The Heart of the Demon

Chapter 7

The Demon's New Jutsu

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of its characters

Authors note: Thank you to for pointing out there is in fact a suicide shadow clone jutsu, I had no idea but it's totally awesome.

Team seven led by Tazuna arrived at his house less than an hour later to Kakashi's relief, this had been a long day but at least they could rest some now. Tazuna led them through the house into the living room "it's not much to look at but it's home"

A second later a women walked through one of the doors "thank god you're all right, we were worried sick about you" the women hugged Tazuna before bowing to their guests.

Tazuna introduced the women "This is Tsunami, my daughter" he then gestured to the leaf ninja "and these are the ninja from Konaha that are going to insure we can finish the bridge" he motioned for them to introduce themselves

"I am Kakashi Hatake, leader of our team, jonin of Konaha"

Sakura was next "I'm Sakura Haruno"

"I'm Sasuke Uchiha"

"and I'm Naruto Uzumaki" Naruto was still a little down from having her kill taken from her so her introduction was a little lack luster from what it usually was.

"It's wonderful to meet you all, thank you for protecting my father; I don't know what we would do if we lost him." Soon after there was a screech from the door Tsunami had come from and she jumped and rushed back though the door call over her shoulder "dinner will be ready in a few minutes."

Tazuna led team seven to where they would stay "here you go" he motioned to the room as he opened the door "I'll let you set up" Tazuna said as he walked back down the stairs to the dining room. Naruto took the far back corner of the room and Sasuke set up close to her, maybe a little too close. Sakura took the corner of the room on the other side of Sasuke and Kakashi took the corner across from Naruto.

"Dinner is ready" they heard Tsunami call from down stairs and headed down to eat, Kakashi was happy to be able to rest and recharge, that fight was pretty chakra intensive and frankly he was surprised Naruto didn't seem more tired even with her enormous chakra reserves. They sat down for dinner Kakashi sitting at one side of the table with Tazuna sitting at the head and Tsunami at the foot of the table, Naruto sat across from Kakashi and Sasuke of course sat next to her leaving Sakura to sit next to Kakashi. Not long after the food was bought out Tsunami called upstairs again "Inari dinner is ready, come get some food" and a few seconds later a sulking boy slumped down the stairs and took a seat next to Sakura.

They started dinner and some light conversation started up "So how was the trip from Konaha?" Tsunami asked

Sakura spoke up first "we were attacked, twice" Tazuna shot Sakura a look as Tsunami looked to him "you were attacked?! Are you okay?"

"yes we're all fine, the ninja here were more than capable of defending against the attacker."

Sasuke interjected "we're all fine? Naruto got stabbed! By a cleaver bigger than her and you say we're fine."

"come on Sasuke do I look hurt? I'm fine so stop going on about that" Naruto was still annoyed by the whole thing and here he was making a big deal about her getting stabbed.

"You were stabbed Naruto! You could have been killed!"

"but I wasn't and if you haven't noticed it didn't even slow me down so let it go!"

Kakashi sighed and shook his head "yes we're all fine, Naruto is a very fast healer." Sasuke gave Kakashi a quick glare but let the subject go and the conversation died a bit after that.

A little later Kakashi decided to see if he could cheer up Naruto who was still clearly upset about the day's events "So Naruto I noticed you used a clone covered in paper bombs against Zabuza, it was a clever move"

Naruto gave a small smile "thanks"

Kakashi nodded "did you know there is actually a jutsu for an exploding shadow clone?"

That got Naruto to perk right up "really?! Awesome! Can you teach me, please please please!" Naruto was now jumping up and down in her seat

"I wouldn't have brought it up if wasn't willing to teach it to you."

Naruto jumped out of her seat "great let's go!"

Kakashi sweat dropped at that "tomorrow Naruto, it's late and I'm still eating"

Naruto slumped a bit but nodded "alright."

After dinner team seven went upstairs to get some sleep. Naruto was excited for tomorrow, learning new jutsu was always fun and this one sounded awesome! She got ready for bed and took her corner eager for the next day. Sasuke took his spot next to Naruto "why are you so close? Everybody else took the corners" Naruto asked slightly annoyed he had chosen to sleep two feet away

"after what happened today I'm not letting out of my sight, I have to protect you"

while some might like the sentiment it pissed Naruto off "what the hell does that mean?! You think I can't protect myself?!"

"Obviously not! You got yourself stabbed!"

Naruto was angrier than she had ever been at Sasuke in this moment "It was a battle Sasuke, shit happens! And if I can't protect myself how are you supposed to protect me? We all know I'm stronger."

Kakashi came into the room after he heard all the yelling "Stop it! You're ninja, act like it! Stop fighting and get some sleep."

Naruto glared at Sasuke until he finally picked up his stuff and moved to the remaining corner of the room. Kakashi laid in bed thinking to himself 'they're almost more trouble than they're worth, they're probably the strongest genin in Konaha but this was ridicules it was so easy to set one of them off.'

The next day at breakfast you could feel the tension in the air. Sasuke, despite Naruto's many objections, wouldn't leave her side insisting she not be out of his sight for more than a moment; their constant bickering had everyone at the table uncomfortable.

Kakashi decided to give the rest of the table a break from his students fighting "Naruto come on let's go"

Naruto stopped mid argument with Sasuke "Yes! New jutsu!" she called as she jumped out of her seat and shot out the door with Sasuke close behind.

Kakashi sighed and bowed to Tazuna and Tsunami "please excuse their behavior. They have an, odd dynamic" with that Kakashi left with Sakura in tow.

Kakashi led his team to a small clearing not far from the house "All right first things first" Kakashi said as he looked at his students "this jutsu is an advanced form of an already advanced jutsu, it requires outstanding chakra control and complete mastery of the basic shadow clone jutsu." That didn't make any of them feel confident Sakura had great chakra control but she didn't use shadow clones and this jutsu didn't really fit her style, Sasuke knew the shadow clone jutsu and had good chakra control but it wasn't outstanding, and his mastery over shadow clones was nowhere near Naruto's. Naruto herself was confident she had the mastery needed over shadow clones but she had some trouble with chakra control, she and Kurama had been working on it for a while but sheer amount of chakra she had along with it being volatile due to the tailed beast chakra had made chakra control difficult for her. "Now that that has been said, this jutsu defiantly fits Naruto more than either of you" he gestured to Sasuke and Sakura "so if you want, you can try to learn it along with Naruto, or I could work on other things with you two."

Sakura nodded "yeah I don't think this jutsu really fits with my style, learning something else would be nice"

Sasuke looked at Naruto for a few seconds before responding "as much fun as it sounds, I think I would rather work on some elemental jutsu."

Kakashi nodded he had expected as much "alright, I'll show Naruto what to do and meet you two over by the water" he pointed to his left. Sasuke followed Sakura to water albeit reluctantly as he didn't want to leave Naruto's side.

After they had gone Naruto sighed in relief "thank god, Sasuke has been annoying lately"

Kakashi chuckled at that "yes he has been quite protective of you since the fight"

Naruto shot him an annoyed glance "let's get on to the training"

Kakashi shrugged and put his hands up defensively "alright." Kakashi went through the hand seals and created a suicide shadow clone "it works just like a normal shadow clone in the sense that it is a solid clone of yourself capable of anything a normal shadow clone would be, the difference is you have to build up the chakra to the point where it can explode while maintaining the form. The real trick to making this jutsu effective is being able to build up the chakra and still being able to keep it feeling and looking like a normal shadow clone, if you build up to much the clone could go off without warning or your opponent might even be able to sense that it is not a normal shadow clone and avoid it. If you don't put enough chakra into it then the clone won't be able to explode and will instead just be a regular shadow clone that cost more chakra." Kakashi then had the clone detonate in a large explosion leaving a crater in the ground.

"That is awesome!" Naruto shouted excitedly

"the size of the explosion and overall effectiveness of the jutsu depends on the amount of chakra you expend and your ability to conceal its differences from a regular shadow clone" Kakashi continued.

Naruto quickly went through the hand seals and pumped her chakra into the clone. What spawned from her attempt could only be called an abomination; it was bulging and literally pulsing with chakra. The deformed clone let out a loud groan and Kakashi grabbed Naruto and jumped away just before it went up in a massive explosion. Naruto looked wide eyed at the massive crater left by her clone "that was amazing" she said with a stunned smile

"maybe a little too much chakra Naruto, you nearly blew yourself up. Try more control over the chakra for now and put less into it." Kakashi was surprised by the size of the explosion he knew she had chakra to spare but the amount she put into that clone must have been enormous.

Sasuke shot back to the clearing "What the hell happened?! That explosion was huge!"

"it was my first attempt, and don't be so surprised it is supposed to explode after all" she said with a smirk.

Sasuke deadpanned and Kakashi gave let out a laugh "come on Sasuke, let's let Naruto practice, and Naruto be careful, don't go blowing yourself up, I wouldn't want to explain to the Hokage how you blew yourself up practicing a jutsu I taught you."

Naruto laughed "I'll do my best but no promise" she called to him as he walked away practically dragging Sasuke with him.

Kakashi and Sasuke arrived back at the water with the waiting Sakura not long later "Alright Sasuke you wanted to learn an elemental jutsu, did you have anything in mind?" Kakashi asked as they walked to Sakura.

"yeah I was wondering if you could teach me that jutsu Naruto used that hit yours and created the steam 'Dragon flame jutsu' I think it was"

Kakashi raised his one visible eyebrow "that's not an easy jutsu, Naruto is an extraordinary genin to be able to use it." Sasuke frowned a little at that before Kakashi continued "but, I think you're up for it" he said with a smile. Kakashi proceeded to show and explain the jutsu to Sasuke who began practicing aiming at the water to not burn anything, all the while there were periodic explosions coming from Naruto's direction.

Kakashi then went to Sakura "Okay Sakura it's your turn. Would you like to continue genjutsu? You've had quite the aptitude for it"

Sakura nodded "I would like that." Kakashi went over some basic genjutsu with Sakura while certainly not at the level of his other two students she was very bright and was quickly become very skilled in genjutsu he wouldn't be surprised if she could be one of the strongest genin in Konaha if she would stop obsessing over Sasuke, though he had noticed she didn't seem to be doing it as much.

Tazuna showed up not long later "hey, is one of you going to come guard me at the bridge?"

Kakashi looked at him "it's unlikely there will be any trouble with Zabuza out of the picture, so I'll send a clone with you today." He said as he created a shadow clone "the clone should be able to protect you, if anything happens the clone will contacted me and we'll be right there."

Tazuna nodded "alright, but you better be right about that I don't want to die because of this" he was clearly worried after what happened yesterday.

Kakashi was looking over his students practicing their respective jutsu. It had been about three hours and he noticed that Sasuke seemed to be having trouble with his jutsu which wasn't really surprising seeing as it was a hard jutsu to use and he was only a genin, but he decided to follow up on a suspicion he was having. Kakashi walked over to Sasuke "how is it going Sasuke? You look tired"

Sasuke grunted "I'm fine, I'll get it, I always do."

Kakashi nodded "have fire jutsu always been like this for you?"

Sasuke wasn't sure what he meant "yeah, they're hard at first but I always get the hang of them after a while"

"alright carry on then"

Team seven all migrated back to the house after a hard day of training, Tazuna was already back and Tsunami was working on dinner.

"That was good work out there you guys, I'm very happy with all of your progress" Kakashi said with a smile to his exhausted team who all groaned at him getting him to chuckle. They all took their seats to wait for dinner and Kakashi decided it was a good time to test his students elemental affinities, he had a feeling Sasuke didn't have a fire affinity. Kakashi took out some paper and made sure he had his students attention "I think it's time we find out what your elemental affinities are"

Sasuke scoffed "I already know mine, and Naruto knows hers as well"

Kakashi simply smiled "Humor me" After Sasuke's interruption Kakashi continued "these pieces of paper are made from special chakra infused trees and will show you what affinity you have, all you have to do is push a little bit of chakra into it" He held up one of the pieced of paper between two fingers and pushed some chakra into it which caused it to crumple. "The paper will crumple for a lightning affinity, burn for a fire affinity, become drenched in water for a water affinity, crumble to dirt for an earth affinity, and split in two for a wind affinity" Sakura was eager to find hers out being the only on the team who didn't already know their affinity "Sakura how about you go first" Kakashi said as he handed her one of the pieces of paper. She held the paper between her fingers like Kakashi had done and pushed her chakra through it and the paper instantly became drenched in water "A water affinity, not unexpected, I have plenty of water jutsu I can teach you" Kakashi said to an excited Sakura. "How about you next Sasuke?"

Sasuke shrugged "I don't see the point but I guess it won't hurt anything" Sasuke took the offered piece of paper and mimicked Kakashi's example, the paper crumpled and Sasuke had a dumbfounded expression on his face "As I expected, you don't have a fire affinity. With a lightning affinity I'll be able to teach you my personal jutsu" Sasuke nodded as he thought over what he had just learned. "Alright Naruto do you want to try?"

Naruto nodded "sure can't hurt" she took the paper and did the same as the others. The paper split down the middle and lit on fire at the same time and Kakashi couldn't hide the surprise from his face, he had never even heard of someone without a Kekkei Genkai having two dominant affinities. The genin didn't seem surprised by this as they all knew how skilled Naruto was with both types of jutsu and were unaware that it wasn't normal for someone to have two affinity types.

"Diner's ready" Tsunami called from the other room and Tazuna and her brought it out to the table shortly after. "I hope you like it" Tsunami said with a smile to their guests as she placed the food on the table and took her seat "Inari dinner" she called up the stairs and Inari slowly came down the stairs with his usual depressed attitude before taking a seat next to his mother. There was some idle chatter as dinner went on, Kakashi and Tazuna spoke about the bridge while Tsunami talked with Sakura and Naruto and Sasuke went about their usual bickering.

Dinner was halted by an outburst from the usually quite Inari "Why do you even try?! You're all gonna die anyway! You can't beat Gato."

It was quite for a second before Naruto let out a laugh "you think that little prick's gonna kill me? You got that one backwards."

Inari scoffed "yeah right, you should be afraid you have no idea what he can do, he'll kill you just like he killed dad you have no idea what it is like!"

Naruto glared at him before giving an evil grin "you have no idea what fear is kid, I'm not afraid of anything, because I'm scariest thing there is." Her eyes flashed red for a second and she put off enough killer intent to scare the shit out of him.

Inari fell to the ground and stared horrified at the girl "Naruto!" Kakashi yelled "what is wrong with you! You can't go sending killer intent at civilians! He's just a child!"

Naruto turned a glare to Kakashi "I was just teaching him a lesson, you heard how he was talking"

"that is no excuse Naruto for god sakes show some restraint!"

Naruto scowled at him before getting up and walking out of the house slamming the door behind her. Kakashi sighed "I apologize for her behavior" he said bowing to Tsunami before following Naruto.

Sakura scoffed after Kakashi left "What is wrong with her?"

Sasuke looked angrily at her "Nothing is wrong with her! You have no idea what she's been through so don't you dare talk about her like that" the outburst startled Sakura who stared wide eyed at Sasuke as he fumed at her before he too followed Naruto out the door.

"He really loves her doesn't he" Tazuna said after watching the scene play out, it was like a knife stabbing into Sakura's heart. He really did love Naruto even with how she acted and everything she did, how was she supposed to compete against her? Tsunami tried to console the clearly scared Inari but as soon as he regained his bearing he ran back up to his room.

Naruto stormed through the forest, damn Kakashi she didn't do anything wrong, that kid asked for it. Kakashi was always on her case, ever since team seven had been formed he'd been watching her like a hawk it was bull shit.

"Naruto stop!" Kakashi yelled to her as he caught up.

Naruto growled and looked at him with a hateful glare "what do you want? Can't I have one fucking minute to myself?!"

Kakashi gave her a sad look "Naruto I know you've been though a lot but you have to control yourself."

Naruto was filled with a burning rage "You don't know shit!"

Kakashi sighed before deciding what to say next "I know more than you think Naruto. Your father was a good friend and I promised to watch over you"

Naruto scoffed "Oh yes my father, the legendary fourth Hokage" Kakashi went wide eyed caught completely off guard "you think watching from the shadows counts as watching over me? Where the hell were you when I was kicked out of the orphanage or how when I was living on the streets eating out of the trash like some stray dog?! Or when I was cornered by a mob and stabbed fourteen times?! I was six, alone and hated and you watched from a distance never intervening, don't flatter yourself Kakashi, you never watched over me a day in your life! You're a hypocrite and a liar" as she screamed at him tears had started to flow down her face as she remembered her life before Kurama had saved her.

Kakashi stood dazed as she vented at him, and she was right, what kind of student, of friend was he to Minato to let his daughter go through all of that? He should have taken care of her, he should have protected her, and the fact that she somehow knew about everything only made it worse, he couldn't hide his shame.

Naruto stared at him for what felt like an eternity after she finished waiting for a response, but Kakashi just stood there wide eyed and speechless. She eventually shook her head and retreated further into the forest. Kakashi watched her go still too stunned to move when he heard Sasuke behind him

"is it true?" Kakashi looked over his shoulder at him "did those things really happen to her?" he paused for a moment "and did you really just sit back and watch?" Sasuke kept his face as impassive as he could but he could feel the rage bubbling over.

Kakashi just looked at him not sure what to say, he couldn't forgive himself how could he expect Sasuke to understand, especially since he was so irrational when it came to her. "yes, I didn't look after her and I know I should have, I was on a mission when she was attacked by the mob, but I could have been there for her and I wasn't" he said it quietly and the words were filled with the shame he felt.

Sasuke was overwhelmed, he had known Naruto had had a hard life but he didn't know the extent, she would never talk about it and he could hardly blame her now knowing what had happened. "You disgust me" Sasuke spat out scowling at Kakashi before going after Naruto.

Naruto found a tree and sat in one of the branches trying to stop crying 'damn that Kakashi I haven't cried in years' she thought as she tried to compose herself

"It's alright pup, I'm here, you'll never be alone again, and I won't let anything hurt you."

She smiled a little at that 'I know, thanks Kurama.'

A few seconds later Sasuke showed up "Naruto" he called as he landed next to her. She quickly wiped away her tears "Sasuke, what are you doing here?"

Sasuke looked at her with a small frown "I heard everything, why didn't you ever tell me about it? You know you can tell me anything."

Naruto froze at that she never wanted to expose herself so much to anyone much less Sasuke she didn't want him to see her so weak, what they had worked and she knew it was going to change now, there was no way Sasuke would be able to treat her the same after finding out about her past. "I… I didn't want you to see me weak, I didn't want you to ever know, I didn't want anybody to." She looked at the ground as she said it and the tears started flowing again. Sasuke saw her start crying, he had never seen her cry before it just wasn't something she did, seeing her like this wasn't right it made him angry, angry at himself for causing it, angry at her for doing it, but most of all angry at the people that had made her feel this in the first place. He didn't know what to do so he went with his instincts and wrapped his arms around her. Naruto was surprised by him hugging her but she didn't protest, she just let herself cry into his shoulder.