed, in this case you, wouldn't be damaged so much because of the demonic energy."
Naruto frowned because he really had no idea what the man was talking about, but he nodded nonetheless. "So you are saying that I am not a monster?"
Jiraiya hit the spiky haired boy's head. He couldn't believe how stupid the boy was. He really had the IQ of the behind of a pig. "No, you are not a monster. But let's continue. Just listen for a while, okay?"
The boy nodded and kept his mouth shut. It took him all of his will power to stop talking for a while, but he knew that this was important. Although the man next to him was a real pervert, he really knew his stuff. He had already taught him how to summon, so why would he interrupt him now.
"Because you have two kinds of chakras in your body, they have begun to mix with each other. But because of this mixing, your control becomes very bad. The chakra of a demon wasn't meant to be controlled by a human body, so your body has trouble to accept that energy. Do you understand?"
The boy was lost in thought for a while and Jiraiya could see by looking at him that he was having trouble keeping up. His expressions were changing by the minute. "Yeah, I think I understand it somewhat, Ero-sennin. My body can't control the chakra of the fox, right?"
"Yeah, something like that. So in reality you are very good at your control. You are doing a very good job right now. I think that you would be as good as most chuunin with your control if it wasn't for the fox." He said with a smile on his face.
Naruto's lips curled into a big smile. He couldn't believe that the old man next to him was actually praising him. "Thanks a lot, Ero-sennin."
Jiraiya smiled now. "But your control needs to become even better now."
"Why? I can already walk on water and walk up the trees without breaking a sweat. I am wasting less chakra with my jutsus now too, so why do I need to get even better control now. I can increase my control a little every day with my usual training. There's no rush, right? You can better use this time to teach me an awesome new jutsu! Maybe the one that Sasuke-teme uses, that katon move." Naruto said with a big smile on his face.
"You fool!" Naruto was surprised by the outburst of his teacher. "Not everything revolves about new jutsus, you know! I am sorry to say this, but you are not ready to be learning elemental jutsus yet. To learn such moves, you have got to have control and intelligence. It takes a lot of work to learn a new jutsu!"
"But Sasuke can use a fire move. If he can use it then so can I!" Naruto screamed back.
"Sasuke is part of the Uchiha clan. That clan specialises in katon jutsus. They have an affinity for it. It is only natural that he would be able to learn such a move much easier than you. His parents must have taught him that before they died. And to tip it off, I have heard about this friend of yours. He is called a genius." He said with a serious expression on his face.
Naruto became sad when he heard this. His parents had probably helped Sasuke with his training. Sadness always overtook him when he started to think about his own parents. Were the still alive? Had they abandoned him when he was little or didn't they have a choice? Would they be proud of him? All of these questions dwelled in his mind all the time. He was able to contain his sadness most of the time, but when someone actually talked about parents, he lost his control and became sad.
Jiraiya saw that the boy became troubles because of his words and hit himself. He knew that the boy didn't have any parents. He put a hand on the shoulder of the boy and gave him a smile. "But luckily you have something that is more important than that."
Naruto raised his head when he heard this. "You have to power to never give up!" Naruto couldn't help but smile when he heard this. The man next to him was a pervert, but he was one of the nicest people he has ever known.
"So I was saying that not everything revolves around elemental jutsus. Most fights are decided by very small things like control, insight and luck. If you can control your chakra well enough, you would hold out much longer than your opponent. I can see that you have a lot of stamina and chakra, and because of the Kyuubi you have got even more. Think what you would be able to do with perfect control." The frog tamer said while looking towards the clouds.
Naruto was struck by awe. It was true that he had a lot of chakra and people who had seen him fight praised him for his endurance. With perfect control he would be able to make so many clones and he would be able to hold out even longer. "Alright, Ero-sennin, you have convinced me. We have got a few days left before the finals, so let's focus them on chakra control!"
Naruto jumped up from the rock and started to run towards the water. Jiraiya smiled, because the boy had come a long way since he met with him. Maybe it was time to teach him something nice. It would help with the chakra control training as well. He snickered, because he knew that he had exactly been the same as that boy once. He wasn't able to concentrate and he hated to do things he already could. Yeah, it was time for the next step.
"Naruto, come over here!" He shouted while using his hands as a megaphone.
Naruto turned around when he heard his name. He had just begun with his training and now the man was calling him back already. But he didn't complain. Almost anything was better than the boring training he was doing now. He started to walk back to the man sitting on the rock. "What's the deal, Ero-sennin?!"
"I thought it was about time to teach you something new. You have been doing such a good job that I think you are ready to begin this training. It is everything you just made a fuss about; I am going to teach you a new jutsu!" Jiraiya said with a smile on his face.
Naruto's eyes widened and a smile started to appear on his face. "Really!? You mean it, Ero-sennin?! But you just told me that I am not ready for that yet!"
"I told you that you are not ready yet for an elemental jutsu, but the jutsu that I will teach you isn't an elemental one. Watch closely, kid."
Naruto never took his eyes off the man who promised to teach him a new technique. He followed every movement; he listened to every sound he made. Naruto was ready for everything. He was already focusing his attention on the man's hands, because he would have to memorize the hand seals.
He was surprised when the man simply stretched out his right hand with his palm towards the sky. Naruto didn't understand what the man was doing, but kept his gaze locked on the hand nonetheless. The wind around his hand started to spin and Naruto was surprised when a small blue ball started to form above the man's hand. His eyes widened when he saw that the ball was getting bigger and bigger until it was as big as Jiraiya's hand.
Jiraiya now turned to the yellow haired boy with a smile on his face. "Now this is the 'rasengan'.
"Wow!" That was all Naruto was able to say. His jaw almost hit the ground and his eyes were still widened. He couldn't believe it. Chakra was visible on his hand and it was spinning extremely fast. He tried to touch the ball, but his hand was repelled by the strong winds around it.
"Looks pretty nice, doesn't it? Let me show you how powerful this technique really is." Jiraiya looked around and smiled when he saw his target. Walking towards a tree very close to him he used his free hand to make a hand gesture that was meant for the boy to follow him. The boy complied and sprinted towards the tree too.
When the sannin saw that his student had finally arrived he trusted his hand forward into the tree. "Rasengan!" The ball of energy went right through the tree and after a while it fell over. The ball disappeared and Jiraiya turned to the boy again with a big smile on his face. "This is the rasengan."
Naruto couldn't believe it. "Wow! That jutsu is so cool! It went right through that tree! Teach me how to do it! Teach me, teach me!"
Jiraiya was happy that the boy was glad to be learning a new technique, but the boy could have expressed his feelings on a somewhat softer tune. "Ok, now take a good look and listen well. I am going to explain this only once."
Naruto nodded and focused his eyes on the big man's right hand. "First you have to gather chakra in the palm of your hand. You remember what you did with the tree climbing exercise? You needed to gather the chakra at the bottom of your feet and that is the hardest place to gather chakra, so this should be pretty easy. But you have got to focus a lot of chakra there."
Naruto frowned, but nodded nonetheless. 'I will just pretend like I understand what he's saying for now.'
"Then you make the chakra rotate. You need to pump a lot of chakra in this attack or else it will become useless." He said with a serious tone. "And then you will have to keep the chakra contained in the form of a ball. That's all there is to it. If you can do those three steps, then you will be able to perform the technique…in theory that is."
"That is so cool! Don't worry, Ero-sennin, this will be easy. I will master this technique quickly!" The boy said with a big smile on his face.
Jiraiya hit the boy lightly on the head. "So this technique is easy to master, isn't it? It took the creator of this jutsu about three years to complete it!"
Naruto's jaw fell on the ground now. "Three years! I don't have time to train three years for this move! I need to become hokage, so that everyone will acknowledge me!" The boy started running around the field of the training grounds with a worried look on his face.
"Don't worry kid, don't forget about me. I have learned it too and I have some tricks to learn it to you." Jiraiya said while grabbing something from his kunai pouch.
Naruto was surprised when the frog tamer suddenly threw something his way. Was it a kunai, or was it a shuriken? He was about to jump away when he saw what it was. He caught it with his two hands and raised one of his eyebrows. "A water balloon…"
Jiraiya grabbed another one and placed it on the palm of his right hand. "Yes, a water balloon. Now look closely. Remember the first two steps."
"Uhm, gathering chakra and making it spin, right?" Naruto said with confusion written all over his face.
"You're getting sharper by the minute, boy. Now look closely."
Naruto could see that the water was trying to find a way out, because he could see a lot of little bumps in the balloon and then suddenly the balloon exploded. "What the hell? What did you do, Ero-sennin?!"
"I just gathered chakra in the palm of my hand and I made it spin. The spinning caused the balloon to burst." The frog sannin said with a smile on his face. "This is the first step of the rasengan training. Try to break the water balloon in your hand by spinning chakra in the palm of your hand."
"Okay that will be so easy, Ero-sennin!"
Naruto placed the water balloon on his hand and started to focus his chakra. 'This is it. The chakra is in place. Now I have just got to spin it!' He started to spin the chakra with all of his concentration. He could see that the water balloon was moving, but it just didn't seem to break. He dropped the balloon and sat down on the ground with a disappointed expression on his face. "It didn't work!"
"Don't worry, kid. You will get better at it. I have faith in you. This technique requires a lot of practise, so start practising!" Jiraiya said with a smile on his face, before turning around. "I will be back later to see if you have made some progress. Try hard and don't give up."
"What the hell! You're leaving! You are supposed to be my teacher. Can't you help me some more on this?" Naruto almost screamed when he saw the man walking away.
Jiraiya stopped in his tracks and glanced over his shoulder. "Don't you understand?! From now on you will have to do it by yourself! I can't help you with this any more than I already have. You will have to grasp this step by yourself or else you won't ever learn the technique. Try to figure something out for yourself. I am sure that you can do it. You just have to concentrate." He disappeared in a puff of smoke, leaving Naruto and the water balloon behind.
"That stupid pervert! He is probably headed towards the women's bathing house right now!" Naruto said before sitting down once more. "So I have got to figure something out, huh. Too bad that thinking is one of my bad habits…"
After trying it again a few times, he threw the water balloon on the ground again. Frustration was getting to him and he wanted to kill that sannin right now for letting him figure everything out by himself. But there was nothing to do about it. It was just him and the water balloon now. Speaking of which. He turned his face towards the balloon. "So can you help me?"
There was a long silence after that. The winds started blowing and all of the trees seemed to sweat drop. One single crow was flying in the sky at that moment, saying: "Idiot… idiot…idiot."
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The hokage was currently sitting behind his wooden desk, looking through some documents. The last few days had been very tiring, because there were a lot of preparations to be done. The chuunin exams would be upon them soon and Konoha needed to show the other countries that the village was ready to handle everything. Showing the other countries that your country is capable of handling something on this scale meant a lot of respect.
He let out a smile when he thought about the finalists. Most of them were from the village and those who made it were rookies. That would most certainly leave a great impression. The old man hadn't expected Naruto to go to the finals, but after seeing his match against Kiba he was sure that the boy would do fine. 'He's beginning to look like you more and more every day, Arashi.'
Another reason why the village needed to look good was that the kazekage himself would be showing up. The man had agreed to come to Konoha in order to watch the finals. This was very strange, because normally the kage of the wind country wasn't the type to go to other countries in order to watch some battles. The only conclusion the old man could come to was that the kazekage was coming here to watch his own son fight the last uchiha.
Uchiha Sasuke had made it through the first and second exams, although it wasn't without troubles, and he would be fighting against Gaara of the sand in the first round of the finals. Sarutobi could still remember that shinobi of the sand. Something was wrong with that boy and the rest of the sand shinobi were acting kind of suspicious as well.
The Uchiha clan had always been a noble clan, famous for all of its great fighters. But since 'that' fatal day, there have been no more uchihas participating in the chuunin exams. That's the sole reason why so many people were coming to this year's chuunin exams. They wanted to see the legendary clan in action once more.
And then there was the last problem. The problem that had arisen during the second exam. According to Anko, who is a special jounin of the village, Orochimaru had returned to the village. The woman had told him that he had taken the face of a grass ninja and had infiltrated the exam in the forest of death. The snake sannin had fought her and had even let her live to her great confusion. He then supposedly told her that the village would fall by his hands, but hadn't told her anything else.
The old man sighed and opened on of the drawers of the desk in front of him. He pushed away some documents, before taking a frame out of the brown drawer. A tear almost escaped his eye when he looked at the photo. It was him in younger days. Still not grey and with a big smile plastered on his face. Around him he could see his students.
On his left was the small blonde girl with a smirk on her face. Tsunade was the granddaughter of the first hokage and so she had always been very close to the founder of the village. He himself had been taught by the first and second hokage and he held them both in great respect. After the man died, he had always vowed to protect and train the girl. He had even gone so far to ask the people in charge to add her to his team. She was a little spunky and pretty weak at first, but she grew out to be the strongest kunoichi the village has ever known.
In front of him was the white haired boy known as Jiraiya. The boy had always been a hard one to deal with. Being the pervert the boy was, he was always able to find himself trouble. Most of the time he would peek in the women's bathhouse and according to the boy he had never been caught. Sarutobi could still remember how the boy fell into all of his traps during the bell test. But he too grew into one of the strongest shinobi the world has ever known.
Then he looked to the last person in the picture. The man causing problems for him right now, Orochimaru. The boy with the pale face had always been a genius when it came down to fighting. Because of a weird look in his eyes nobody had ever been able to figure him out completely. Sarutobi sighed, because even when he was the boy's teacher he had known that the boy had something sinister around him. He had seen the dark look in his eyes. But he hadn't given up on the boy, hoping that his training would help the boy clear his mind. The village was in dire need of power and that little boy was able to grant it to them.
What a mistake that has been. Once the boy had come of age he started to get more and more distant from the others. The young man disappeared sometimes, only to return many weeks later. When the fourth hokage had been chosen a few years later he became even more distant. He vanished after the Kyuubi assault one day to never return again.
People started to go missing around that time too. Not only civilians, but ninjas too. This caused the council to panic a lot and a search was ordered. All the trails were leading to the same place. Sarutobi clenched his fist now and almost dropped the picture. They had found a hole in the ground of one of the training grounds around Konoha. After checking it out he went in with two anbu agents in order to find the culprit, but what he found hadn't been what he had been expecting.
Inside the dark depths of the hole was waiting for him no other than his own student. One of the people he had grown to care about. Orochimaru had smiled at him then with a sinister smile before getting ready to fight his own teacher. The man had defeated the two anbu that were with him within a mere second before jumping behind the one who taught him so much.
Sarutobi sighed now. He had made the biggest mistake of his life back then. He let the man go without a fight. It was his job to protect the village, so he had to bring back or even kill the man who had done so many terrible things. But after summoning the great ape Enma, he just couldn't fight the man. He wasn't strong enough to fight his own student. Orochimaru ran from the village and nobody had seen him since.
Putting the frame back in the drawer he let out a big sigh. If he just would have been stronger that day. Everything would have been different. Uchiha Sasuke wouldn't have the curse seal right now, the village wouldn't have to worry about getting attacked by a psycho. The village would have been much better of without him. A loud thud was heard after he slammed his hand on his desk with all the anger inside him.
"Damn it, why am I so weak! I don't deserve to be the hokage of this village." He said with an angry look on his face. Almost nobody had seen this side of him, but he couldn't contain himself any longer. He just had to get this out of his system. "Why did you have to die, Arashi? The village needed you and now still needs you!"
Looking up, he could see the pictures of the previous hokages. They had all did such a great job with the village. The first and second hokage had founded the village known as Konoha today and had both died at a pretty young age in order to protect it. Then he moved on to the fourth hokage who had protected the village from destruction when the Kyuubi attacked. And his fate had been death as well.
He now clenched his fist again. And the only hokage who had let the village down was still alive. He looked from the left picture to the right one with a determined expression on his face. "I am sorry for everything. I can't change the past, but I promise that I will protect this village with my life, just like you three taught me!"
Just then he heard some knocking on the wooden door of his office. He quickly turned around to sit behind his desk once again. He put some documents in front of him, so that nobody would ever find out what just happened in the room. "Come in!"
The door opened to reveal a tall man with some kind of hood on his head. The man had scars all over his face and he was wearing a long black jacket over his jounin vest. A serious expression was apparent on his face and this worried the hokage quite a bit. The man walked over to the desk and bowed in front of the old man.
"Please sit down, Ibiki." The Sarutobi said while blowing out some smoke from his pipe.
"Hai!" Ibiki sat down in one of the chairs in front of the desk with a deep sigh. He put one f his hands in his pocket and revealed a few documents when his hand came out again. After checking if it were the right ones he laid the document on the desk.
"What is this?" Sarutobi asked with confusion.
"These reports are made by me. Mizuki has finally talked." The hokage looked even more confused now, but didn't get the chance to say anything. "After Naruto had defeated the traitorous chuunin, we had brought him to the dungeon to begin the interrogation. But for a long time we weren't able to get any information out of the man."
The hokage remembered the man now. This was the man that had let Naruto steal the scroll of sealing. The man who had been in contact with Orochimaru before. His eyes widened when he remembered the words of Anko. The snake was about to make his move and Mizuki might be the key. "Please continue."
"Hai. I had ordered my subordinates to continue with the interrogation while I was busy with the first and second exams of the chuunin exam. To my great dismay they too hadn't been able to get something out of the man." The scarred man said with a sad voice.
The hokage only nodded. It was too bad. It would have been very convenient if the traitor had told them something about the snake sannin. From his words the village would be able to prepare for an attack. He was about to pick up the documents when the special jounin in front of him began to speak again.
"But I didn't give up. I knew that the man held a connection with Orochimaru and after hearing what happened in the forest of death I couldn't give up. The safety of the village was at stake, so I did what was necessary. I called one of my greatest subordinates to help me." He started to smile now.
The hokage knew exactly who the man in front of him meant. "You mean…"
"Hai." The man said while nodding. "The best interrogator of the whole village, the man with the ability to look into one's mind, Yamanaka Inoichi."
The hokage was silent for a while now. The man in front of him only called that man if the village was at stake, because his way of getting information was not right. That man was able to slip in someone's mind and replay everything that he had ever seen or done. In some countries this kind of technique is strictly forbidden, but Konoha wasn't one of them.
The technique was only used in situations like this or in war times though. Although it was a very convenient technique, it was a very dangerous technique too. The jutsu could backfire anytime and the one who performed the jutsu could be stuck in the mind of someone else for eternity. The technique could also destroy the person on who the technique is performed if the caster would make a small mistake.
But the hokage knew that this was one of the times to use this jutsu. "So did he find something?"
Ibiki started to look very serious now. "He found a whole lot, hokage-sama. Everything is inside these documents. Please look at them now."
Sarutobi nodded and picked up the documents. He put his pipe down and started reading through the long report. Ibiki waited, not moving an inch. He knew what was inside of those documents and he knew that it wasn't pretty.
The hokage dropped the documents and they fell on the ground. His eyes were wide and anger was apparent in his face. "This can't be…"
It was silent for a while. The only sound that was heard was the sound of the wind outside.
Sarutobi suddenly stood up and turned to the window with his hands folded behind his back. "Please send out word for all the jounins in the village to come to the meeting room and get Jiraiya too. And make it fast. If this is true, we don't have any time to waste!"
"Hai!" The man then made a seal and disappeared in a puff of smoke.
Sarutobi looked over the village from the window in his room with a determined expression on his face. "I swear that I won't let this village down again! I will protect this village even if it means my life!"
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Jiraiya was walking towards the training grounds again. His face was still a bit red. Today had been a good day for peeking. He hadn't known that there were so many beautiful women in the village of Konoha. He would have come back here much sooner if he had known that. All those wasted years…
When he entered the training grounds he was surprised to find the boy sitting under the tree with his eyes closed. Had the boy already completed the first step? That couldn't be, right? It had taken him much longer to complete this step. The water balloon was nowhere to be found either. "Have you completed it already?"
The boy opened his eyes and stood up with a big smile on his face. "You better believe it, Ero-sennin!"
The frog hermit grabbed another water balloon out of his pouch and threw it towards the boy. "Show me."
Naruto caught the balloon and gave the man a grin. 'Now this is my chance to prove that I am going to become hokage of Konoha.' He laid the balloon of his hand and closed his hand. 'Now concentrate the chakra to the palm of my hand. There it is and now spin in all ways!' He used his left hand to hit the water balloon at different places and the balloon exploded some time later.
"Yeah, I did it. How did you like that, Ero-sennin!" The boy jumped around and made the peace sign a few times too. Jiraiya was happy that he had really finished the first step already. He had figured out that he had to make it spin every way and not just make it spin in circles. Although he had to use his left hand too, he had done it and he was proud of the boy.
"You did great, Naruto. Now I can show you the second step."
He grabbed something out of his pouch again. Naruto was hoping for something more daring this time, but when he saw the small rubber ball, his hope fell. "A rubber ball?"
The perverted hermit threw the ball towards the boy and gave him a smile. "This ball is much stronger than the water balloon. This is basically the same training as the first step, but this time you have got to use more power. Try it."
Naruto frowned, but placed the rubber ball on the palm of his right hand nonetheless. He closed his eyes and started to focus his chakra. He suddenly opened his eyes and started to hit the ball at different places. Bumps were starting to appear, but the ball didn't explode. "What the hell? Why didn't it break?"
The old man laughed. "This is what I told you. In order to clear the second step you have got to have power. You need to focus more chakra in your hand. If you do that, then it will be easy to break it." He said with a smile on his face. 'Although it took me more than a week to clear this step…'
He was about to say something else when he saw a puff of smoke next to Naruto. When the smoke cleared he could see a scarred man in a jounin vest and a black jacket over it. "Ibiki, what are you doing here?"
"Hokage-sama had summoned us, please come to the meeting room. It is urgent." And with that the special jounin disappeared as fast as he came.
The frog tamer turned to the young boy who was giving him a confused look. "I am sorry, kid. I have to go to some stupid meeting. I think it is very serious."
Naruto frowned, but understood that it was important.
"Just go home now, kid. It is getting pretty late and you are going to need your rest. Start with the second step tomorrow." The frog hermit said with a serious tone. "I will be going now. Later." He made a seal and disappeared in a puff of smoke.
Naruto sighed, but he knew that the pervert was right. He was getting tired and he would need his sleep. He couldn't feel his right hand anymore because of the rasengan training. He just hoped that he would be able to move it again tomorrow. After stretching one more time, he began to make his way back to the village with a big smile plastered on his face. He was looking forward to dreaming about his dream girl again.
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The grassy floor of the training ground started to become black all of a sudden. Two figures jumped out of the hole and landed on their feet. They were both wearing black coats and they were hooded too. They were wearing black gauntlets and shoes too. The only things that weren't black were the chains that were hanging around their necks. The left one was tall and the right one was pretty short. To the right they could see the yellow haired boy walking to the village of Konoha.
"He is getting stronger and stronger, isn't he?" The tall one said while seeing the boy jump over in the trees.
The shorter one nodded and kneeled to look at a few flowers. "Yeah, he has come a long way, but it is still not enough."
"There is still time for him to grow. They aren't making their move just yet or should I say that they cannot make their move just yet. We still have a few years. Let's hope that he will be strong enough by then. If he isn't strong enough by then, then we will have no choice…" The tall one said while sitting down on a rock.
The smaller one sniffed in the scents of the different kinds of flowers. "Yeah…But I have faith in him. I have been following him for a while now and I believe in his power. He is determined to get stronger and I can see that he cares a lot for his friends. He is willing to set his life on the line for them...There is another one in the village right now too. That one looks pretty dangerous. He is very strong for his age, just like the boy, but I don't know if we can trust him."
"Let's just focus on the yellow haired one for now. We can't waste time watching two of them. That would only increase our chance of failing. And we can't fail, no matter what." The tall one said while looking up.
"Yeah, you are right."
"You really can't get enough of those flowers can't you?" The tall one said. "Every time that you don't have to do anything important, you are busy fumbling with flowers. I don't see what you see in them."
"Yeah, they remind me of my past." The small one mumbled while standing up again.
They suddenly felt a strong wind from the east. They looked at each other and nodded.
"Looks like the village is in for a lot of trouble. I think it is about time we left. We have a lot to do." The tall one walked over to the black hole. He was ready to jump in when he saw that the other one wasn't coming. He sighed and waited for the coated figure to come.
The smaller was staring to the village. Finally turning around, the figure in black coat walked over to the other one. After the tall one had jumped in the hole, the hooded figure looked to the village one more time. "Be safe."
The figure jumped into the hole and a few seconds after that the dark hole disappeared, leaving behind a quiet and peaceful training ground.
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AN: Phew, the chapter became longer than I had anticipated. I hope you liked it. Looks like Jiraiya has is scared of bird shit XD. Naruto has started his rasengan training. Don't worry, I won't write chapters full of Naruto trying to perform the rasengan. I made Sarutobi quite emotional about his mistake. I hope that you like that.
And does someone have any idea who the coated figures are?
I am going to make a poll for the pairing and I am going to continue this poll for a few chapters. Please tell me which pairings you would like.
Poll:
Ino: Chouji or Shikamaru or Kiba
Tenten: Lee or Neji
Hinata: Kiba or Shino or Sasuke
Temari: Shikamaru or not?
Hope to see you next chapter again. I hope to finish it soon. The action will begin in the next one and some NaruSaku again.
Until next time!