Greetings everyone! first of all, thank you to everyone who has read up to this point! it means a lot to me that you have managed to stick with me for a story that is hitting 37,000 words by now (it appears like it's more because of all the authors notes I keep putting in) in any case, enjoy the story and I shall see you at the bottom!

Part 7

"So what is the mission assignment?" came the gruff voice of a man wearing an ANBU mask with three other ANBU behind him.

"You are heading into the land of rice paddies . . . this assignment is a retrieval mission, the person in question is highly valuable to me . . . however, there are complications in the retrieval aspect" Explained Minori, leaning against the wall of an abandoned building in the middle of a forest outside of Konoha.

"Complications?" Asked a decidedly female ANBU member wearing a mask with a cat design.

"You need to retrieve the girl but you need to make it look like she has been kidnaped and you need to make sure that the kidnapping can't be traced to anything" Minori replied, her arms folded across her chest.

"What? How exactly do you want this done?" asked another ANBU.

"This girl has vital information . . . well, vital for me anyway . . . if my enemy learns that she has been taken, they will immediately start asking who took her" Minori explained. "If the answer is Konoha, or another source that can be traced back to me, any information the girl has will become irrelevant . . . I'd rather avoid that if I can" Minori kept her face expressionless as she explained this.

"So the best way to do this would be to make it look like someone hired missing-nin and then the deal went bad" Mused the lead ANBU.

"Preferably make it look like that it was an enemy of the girl's parents . . . her father has a few that would be in a position to do that . . . they of course can't survive and you will need to forge some documents stating that the person in question has hired missing-nin" Minori said and the team of ANBU in front of her nodded

"Excuse me for asking . . . but normally ANBU don't take missions for clients" Asked the female ANBU member.

"It's not unheard of . . . especially when the topic at hand could be of value to the village . . . and this is just the latest example of why Sarutobi needs better ANBU" Minori replied and the four other members of the ANBU squad gave disapproving looks to their female member.

"Anko! Mitarashi Anko!" Came the voice of Minori as she caught up with the woman in question.

"Who are you?" Anko challenged as she eyed Minori with suspicion

"Hmm? Oh Minori, Konoha's resident Fuinjutsu master . . . Jiraiya is a hack" Minori replied

"What do you want with me then?" Anko asked, still eyeing Minori with suspicion.

"Gee, what would a master of Fuinjutsu want with you?" Minori asked sarcastically "It probably has nothing to do with the hickey from hell right?" again, Minori piled the sarcasm on thick.

"Y-you know about that" suddenly Anko became very vulnerable "C-can you . . . do you know how to remove it?" Hope filled the girl's eyes and Minori gave her a warm smile.

"I want to find that out, I need a look at that seal though so . . . unless you want to do it here on the street" Minori said

"Umm . . . my house?" Anko asked almost timidly and received a nod from Minori

It only took the two a few minutes to reach Anko's house, once inside Minori had Anko sit on her knees with her shoulder, and the cursed seal by extension, exposed for Minori's inspection.

"Hmm, hmmmmm mmmhmmm" Minori hummed

"What? Can you tell what's going on? Can you remove it?" Anko was almost frantic with hope but Minori just burst out laughing. "What's so funny?" Anko frowned, almost growling, she was beginning to feel like this was a trap and that she was stupid for falling for it. Anko was already mapping out ways to get her hands on a weapon when Minori's voice came to her.

"If anyone ever tells you they can tell what a seal like this does just by looking at it, they are lying" Minori said, her amusement evident.

"B-but that's what both Jiraiya AND the Hokage did" Anko said, confusion now entering her voice. "Sure both of them said it was beyond them . . . but still, that's what they did"

"And that, my dear, is why I am the master and they, are not" Minori said with a grin as she fished a scroll out from nowhere. "The best Fuinjutsu users disguise their seals as something else. The seal keeping the Kyuubi inside Naruto is in the image of the Uzumaki swirl, the caged bird seal is in the shape of a . . . yep you guessed it, a caged bird" Minori explained as she opened the scroll and placed the paper over the top of Anko's seal. "The idea is to prevent someone from just seeing the seal and either deactivating it, or copying it. Of course, this in turn applies to curse seals . . . sometimes. Despite what people think, Curse seals are not automatically genius level seals" Minori said as she started channeling chakra through the paper and into the seal, activating a seal of her own and watching as lines of ink started to spread across the scroll's paper. "Curse seals are seals that are double edged . . . or specifically designed to do damage as well as their primary function. The Hyuuga curse seal for instance, is designed to destroy the eyes in the case of death but has the added effect of destroying the brain whenever certain people activate the seal" Minori finished channeling chakra into the paper, took the scroll off of Anko's shoulder and inspected the lines of text and the shapes they make. "This one is designed to give you a power boost, mess with your head and attempt to make you loyal to the owner of this seal . . . it doesn't really care what happens to the body after the fact so continued use of this seal would shorten your life by years . . ." Minori sighed and sat down opposite Anko, her hand resting on her chin as she thought about the issue

"C-can you remove it?" Anko asked, she didn't like how thoughtful Minori had become.

"Easily" Minori said without hesitation but she was still staring at Anko like she was trying to puzzle out what to do.

"T-then what's the problem?" Anko asked

"Do you want me to remove it?" Minori asked, taking her hand from her chin and leaning towards Anko, giving her a serious look

"HELL YES!" Anko shouted "Why would you even ask that! I want this fucking thing removed!"

"Well . . . I can do that . . . or . . . I can change it, make it into a completely different curse seal . . . turn it into something that would be totally unique to you" Minori said, picking up the scroll and giving it a cursory glance to check some detail written on it.

"W-what do you mean?" Asked Anko hesitantly

"I could remove all the bad stuff that our little pedo plugged into you . . . mind control, pain on command . . . that sorta stuff. And in it's place, I could perfect the power boost it gives, mess around with the transformation aspects . . . you would even have a margin of use before you start skimming years off the top . . . the problem is, my version would likely do damage to the chakra system after prolonged use . . . use it too much in one go and you would be giving up your life as a ninja . . . but you would be jumping from A ranked to S ranked . . . even if you would be better off only using it for a few minutes at best" Minori explained. "Imagine that epic fuck you the next time you meet mister wet noodle and suddenly you are on his level" Minori said, giving Anko a big grin and soon, Anko started returning that grin.

"What chances are there of things going wrong?" Anko asked giving the concept a good deal of thought

"It's a good chance . . . but if anything goes wrong I will simply stop the changing process and remove the seal altogether . . . one of the things that could happen is that you might even get a kekkei genkai out of it" Minori explained, already plotting out her seal.

"Wait . . . what?" Anko said "How would that happen?" she asked.

"Hmmm? Oh, actually most Kekkei Genkai were created as a result of Fuinjutsu . . . ever wondered why only the Shodaime could use the Mokuton despite a lot of clan Senju having earth and water elements? Yeah, he had a seal on him to help channel his chakra and mold it properly" Minori said absently as she continued studying the curse seal.

"Alright then . . . I'll do it, if it gives me one up on the fucking bastard . . . I'll do it!" Anko said, a feral grin spreading across her face. "How much time do you need to get ready?" she asked.

"It'll take me a few hours to draw up the seal . . . probably want to pick the place to get the seal down so I can get started . . . after that, the process will take an hour, maybe two so you might want to clear a whole day and possibly the next cause I'm sure it's gonna mess you up a little afterwards" Minori said and Anko nodded.

"Can we do it here?" she asked and Minori nodded

"I'll get to work then" Minori replied left to go get supplies.

"Yeah, gonna need you to strip . . . leave everything outside of the circle" Minori said to Anko who began dutifully taking her clothes off. "Just in case you were wondering, this is gonna need as much skin contact as possible . . . it's probably going to tingle . . . and not in the good way" that last comment got a chuckle from Anko as she finished slipping into her birthday suit and got into the circle. "Now kneel in the centre and I'm gonna draw on you" Anko obliged and Minori pulled out her ink and brush.

Half an hour later and Minori was done drawing the rest of the seal with lines of text running from the three tomoe mark on Anko's shoulder right down to the circle she was kneeling.

"This is the where it begins I suppose" Minori said as she got up, cut her hand on a knife that appeared in her other hand and walked around the circle, flicking blood onto various parts of the seal. Anko was getting slightly worried by this, especially as Minori seemed to be chanting something under her breath but Anko couldn't hear what.

"S-so . . . is this gonna hurt?" Anko asked as Minori came to a stop in front of her and got on her hands and knees, her hands inside the circle.

"Probably . . . try not to move, it could be problematic" Minori said with a blank expression and an emotionless voice. "Don't worry, I won't let anything bad happen to you" Minori said with some warm emotion that immediately made Anko feel better. Anko took a deep breath. "Ready?" asked Minori. Anko took another deep breath, and nodded. Minori poured her chakra into the sealing array and Anko felt the lines of text running along her body move upwards and into the seal, it felt like a red hot branding being shoved against her skin. She screwed her eyes shut and growled at the pain but other than that, she kept perfectly still as the seconds ticked by, one at an agonizing time. Just as Anko was reaching the end of her endurance, the pain wound down until she felt the process stop completely. Opening her eyes, she realised she had been crying at some point and that the seal was gone with nothing but Minori watching her.

"Is . . . Is it done?" Anko asked in a shaky voice.

"How do you feel?" was her only reply.

"I feel . . . light . . . f-free" Anko said, her voice choking up. "It . . . I . . . so clean . . . it's beautiful" Anko promptly passed out.

"So you had your cursed mark changed?" Sarutobi asked incredulously. Anko nodded, a grin plastered on her face. "May I see it?" The old man asked and Anko shrugged, walking over to him and presenting her shoulder. On her shoulder were two tomoe marks together with their tails facing downwards, making the general outline of a heart that had been split down the middle.

"Minori-sama calls it the Sundered Heart seal" Anko said softly.

"Minori-sama? I think this is the first time I've ever heard of you speak of anyone with such honorifics before" Sarutobi said with a light chuckle.

"T-there was one other" Anko said in a voice barely louder than a whisper. The implications however, were not lost to Sarutobi who immediately recognised where the girl's loyalties were now firmly entrenched.

"Can you be absolutely certain there are no control aspects of this new seal?" Sarutobi asked

"WHAT?! Are you accusing Minori-sama of controlling me!?" Anko shouted, causing Sarutobi to grimace at the loud noise, Anko could be extraordinarily loud when she wanted to be.

"Not what I meant girl" Sarutobi said with a sigh. Anko calmed right down after that. "I meant, are you certain all of Orochimaru's machinations have been dealt with?" Sarutobi asked.

"Oh. . . umm hehehe yeah, they were taken care of, I can even feel the difference" Anko said sheepishly, one hand rubbing the back of her head and a sheepish grin plastered on her face. Sarutobi sighed, the girl was adorable sometimes . . . like a puppy . . . very much like Naruto used to be.

"Good, now that we have a way of dealing with the curse seal I feel a lot better about this whole mess" Sarutobi said "what precisely does this new seal do though?" asked the aging Hokage

"It's a power boost . . . umm, it also has a few extra features . . . hard to explain really . . . but yeah. Minori-sama said that it would boost me from A rank to S rank for a few minutes . . . after that, I risk burning out my chakra network" Anko said, shrugging as she finished. "Personally, if I ever use it, It will probably mean I ain't coming back alive anyway"

"In any case, it's good that you are finally rid of that curse" Sarutobi said, even as he wondered if the same techniques could be applied to remove the caged bird seal. "Well then, if that is all, it's good that the last vestment of that traitor is finally gone" Sarutobi said and Anko got the dismissal in his words and left. "If I didn't know any better . . . I'd say you might be building up for a coup" Sarutobi said to thin air after the door to his office clicked shut. Minori appeared out of nowhere and gave Sarutobi a grin.

"Thankfully you do know better" the woman said, her arms folded as she regarded Sarutobi.

"Is there any particular reason you refuse to use my title?" asked Sarutobi as he examined a document that needed work.

"You don't deserve it" was the simple reply and Hiruzen's eyes snapped open in surprise. "I will always respect your power, your skill, your accomplishments . . . but you should have stayed retired . . . if there was a better option, I know you would have taken it but still, the Sandaime has retired" Minori said sighing as she walked over to the window. The sun had already set and darkness covered Konoha like a blanket yet, even with the night time, the city was still bright with lights shining in almost every window save for one area of the city sized village. "Where was the Hokage when they needed help" Minori said, indicating the darkened patch of Konoha. "And what on Kami's world were you thinking when you offered a visibly insane fourteen year old the position of Hokage?" Minori turned back to face Sarutobi, her eyes holding her expectation of his answer.

"You were skilled . . . Intelligent . . . I don't know" Sarutobi said sighing as well "I'm tired Minori . . . so tired" A tear gathered in the corner of the old man's eye and fell. "I've seen so much war and death . . . all of the shinobi wars I have lived through. I've sent so many people to their deaths, made so many decisions . . . Minato was my best hope . . . you saw how that ended" Minori turned back to the window.

"My agents in the land of rice paddies . . . haven't reported in a while . . . I hired those ANBU to find a girl . . . she managed to get a message to me. It was brief, nothing in it other than that it managed to convey that she knew what was going on" Minori said softly. Sarutobi nodded as he got to work on another document. "Can you hear them?" Minori asked

"Hear what?" Sarutobi replied, turning his attention to the woman.

"Drums . . . drums on the horizon" minori said cryptically. "The drums of war" Sarutobi took in a deep breath.

"It's going to hit us isn't it? There is nothing I can do to stop it . . . I'm not sure I can handle another war Minori-chan" Sarutobi said "Perhaps it's time you took the hat" Minori whirled around at break neck pace.

"You know why I can't do that!" Minori exclaimed looking back at the old man

"You can . . . you are practically running this village already! Stop acting childish girl!" Sarutobi said, raising his voice.

"We . . . we need to present a strong front . . ." Minori said, looking away from Sarutobi "We can't afford a change in leadership right now . . . we are hosting the next exams after all . . . when that is over . . . then maybe we can talk" Sarutobi regarded the woman carefully before returning to his paperwork, it was likely he would be here all night at this rate, he was really regretting spending the day watching the students that had graduated. "Go home Hiruzen" came Minori's voice as she watched the old man with a faint smile. "I'll do the work for you"

"You know I can't do that . . ." Sarutobi said

"Yes you can, you're the Hokage, anyone gives you grief . . . put em in their place" Minori replied with a grin

"Troublesome woman . . . I should change my name to Nara at this rate" Sarutobi said with a faint smile of his own. "Very well, but I will be leaving ANBU here . . . don't getting any funny ideas" he said, putting down the sheet of paper and raising from his seat. Putting his hat on, Sarutobi turned and walked towards the door. "Don't stay up too late Minori" He said over his shoulder before leaving. Minori took his seat, pulled out a pen, picked up a document and began working.

"Wait . . . what the? How?" Minori said as she studied the piece of paper in front of her. Minori's face darkened into a scowl "A reckoning will come" she said ominously. She was quite very aware that Hiruzen had left that piece of paper for her to find on purpose, perhaps as a demonstration of exactly just how bad things had been getting. Putting the paper aside, Minori schooled her features and began the task of doing all of the old kage's paperwork but this time she carefully inspected each document, putting one aside every so often.

"So . . . pretty little city you have here . . . Nee-chan" said a girl around the age of twelve as she and Minori sat in Minori's living room.

"It's rather homely isn't it?" Minori replied, sipping a cup of tea. "So . . . I'm fairly certain we have never met" Minori said in a conversational tone, despite the barely hidden meaning.

"I . . . yes, we have never met" the girl said looking away, she had brown hair that was worn down with two pig-tails hanging off the side of her head, just behind the ears while the rest of her hair fell to her shoulders. "My name is Kusawashima Yuriko . . . daughter of the Daimyo of the land of Rice Paddies . . . I . . . my father is dead . . . he met an unfortunate accident coincidentally after he refused the Otokage's request to be allowed to levy civilians into some form of army . . . My uncle was less . . . confrontational" the girl said as she stared into her own cup of tea. Three Samurai were also in the living room, intently watching Minori

"And these fine gentlemen here? I hope they are very aware that I could kill all three of them simultaneously before this cup of tea hit the table" Minori said, adding the last part for their benefit incase they got funny ideas.

"Them? Oh, I hired them to aid in my escape . . . had I known you'd sent Ninja, I probably wouldn't have wasted good funds but still, quality retainers are always worth their prices and they have proved they are of the best quality" Yuriko said, picking up her cup of tea and taking a sip.

"Nakamoto Kenji, Shiruyama Hiro, Akasuchi Motsuma" Came the deep voice of the middle samurai. All three of them wore simple Kimono suits with the middle one, Kenji, wearing a lime green Kimono suit, his left man, Hiro, wearing a dark blue Kimono suit and Motsuma on the right of him, wore a tan suit. Minori nodded at them.

"You said the Otokage was levying the masses?" Asked Minori as she regarded the girl.

"Yes . . . the ninja from Otogakure have been teaching them how to use weapons and chakra . . . either comply or their families die" Yuriko replied Minori took in a deep breath as she thought things through

"That's a problem . . ." Minori said simply "That's a big problem" Minori pulled out a piece of paper from nowhere and began writing down a message on it. "I have to go get this message sent off . . . feel free to stay here, there is a guest bedroom, one other person lives here, a boy your age, probably be home soon . . . I will find you better accommodations as soon as I am able" Minori said as she got up and walked towards the door. "You have plenty of protection for now" she said as she gave the samurai a glance before leaving.

"Not much to go on Hime-sama" Kenji said as he eyed up the door Minori had just left through.

"She is famed for her bingo book entry" replied Yuriko, tossing Kenji a copy of the book in question, already marked with the page in question.

"This can't be right!" Kenji exclaimed

"We shall see" was the girl's reply as she continued sipping her tea. "This at least, proves to be entertaining" she said just as the door opened again and Naruto walked in. he blinked, she blinked, Kenji blinked.

"Um hi" the boy said awkwardly.

"Damn he's cute" thought Yuriko

"Hi . . . I'm Yuriko . . . I'm only here until I've found a new place to live . . . please be good to me!" Yuriko said, finishing the traditional greeting with a short bow.

"Uhh Naruto . . . Hinata's gonna kill me" the boy said in reply.

"A rival! Could she be his girlfriend already? I must have more information!" Yuriko thought again while Kenji looked on with amusement twinkling in his eyes.

well, that's done . . . firstly, allow me to apologize for my slow updates . . . I need at least 4 to 5 hours available to write a chapter and I usually prefer those 4 to 5 hours to be not in the morning . . . i do better work when i'm not struggling to keep my eyes open.

I can't help but think that the quality of my work is dropping off as I go on . . . but for now at least, the plot is moving, will that random girl i just threw in be of any value in the coming story? is she there for plot? or for justice? will i finally get Naruto laid? should i? which of the two (now three) girls would you recommend as a shipping choice for our hero that has received mysteriously little screen time . . . yeah . . . i should really write more from Naruto's perspective shouldn't i?

in any case, tell me what you liked, disliked, what you would like to see more of and what you thought could use improvement.

Take care.