Just to clarify, I'm not confirming any pairings until I've decided on them. I'm acknowledging Hinata has a crush on Naruto and giving his personal reasons for why he's not going to think about anything like that for a while, sorry for the confusion. While I do like the pairing, I don't think Naruto's bloody secret is a good fit for the girl anyway and I have a few other idea that I like better for this story.
If you'd like, feel free to state who you would like to see him paired with. It might not influence my decision but if I notice a lot of readers leaning towards something I was already considering then that would influence said choice.
Hinata, Kiba, and Karin elected to follow Jiraiya and Naruto to where Kakashi was, which was apparently the hospital. In the foyer they found Sakura there with Kakashi and Sasuke, the Hatake raised an eyebrow at Jiraiya.
"I figured it was quicker to get you to verify my identity than to go find my ninja registration." Jiraiya confessed.
Kakashi raised his hitai-ate to reveal his Sharingan briefly, "No henge, that's Jiraiya of the Sannin alright." he introduced to the two genin who had yet to meet the man yet, "Say, could you autograph this book by the way?" he asked casually as he pulled out an Icha Icha copy.
Naruto turned paler, "You wrote that smut?" he asked, "Why the hell do you call a penis a member!? I don't get it!" he asked crassly.
Sakura and Hinata both turned bright pink as Sasuke and Kiba stared at the blonde with the surprise. The nurse at the front desk glared at the group as Kakashi and Jiraiya both looked at Naruto.
"It's called using subtle language and metaphors, euphemisms and synonyms." Jiraiya explained professionally despite the topic, Sakura looked a mix of disgusted and dismayed that two of three of some of the most legendary Konoha shinobi were such creeps.
"I have no idea what you just said but I do not like your long words!" Naruto snapped in response.
"So you did read it?" Kakashi asked, and the smirk under his mask was audible in his voice.
"Enough to know not to finish it." Naruto retorted derisively, cheeks pink with embarrassment and anger.
"But up until the smut the story was pretty good right?" Kakashi asked, "Enough to get you to get up to the smut, I know for a fact it doesn't start straight away, Jiraiya-sama likes a good build up, world building, and getting to know the characters before they get intimate." he insisted.
Kiba had not been ready for the day when he woke up, and Hinata had gone bright red and was now staring at a spot on the floor between her feet with great intensity. The Inuzuka wondered if becoming stronger just naturally made people weirder, Naruto had always been a little weird and he apparently had more chakra than anyone in the village technically.
Karin sighed, "This is so far off the topic I expected." she complained, "Can you check the fuin now? I'm an iryoninja I know almost nothing about fuinjutsu." she added with a huff.
Jiraiya raised an eyebrow, "Uzumaki without fuinjutsu?" he asked.
"I can make kibaku fuda, anyone with basic chakra control can figure out Kaifu no Jutsu," Karin excused and at the second name Naruto recalled how he had figured out that one on his own, "and I can perform Funyo no Jutsu." she finished and the blonde had no idea how to do that one.
"I want to make kibaku fuda." Naruto decided immediately, that might be the edge he'd need against monsters like Gaara or that thing with antlers.
Kakashi considered that, "Hm, well, I need to get Sasuke-kun trained up so Gaara doesn't turn him into a red smear or cripple him worse than Lee," he mused and the Uchiha glowered, "and I only have one tokujonin I can pull in a favor for this." he added, looking between Sakura and Naruto before his sole visible eye fell meaningfully on Jiraiya.
The white haired Sannin scoffed, "You want me to autograph your book and help you train one of your students?" he asked incredulously, "I'm always happy to sign something for a fan, but I'm too busy to teach some dumbass how to do fuinjutsu." he pointed out.
"I can probably show you how to make kibaku fuda." Karin muttered to the blonde, who nodded.
"Yeah, give Sakura-chan the tokujonin." Naruto decided, he was pretty sure she needed it more.
Sakura could guess why the blonde had deflected the unknown tokujonin to her, and while she was a little offended she was also silently grateful. She was also disappointed not to be getting personal training from Kakashi, but she had to admit Gaara was absolutely the most terrifying genin to face in the final phase.
Kakashi raised an eyebrow, "You're going to let another genin show you the basics and just wing it from there?" he asked and when the blonde nodded confidently the jonin looked to the Sannin.
Jiraiya turned pale as the implications of a jinchuriki unsupervised messing with fuinjutsu, amateur experiments were dangerous enough when not created by weapons of mass destruction, "You know what, my schedule just cleared up." he said, perhaps a bit too quickly, "I'll consider training you for this final phase, I don't know much Uzumaki fuinjutsu but I can show you some basics if that's what you want to use."
Sasuke frowned, "You're going to blow Neji up?" he asked dryly.
Naruto snorted, "Nah," he denied, "but fuinjutsu seems useful anyway. I already know how I'm gonna beat Neji."
Sasuke smirked, "Good, we can fight in the second round then." he said confidently, oddly eager to fight his own teammate.
"Can we focus on the fuin that a nukenin layered on the fuin containing the Yoko?" Kiba requested, his voice had a pleading tone with it. Naruto supposed he couldn't blame the boy for being terrified, the Kyuubi no Yoko was considered a sentient, hateful, natural disaster.
Jiraiya nodded, "Right, right." he agreed, "Take your jacket and anything under it off." he ordered the blonde Uzumaki bluntly.
Naruto frowned then looked at Kakashi who nodded, the boy grumbled but took off his jacket and removed his shirt in the hospital foyer, "Not even a scar?" Kiba asked incredulously, "Uzumaki thing or-?" he asked.
"Both." Naruto interrupted quickly.
"Okay, now mold some chakra with your eyes closed." Jiraiya said and the blonde closed his eyes as he made the ram sign, Kakashi subtly moved to block passerby views of what was happening, thankfully there was not much foot traffic and the nurses knew who Naruto was even if they didn't know him personally.
The genin, besides the blonde himself, all watched as the fuin appeared, it had the spiral in the center and eleven spokes, but none of them had the expertise to understand that but the Sannin, "Gogyo Fuin, good to see his fuinjutsu is as sloppy as ever." Jiraiya mused casually as he put his right hand behind himself and gathered chakra, "An odd numbered fuin like that over the even numbered Hakke no Fuin Shiki is going to wreak havoc with your chakra control." he mused.
"It is?" Naruto asked with a closed eyed frown, he had not even noticed much of a difference. Although he did find it a bit harder to perform ninjutsu lately, he decided he should probably pay attention to changes like that in future.
"Oh yeah, this should fix it." Jiraiya promised before slamming five flaming fingers of his own into the same spots Orochimaru had struck, "Gogyo Kaiin!" he declared as Naruto doubled over in pain.
The triumphant smile of the Sannin dropped as Naruto shuddered and when blood red chakra rose up Jiraiya's eyes widened in panic, but to the surprise of both himself and the other present jonin it quickly retreated into Naruto's shivering form.
"That hurt!" Naruto growled at the old man with the nose piercing with a glare that promised vengeance, strangely his pupils were back to normal.
"Try doing a ninjutsu, you'll find it easier now and you're welcome." Jiraiya retorted, deciding not to comment on how strange that flash of red chakra had been.
Naruto considered it, then he decided to make a pair of basic bunshin, to his surprise not only did it work, but they weren't static, he'd managed to get them to appear lifelike and he could even make them move, "Woah." he muttered.
"You picked the most basic bunshin? I heard you can do kage bunshin?" Jiraiya asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Kage bunshin is easy!" Naruto retorted enthusiastically, "I actually made regular bunshin work! You have no idea how big of a deal this is for me!" he laughed triumphantly.
"If you shinobi are going to train and make a ruckus, please leave." The nurse at the desk said sternly with a glare at Naruto, who sheepishly calmed down and dismissed his bunshin.
Sasuke nodded in agreement, silently urging Kakashi to get a move on with a look at the jonin. The Hatake sighed, "Sakura-chan, if you go to Hokage-sama and ask for the tutor I organized? He'll know what I mean and introduce you two." he requested a bit guiltily.
Sakura nodded, "Sure, take care of Sasuke-kun." she responded with a slightly demanding tone before the two left, then she went to go to the Hokage tower.
"Alright, come on Naruto, let's see what we can figure out for you this month." Jiraiya mused casually as he turned to leave, Naruto shrugged and waved to Karin, Kiba, and Hinata before he moved to follow.
Karin glanced at Kiba and Hinata, "So, you two want to hang out or something?" she offered, she didn't really know anyone and while Kiba was a bit rude he seemed to get along with Naruto.
Kiba shook his head, "Nah, you two girls have fun." he said before turning and leaving.
Jiraiya lead Naruto to a training ground at the edge of Konoha, towards the wall and near some waterfalls not too far from the hot springs or the monument. As soon as he decided they were in a good spot he turned on the blonde genin with a stern expression and his arms crossed, "Alright, how much have you used the Kyuubi's chakra?" he asked seriously.
"I have no idea." Naruto answered honestly.
Jiraiya raised an eyebrow and cocked his head to the side, "You don't even know?" he asked, "Have you felt it before?" he asked.
Naruto frowned and closed his eyes as he tried to think, "I guess the kitsune must be making my Uzumaki healing work better." he stalled for time as he tried to figure out what the difference would be between feeling the Kyuubi's chakra and his own inhuman abilities from the old blood.
"Kid," Jiraiya began seriously, "almost as soon as I took the fuin that Orochimaru put there off you used his chakra." he explained and the boy widened his eyes at the news, "Also your pupils stopped being slit." he added, he didn't want to say that wasn't supposed to happen but he could tell from the way the blonde flinched that the genin knew.
"Orochimaru must have screwed up or something." Naruto grumbled the excuse.
Jiraiya knew it wasn't true, he was an expert in the field of fuinjutsu and the slit pupils had been weird, weirder was Naruto drawing on enough of the kitsune's chakra to see visibly before returning to normal. He knew it wasn't Orochimaru's work or a side effect of an odd numbered fuin layering an even numbered fuin, something strange had happened.
"Well, whatever the case," Jiraiya set the issue aside for now, he got the sense that the boy himself didn't fully understand either, "you think you have a way to take out Neji after seeing him fight once and a single night to sleep on it?" he asked.
Naruto nodded, "Taiju Kage Bunshin." he answered bluntly.
Jiraiya blinked at the casual mention of using kinjutsu, "That's..." he cut himself off and hummed as he considered it, "Actually, that's crazy enough to work." he mused, "How many can you use?" he asked.
Naruto had no idea so he shrugged and made the hand sign, "I dunno, you took that dumb fuin off me so let's find out y'know." he said before molding his chakra, the entire area became a cloud of smoke.
Jiraiya was blinded for a moment but when the smoke cleared his eyes widened, the actual number was hard to tell, but it was easily in the thousands, "Oh and they're all physical." he muttered.
The bunshin popped and Naruto staggered, "Oh right, careful with the kinjutsu." he grumbled as he clutched his head, Jiraiya was pretty sure almost anyone in the world would be dead attempting to make half that many kage bunshin.
"So, you're going to overwhelm him with sheer numbers?" Jiraiya asked.
"Nah," Naruto denied, "that's just to show how many bolas I'm going to through at him." he explained.
"Why not just use Kage Shuriken no Jutsu?" Jiraiya asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Nani no Jutsu?" Naruto asked with a raised eyebrow.
"How did you-?" Jiraiya began before he shook his head, "Nevermind, it's the same hand seal but focused on your thrown weapon, you need some of your chakra in the weapon too so it's technically harder." he explained.
Naruto's grin stretched across his face, "Oh I am going to destroy Neji!" he bragged before he threw his head back and laughed a little too maniacally.
"Didn't you want to learn kibaku fuda?" Jiraiya asked.
"Oh right," Naruto said, "teach me." he demanded with an eager grin.
Jiraiya rolled his eyes, "How about some respect, I'm a Sennin too for your information."
Naruto frowned, "Please teach me, Ero-Sennin?" he requested.
Jiraiya's eye twitched, "Good enough." he grumbled, "The first thing to understand is that it requires a very fine control of your flow of chakra into the ink, so honestly it's concerning you were amazed to perform bunshin." he explained, "So to start with, have you ever walked on water?"
"No." Naruto answered immediately, "How do I do that anyway? I saw Zabuza and Kakashi-sensei doing it too."
Jiraiya paused, "Zabuza Momochi?" he asked and the blonde nodded, the Sennin was baffled the boy had seen something like that already, "Wow, well, anyway that's what I'm teaching you, it's similar to tree walking." he explained.
"Why is every chakra control exercise but the leaf one useful?"
"It's training wheels for tree walking." Jiraiya answered dismissively, "Although doing it on top of other training is still good for focus." he added before continuing, "So, with water walking you want a more constant flow." he explained.
Naruto looking at a nearby source of water and made the ram sign until his feet glowed yellow, then he leaped onto the surface of the river and sank in up to his ankles. Technically it worked slightly, however he lost balance as he hadn't expected to sink, plus the amount of chakra and the running water threw him off balance to send the blonde under the surface.
The young genin came up a moment later with a glower, he could stand on the riverbed with the water up to his shoulders, although the running water pulled at him a bit as pulled himself back up on to land a bit downstream of where he started.
It had taken Naruto all day to finally manage to stand on the surface of the running water, judging from Jiraiya's expression when he finally succeeded that had been impressive. Of course the blonde had then attempted a handstand and dunked himself head first into the water, but he'd lasted a second before the dunking.
When Naruto returned home he found Karin and Hinata, the redhead nudged the pale eyed girl and the blonde boy tensed with alarm. He worried Karin had convinced the Hyuga to give a confession, a confession the boy was not sure how to respond to, he didn't want to lead the girl on or accidentally hurt her.
"Naruto-kun," Hinata began shyly, clearly having trouble finding her nerve, "I'm not sure how long your jacket will take," she said and Karin gave the other kunoichi a stern look, "but I wanted to thank you."
"Thank me?" Naruto asked incredulously.
"Y-you never gave up, and you endured a lot." Hinata said without looking up, "I saw, probably not everything, but what I saw was, well, I mean, it was worth looking up to." she continued, "I know it didn't turn out great, but well, you, um, inspired me." she confessed, both genin red faced, "So I would like to be your friend!" she requested with a bow.
Naruto felt all the tension leave his body, friend was good, he could do friends, "Friends sounds nice." he said happily.
Hinata nodded, still red faced, and retreated from the scene.
"So what'd you say to her?" Naruto asked once the Hyuga was gone.
"We had some girl talk," Karin answered vaguely with a shrug, "figured out she more admired you than anything, if she has a crush on anything it's an idea of you she might have in her mind, but I'm not a head doctor." she explained flippantly, "I got your back, Aniki." she finished with a smug smirk.
Naruto returned the smirk with a genuinely grateful smile, "I appreciate it, Imouto." he retorted.
"You are shorter than me!" Karin snapped, "Come on, I'm being so supportive, I deserve to be Oneesama!" she demanded hotly.
Naruto rolled his eyes, "Oneetan." he teased.
Karin flushed, "That's not a real word!" she insisted angrily.
"Fine," Naruto huffed before he smirked, "Karin-kaachan."
"No!"
Naruto decided he liked Karin and Hinata, they helped him feel a little normal. Family and friend, he supposed his team were supposed to be friends too but Karin was different. Karin was Uzumaki too, she even helped cover what she thought was stolen kinjutsu.
The blonde Uzumaki felt bad for lying, but he had no idea how to explain what was going on with the old blood. He didn't fully understand it himself, even reading the journals had given him differing ideas. Few of which were negative granted, but he still couldn't actually make sense of what he was.
Naruto did not even know if he counted as a human anymore, he bled and felt pain, but he couldn't die. Normal people could die, Shinigami took anyone who died. Maybe the blonde would die someday, but as long as he could dream he would not die even if he was killed.
Even Naruto knew that was weird, he had not needed to have his intelligence or wisdom enhanced by magical blood to know that resurrection was not natural. Given what he had seen, experienced, and learned, the boy could not help but feel like a predator clothed as prey when he tried to act normal.
Naruto's thoughts were set aside as he entered the dream, not intentionally but because his attention was caught by the shisha, the little things had a box for him apparently. A long box, rectangular. Naruto opened it, no one but him and the doll inhabited the dream apparently.
Inside the box was a wide brimmed hat on top of some folded clothes, he realized they were similar to what the old man who had given him the old blood in the first place wore. Although thankfully they looked cleaner, and a bit darker in shade as far as the blonde could tell.
Naruto frowned since he liked orange, but he had to admit enclosed boots and a long coat did seem appealing for the depths where his mobility was already restricted. However Naruto did not exactly feel comfortable changing his clothes in the dream, the doll was right there watching. He supposed he could use the shack, and mercifully the doll did not comment on the blonde boy taking some privacy to try on his new outfit.
The outfit itself consisted of a bit more clothing than Naruto was used to wearing, some of it leather and it was even reinforced with metal as far as he could tell. The pants and boots were a simple enough affair, but there were were two shirts with the coat, and even Naruto could tell it was a three layer affair.
Eventually Naruto was fully dressed, the white shirt was entirely covered and despite being mostly leather on the outside it was surprisingly comfortable, with some kind of red fabric as the inner lining of his coat. The coat itself had a built in mantle that was a darker shade and stiffer material than the rest of it, the blonde guessed it was armor.
The hat was the hardest to Naruto, sure it kept his hair out of his eyes but so did his hitai-ate and his hitai-ate did not obscure his peripheral vision. Eventually he got the hat to sit in a way that didn't bother him after fiddling with the brim.
One of the belts was obvious and helped keep the pants up, but the smaller belt and the larger belt left Naruto confused as to their purpose. He strapped his weapon holster to the first belt on his right hip and his tool pouch on the back of his left hip, then took the other belts out to the doll with him.
"Hey, what's this belt for?" Naruto asked curiously, holding up the smaller belt.
"Some ryoshi came to believe that bad blood creeps up the left leg," The doll answered simply, "so they would bind that leg with a small belt. Just in case." she answered.
Naruto decided to strap the belt to his left leg, just in case, and strapped his shuriken holster to the belt. Which only left the third and bigger belt, "What about this one?" he asked.
"That is a bandolier." The doll answered, "It goes over your torso and can carry small tools like blood vials." she explained. Naruto looked at the belt and saw it did have small built in holsters, so he put it over his head like a sash and let it hang over his new coat from right shoulder to left.
Naruto put a couple of blood vials in the bandolier to test out how it worked and was surprised at how well it held them in place, even if he went into the shack to walk onto the ceiling they didn't drop out. The blonde ran a quick lap around the dream while jostling himself intentionally to get used to the new clothes and confirm the bandolier did indeed hold things firmly in place.
As Naruto stalked the depths that night he appreciated how surprisingly quiet the boots were, they also weren't as heavy as they looked. As he explored the area around where he met Maboroshi the blonde saw a light source moving and hid, the journals had said that those were almost always bad news.
The blonde genin hugged the wall and crept along to the corner before he peeked at the source, as soon as he did he jolted back as he met the eyes of a humanoid beast with fur and elongated limbs, even the neck of the creature was lengthened.
The thing swung a cleaving blade that Naruto had already avoided by jolting away from the corner but with a growl the humanoid thing came at him, the blonde readied his Nokogiribocho and waited for the next swing. As soon as his prey attacked the blonde genin lunged under the wild swing and tore open the right side of the humanoid monster with the saw toothed edge of his weapon, then he swung again in the back right leg of it to bring it low and swung a third time into its back and the thing dropped.
The haze of the Chi no Isshi flowed into Naruto as he sighed with relief, as far as he could tell the wide brimmed hat indeed had not gotten in the way so he would could it. Naruto picked up the torch before the flames could sputter out, as far as he could tell the yaju beneath Konoha did not like fire so it was a good tool to have sometimes.
The fact that monsters living under Hi no Kuni feared fire was not lost on Naruto, he wondered if the name of the place and the development of Katon no Jutsu had ever had anything to do with the monsters in the depths. However it seemed the old blood was not common knowledge, ninja had become ryoshi before him but they apparently left behind being a shinobi.
Naruto wanted to talk with Maboroshi about that, he had been a bit dumbfounded when they first met but he knew the woman could answer his questions and maybe even help him. Another thought occurred to the boy however, the thought that while ninja had become ryoshi before the number of those who had also been jinchuriki was likely in the single digits if it had ever happened before at all.
Immediately Naruto realized what meeting Maboroshi had suppressed and the path his mind was going down, he was lonely. The blonde had more friends than he'd ever had, a genin cell that were dysfunctional but still his, and even a family member. Despite all that he'd gained, the blonde genin knew why he felt so lonely.
"I'm one of a kind." Naruto muttered, normally those words would probably make someone feel confident and unique but the blonde boy didn't relish seeing fear in other people.
The blonde genin was pulled from his morose thoughts by the sound of a bell, he tensed at the sound as that was not the same ringing as his silver bell. After a moment he heard something coming his way, when it turned a corner his eyes widened.
It was like one of the desiccated husks, but more alive somehow. A red mist clung to it and as it turned to see Naruto it charged with a speed none of the desiccated husks before displayed, Naruto braced himself for a fight when he heard another ring of the same bell from the same direction.
The blonde genin recalled that the journals mentioned an iron bell that called nightmares, he holstered his Nokogiribocho, dropped the torch, and crossed his fingers in the bunshin seal, putting a wall of kage bunshin between himself and his prey.
Naruto figured it was as good a time as any to test out his latest strategy and each bunshin withdrew their pistols, took aim, and squeezed the triggers. With ten clicks nothing happened and two bunshin were dispelled by the charging nightmare thing, "It copies the gun that can draw out blood for ammo, but it can't copy the quicksilver bullets." he muttered dryly, "Alright boys, shuriken it to death!" he ordered the remaining eight as he leaped back to avoid a flurry of swings from the husk, which kept swinging even when he wasn't there despite not hitting anything.
The second husk was on its way as Naruto's kage bunshin peppered the first with shuriken, then Naruto heard another chime of that same damned bell. The blonde frowned, he was confident in his stamina but for all he knew that bell he was hearing could summon those things indefinitely.
Then he felt some Chi no Isshi go into him as the first husk disappeared into white mist, it had bled up until that point too. Naruto hummed as he considered that, so his bunshin kills counted for him, and on top of that nightmares had blood somehow.
Naruto made two more kage bunshin, "Charge in groups of four." he ordered the eight remaining of the first group he'd made, there was some disorganization as the plan had formed after they had but the group managed to split themselves before the next husk arrived and the third rounded a corner.
Naruto's confident smirk faltered when the second granted less Chi no Isshi, the third even less, and it faltered entirely when the fourth granted nothing. The blonde pouted and followed his charging bunshin to the source of the ringing, an old blind woman, tall and dressed in a dark yukata under a hooded mantle that was pulled up over greying hair.
The woman rang the bell again, and the red glow from the fifth husk was barely even there. Naruto jumped up and over the two as his bunshin destroyed the nightmare husk, he palmed a kunai in his left hand as he fell then plunged it down into the base of the old woman shaped monsters neck.
"Damned yaju." Naruto groused although he was more annoyed his attempts to harvest a bunch of Chi no Isshi had been thwarted before they began, he took the opportunity to check out how his outfit looked on his kage bunshin to distract himself.
They were all blood splattered, but Naruto had to admit the outfit did actually look pretty cool. It just took longer than he liked to put on, but it also seemed the blood dripped from it fairly easily without staining. He decided to keep the outfit specifically for hunting, showing the outfit to shinobi would raise questions he couldn't answer.
Naruto did decide he should probably get some shinobi armor to go with his regular clothes though, not that it would be much use against Neji or Gaara. Maybe that was why ninja didn't bother with armor as much anymore?
The next day Karin went shopping with Naruto, he'd forgotten to get his new weaponry in the excitement of a new sensei so he picked that up while he was out. He didn't see anything like the mantle or bandolier, and flak vests were outside of his price range besides being given to chunin as a graduation gift traditionally.
So Naruto just got the weapons, armor wouldn't help much against Neji or Gaara and wouldn't be needed much against anyone except Hanbei anyway. As he was deciding between kusarigama designs Tenten stepped up besides him, "Normal weapons?" she asked.
"They're useful." Naruto retorted before his eyes widened, "Oh, hi," he muttered, "uh, you okay?" he asked.
Tenten scoffed, "I'll live, not even crippled." she said the second part a bit more sadly.
Naruto recalled the injuries Lee had sustained, "For people we're supposed to have treaties with, those Suna genin are jerks." he grumbled and the kunoichi nodded. Then the blonde recalled she wanted to know if he had any other ideas for weapons, "Actually, I do have an idea for a weapon," he changed the subject, "not sure how quick I can make it or if it'll help against any of them but-"
"What's your idea?" Tenten interrupted eagerly and impatiently.
Naruto smiled at the enthusiasm, "Uh, well, it's a cane, but made of flexible blades and like a cord in the center to keep it all together." he explained.
Tenten blinked owlishly, "What?" she asked incredulously, "Flexible blades and you want it to be both flexible enough to be a whip but stiff enough to be a cane?" she clarified and the blonde nodded, "I have no idea how to do that." she confessed.
Naruto frowned and decided he should read more in the dream before bringing the cane, he'd need a solid explanation for how he got it working this time. It was also a bit trickier to use than his Nokogiribocho anyway.
"Anyway," Tenten began, "so I heard you're up against Neji in the first round?" she asked as Naruto picked out a kusarigama that had a kama on both ends of the chain, "I don't envy you, he's a taijutsu prodigy so you should avoid getting close to him." she warned.
"Can he do that Hachimon thing?" Naruto asked.
Tenten's eyes widened, "Well, no, only Lee can do that among Gai's genin I guess." she confessed.
"Then he's not as talented as Lee." Naruto decided with a shrug, "He might be good with Juken, and it might be scary, but if he can't output that level of speed then he can't beat me." he said confidently, "We're ninja, I'm not going to run up and start slap fighting with him, or just engage him in his chosen specialty, I'm going to use ninjutsu and whatever tools I need to humble that jerk."
It wasn't until he was done that it occured to Naruto that he was revealing a bit too much of his strategy to someone who was the teammate of his opponent, but Tenten seemed oddly pleased, "Yeah, kick that stick out of his ass for us would ya?" she asked.
Naruto snorted but nodded as he wondered if he could make his own transforming weapon with a kusarigama, or if one already existed. He finally decided on a more traditional design so he wasn't dual wielding sharp blades at all times, he wanted to be able to deal with normal humans non-lethally.
After finishing his purchases Naruto went to meet with Jiraiya again, this time the man had actual fuinjutsu supplies. The blonde couldn't help compare it to calligraphy, which he was bad at. He did his best to keep a steady hand as he copied the array for the kibaku fuda while keeping his chakra flow as small as he could manage into the brush.
Jiraiya watched silently from a slight distance, leaned back too as if that would help if something exploded. Thankfully nothing exploded on Naruto's first try, the Sennin was impressed, he'd expected the first attempt to blow up in their faces from what he'd heard.
The old man with the nose piercing checked over the work with a raised eyebrow, "Handwriting could use work, but you actually did it." he praised, "You made a kibaku fuda on your first try, so let's see how it functions." he ordered.
Naruto took the kibaku fuda across the river, came back, and focused his chakra with a tiger seal, "Katsu." he muttered and the area exploded.
Jiraiya knew well enough how kibaku fuda worked, first tries tended to have too little or too much chakra, "You made a fully functioning kibaku fuda on your first try." he muttered, the last time that had happened had been his last student, "Alright kid, try to make more of those exactly the same way, repitition is key here so keep going until you run out of paper! If you can finish before sunset I'll teach you Funyo no Jutsu."
Naruto got to work, unfortunately the motivation made him a bit too eager and his second attempt did blow up in his face. Jiraiya snorted, since at least it had been a small explosion that time. On the third attempt though Naruto managed to find a rhythm of sorts, he got better at the symbols, faster at drawing them and his body became more used to the correct flow of chakra.
To Jiraiya's surprise he actually did end up teaching Naruto Funyo no Jutsu before he went home that night. Once the boy was gone the Sennin sighed, "Damn, kid's a natural with fuinjutsu." he mused proudly.
Naruto already had blank scrolls at home, they'd originally been for taking notes in the academy but he never did that much anyway. He also found the scroll Danzo had given him and decided to see if he could reuse it, it turned out he could reuse it and his Nokogiribocho was stored safely away.
The blonde grinned, showing up without his weapon might end up being an intimidation tactic in itself. He put his new kusarigama in its own scroll, matched up the bolas in another, and the spare chains went in a third. Four scrolls was a lot for his tool pouch, he decided to buy some smaller scrolls later. Maybe some scrolls that fit in his bandolier, he wondered how he could get one of those for shinobi duty it seemed useful.
That night he studied in the dream and practiced his chakra control, he kind of wanted to try using the cane against Hanbei if the older genin beat Sakura, especially if he beat her too badly, but he could find no explanation among the books he had for how the cane worked. It was just a little too advanced for to pretend he'd made it.
The blunderbuss was a possibility, but he was definitely not taking that up to the surface, that would raise way too many questions. Kakashi probably assumed Naruto found and fixed up some old flintlock to kill Gato, and the blonde was not about to come forward and explain otherwise.
The blonde boy had his plan hammered out for the finals, mostly, a lot of the plan was 'and then wing it' but he had a rough outline of how he planned to deal with almost every opponent. Gaara was the biggest problem, if worse came to worse Naruto would try to use the Kyuubi, he had no idea how but he figured he worked well in desperate situations and under pressure.
Naruto decided that during the next month of training he would have a goal, the building sized bakemono with antlers and a wolf face smelled similar to Gaara. The same scent of fresh and rotted blood mixing together to create a sickly sweet scent, a scent that both repulsed and lured the blonde in equal measure.
If Naruto could kill a Daiju like that then he could kill Gaara.
Traditionally Daiju refers to giant serpents, otherwise called Orochi or Uwabami, however since those have two different and appropriate names and Daiju means 'great beast' it feels appropriate for the barely educated Naruto to just staple the term to anything particularly large he runs into.
Also yes, I have been describing the Cleric Beast, it's not quite the same from the games, as the lore is a little different, but it is functionally and aesthetically a Cleric Beast. That's not exactly a term that fits into Naruto or the lore I'm trying to build though, so the names of such boss fights will be changed or completely unknown as Naruto does not exactly have a HUD telling him the names and health status of his enemies.
