Disclaimer: Sometimes I wonder why I should write this disclaimer in the first place. It isn't like no one knows that the stories on this site are made by fans not the respective owners.

Author's Note: Ugh, I hate exam. 2 more exams and I'll be free! Unfortunately I'll go back to my parents' house in my old town for weeks. No computer, no internet connection, nothing. For the ones who asked me to update sooner…can't! I'm an architecture student, and I'm already struggling to pass my lessons here. Give me a break, please. There is this one lesson that I'm a bit worried that I won't be able to pass…pray to God above (if there is actually a God) that I can get a C mark. Please not a D mark or worse E! My mother will kill me in spot!

About writing the next chapters for my fics in a book or something in my holiday…I can't, guys. All of my data are in my computer (and you know I have many fics and data to maintain, especially Soragakure with the whole squadrons of OC characters), but I'll try anyway, though usually I am not in the mood of writing in holiday, except if I do it with my computer in my hand.

And about longer chapter…I'm not exactly a fast writer… Actually I can stare at the screen for hours and only producing 1 or 2 pages. I have never planned anything on my fic and mostly just write everything out of the blue. I guess that's the reason I'm a bit stuck sometimes.

Part Thirteen

Naruto almost reached the front door when he felt a presence behind him. He turned around to meet Kakashi's eyes.

"What?"

"There will be duel training after breakfast and I expect you to join," the older ninja told him. Naruto only shrugged and exited the house. Kakashi sighed, thinking about his difficult student and how to handle him.

Naruto stepped on the river, without his shirt or jacket. He slowly walked to the center where he closed his eyes and relaxed his stance. He concentrated on the nature around him, as the wind caressed his face. There were children in the riverbank, open mouthed, wondering what he would show them today.

Slowly but surely the water around him rose and made a water shield that surrounded him. He did it for 5 minutes before he opened his eyes. The water shield dispersed but it didn't drop back to the river, instead it coiled around his body like a snake. The water danced around him for a moment before it was separated into many parts. This time instead of a big water snake, there were water threads around him.

Naruto touched one of the threads. The water stiffened and the end formed something like a needle. The change followed by the other threads. Naruto moved. His kata was graceful. He moved like a fluid, just like the fox inside him instructed for years. The water around him followed his movements. It danced around his body, facing invisible targets. He hasn't perfected this move that he started to learn 3 years ago yet, but he planned to.

Naruto jumped high to the sky. The water strings around him followed, separating themselves from the river. To the children below, he seemed to hover in the air for a moment before the water around him exploded into many smaller parts and hardened and showered the river with thousands of water spikes. The river splashed as it was assaulted. The children laughed when the rippling water splashed them.

Naruto landed on the river surface with eyes closed. When he opened his eyes, he could see red liquid colored the river. Twenty dead fishes floated to the surface.

The children cheered loudly. Naruto grinned as he took the fishes and threw them to the children. "Thanks, Naruto-niisan," the blond nodded. He walked to the bank and took his dry shirt and jacket. "Eh? You are finished?" one of them asked, looking disappointed.

"Yes. I have to meet with others in the woods. Perhaps later, kids. See you!" he dashed.

"Wow, he's so cool!"

"Yeah, and he's only some years older than us!"

"I wish I am as strong as he," a 7 years old boy said wistfully.

His friends laughed. "Impossible. We don't have talents like he does," his older sister by one year told him.

"Who cares about that? For now, party time!" he showed them one of the fishes. The others agreed with him.

In the woods

"Kakashi-sensei, Uzumaki isn't here yet," Sakura told him. The jounin scratched his head.

"Huh? What do you mean he isn't here? He's there," Tenten pointed to the blonde boy in the tree confusedly. Were they blind or something?

"That's only a clone," the silver haired jounin informed her. The real Naruto won't just stay silent, observing us," Kakashi thought of how Naruto used to make traps around them or insulted the team members.

Neji activated his byakugan and frowned. "Impossible. He has chakra paths on his body. There is no way a clone can have that," he argued.

"That's because it's not a normal clone. It's kage bunshin, shadow clone. Unlike normal bunshin, it isn't an illusion but corporeal. It has the same power like the real caster and has chakra pathways," Sakura said. "And it needs much chakra to maintain," she muttered under he breath.

"WOW, Naruto-san is so great!" Lee shouted in awe to his teacher. Beside him, Gai nodded in agreement. It seemed that those two have reconciled, or perhaps Lee was just trying to forget Gai's indecent incident. There was also a possibility that he buried his memory about what Naruto said yesterday. All in all Naruto didn't care about their weird relationship.

Neji looked at one direction. "What is it, Neji?" his brown haired teammate asked.

"There is another Naruto running toward us, fast," he said without turning around. No more than 5 seconds later, Naruto jumped to the ground 2 meters in front of Neji.

"Well, since our last member has arrived, let's start. Sakura, you fight Tenten. Sasuke, you with Neji. And Naruto with Lee," Lee jumped and shouted in joy.

"Naruto-kun, let's do our best!" he gave him a thumbs up. Naruto only raised his eyebrow.

"Alright, anything goes. If your opponent gets knocked out, surrender, then you win. No killing," at this the former ANBU eyed Naruto who gave him an amused smirk. "Gai," he nodded to Gai.

Gai stepped forward, "The arena is surrounded by trees with red papers. No running outside the arena is allowed. We will observe your fight from afar. First fight will be the girls. Good luck," he flashed them his white teeth. Sakura entered the arena nervously. She darted a look toward the calm Tenten. The girls stood across each other, waiting for the signal. "Begin!" both girls took their weapons from the pouch. Sakura charged with her kunai, while Tenten stayed on her spot.

It was very easy that the match was a slaughter. Sakura didn't have many techniques except for simple bunshin, great chakra control or throwing kunai. The problem was Tenten was more experienced and she was a weapon master, plus Sakura's chakra control wasn't exactly what you could say big. The pink haired girl looked crestfallen and nearly in tears as she tended her wounds, obviously she was very disappointed to be defeated so easily by another kunoichi. She knew that she wouldn't be able to defeat Tenten without luck on her part, but she didn't know that her ninja techniques were this bad.

Tenten sighed at the appearance of the girl who was on the verge of crying. She knew what she was thinking about, afterall being a teammate of Neji The Gloomy Hyuuga, was tough. She has never beaten him and felt useless the first time around especially with his sharp and loose tongue her confidence was being assaulted. She walked and sat beside her. She started to talk.

Neji and Sasuke stepped forward, neither boy paid attention to their female teammate. Kakashi and Gai were wondering how the battle between 2 prominent clans (one of the clans, the Uchiha, was a bit indisposed, but oh well) would end. They knew that under normal circumstance it would be Neji who would win the match, but you couldn't say that because ninja with a trick on his sleeve could turn up the odds.

Naruto yawned, not really interested with what was going on. Nearby Lee was cheering for both of them. The 2 combatants appraised each other carefully.

"Begin!"

Sasuke threw kunais toward Neji who still stood on his spot. The Hyuuga activated his byakugan and performed kaiten to deflect them. Sasuke's eyes narrowed seeing Neji's kind of defense. The whirlwind dissipated revealing Neji.

'Hm…he's depending too much on his bloodline…and don't he feel dizzy after he rotated too much like that?' Naruto watched the fight from the corner of his eyes, as he leaned on a tree.

"KATON, GOUKAKYUU NO JUTSU!" Sasuke breathed thousand of flame balls and directed them toward Neji, who jumped around to dodge them. Sasuke dashed behind Neji and threw his shurikens. Neji turned his body to see the upcoming weapons. He deflected most of them, but 2 shurikens managed to cut his sleeve and pierced his arm. Sasuke smirked, knowing that he was the first to draw blood from his opponent.

Neji narrowed his eyes. He took the jyuuken stance. "You're within the range of my divination. Prepare yourselves." Neji appeared before Sasuke's widened eyes. He had closed 32 tenketsus when Sasuke opened his eyes to reveal sharingan. The Hyuuga branch member flipped backward in shock.

Sasuke coughed blood. Some parts of his body where Neji stroke felt burning. He was lucky that Neji was shocked to see his sharingan and retreated before he closed all of his tenketsus.

"So you can activate your sharingan," Neji stated to the now shocked Uchiha.

He had activated his bloodline limit? Sasuke's right hand touched his eyes and put it down again. If he had sharingan with him, he could turn up the odds even with his body wounded and his ability to use chakra was severely limited. He had known that some of his body parts were now completely devoid of chakra. The chakra control training Kakashi had given his team made him sure to know that fact.

To activate his bloodline in this duel match, this match wasn't a waste.

Sakura almost jumped to cheer her former crush when she saw the red eyes, when she remembered that she had given up on him. Now it was kind of reflex to do that. Lee cheered on both genins, but they didn't seem to hear it. Kakashi and Gai watched the match in interest, especially Kakashi who promised himself to teach his student how to use those sharingan eyes of his. Naruto himself took out a small notebook in which he wrote his assessment of the battle before him. He focused his observation on the Hyuuga taijutsu style and the byakugan, knowing that he could solely study sharingan in other time since Sasuke was on his team.

Sasuke took out wires from his pouch, ignoring his aching body. He knew he couldn't use the wires to Naruto's level in which the wires looked like they had their own will, but his own technique was still dangerous to his opponent.

Naruto tapped his cheek with his pen before he wrote on the notebook on his hand.

Neji used his eyes to see the almost invincible strings. The Uchiha knew what he did using the strings, that much he admitted, but being a teammate of a weapon specialist gave him experienced on how to beat this technique. Reinforcing his hand with chakra, Neji cut the strings that were intended to bind his body.

"Give it up. You won't win. It's your fate to lose from me and my destiny to win this match," The Hyuuga boy said this in his usual emotionless tone.

'Hyuuga Neji is a stingy asshole who believed too much on fate. He probably had a bad experience to be another kind of cranky brooding guy (the other kind is Sasuke the brooding gloomy avenger). Then again, who cares? Certainly not me. Note to self: usually this kind of guy is easily riled if you push the right button. Try to find it! And give him a prank or two to make him loosen up his lame fate speaking. It is as lame as his fuzzy eyebrow-ed teammate's and his jounin instructor's youth speaking.' Naruto finished his writing and then glanced at Sasuke who seemed ready to throttle the Hyuuga with his bare hands. He flipped his notebook to the alphabet 'U' and searched for Sasuke's name.

'Uchiha Sasuke is a competitive bastard and don't like to be defeated. Wonder what he really thinks of me since he had fallen to my traps numerous times. Note to self: with his bloodline activated, try to find a way to make his eyes completely unable to copy my jutsus. There is no way I'll let him copy them. If he wanted to learn it, he had to do it the hard way. Which is by begging and pleading and of course a debt that I can use for anything. Not that I'll teach him. Beside his ego was probably bigger than his brain—if he had any in the first place, that he won't dare to ask me much less beg me from,' Naruto cackled insanely.

Behind him Sakura was crept out by his 'evil' laugh. She waved her hand frantically to erase Naruto's angelic smiling image. Bad thought! That was right! She was hallucinating!

Beside her, Tenten sweat dropped at her unexplainable act against invisible 'bugs'. The older girl wondered why all of the cute guys she found were insensitive jerk (Neji), brooding avenger (Sasuke), quiet bugs lover (Shino) (Tenten shivered at the bugs image) or insane (Naruto). Then again you couldn't call Lee and her sensei as cute guys, but they still were insane and mentally unbalanced.

The second match was ended quickly with Sasuke being knocked out by Neji, but only after Sasuke sent him an unexpected helluva of punch to his ribcage. The Hyuuga boy put a hand on his ribcage as he walked to a tree. That suicide move (because Sasuke chose not to avoid one of Neji's strikes in order to give him a blow) was unexpected. Sasuke knew that his chance to win was slim to none thought that he had to give the annoying bastard in front of him at least a punch that he wouldn't forget for long to give him a message that he too wasn't omnipotent, especially not because he thought that some lady fate favored him.

He hoped that at least he could make the match a draw. He didn't get his wish though, since Neji was still conscious although was winded by his accurate blow. As he blacked out, Sasuke cursed himself for not going after his balls instead of his ribcage. That way if he succeeded landing a blow there hopefully he would deter him from his irritating fate speaking. Because that meant that it was Neji's fate too to receive a blow to his manhood pride and perhaps lost his ability to reproduce.

Wouldn't it be nice to rid the world from more future Hyuuga brats?

Kakashi removed Sasuke from the arena. He dumped him under a tree. Gai was doing a victory dance, shouting at Kakashi about the burning passion his team's members had, to beat the silver haired jounin's students.

"Naruto, Lee, you two are next!"

Naruto tilted his head as he watched Lee made a joyous dance before the match. "Let's make it quick. I have something else better to do," he said arrogantly.

"Yosh, Naruto-san let's do our best!"

"Whatever," the blond sneered. Nearby Kakashi sweat dropped thinking about how much Naruto and Lee resembled him and Gai. The difference was that Naruto was truly annoyed while he merely ignored the green beast of Konoha.

"Begin!" just as he said that Lee dashed toward Naruto. The blond raised his eyebrow. He admitted that Lee was quick, but his fox partner (namely Kibi) was faster…and more vicious, though the fox couldn't use taijutsu for obvious reason, but definitely was still dangerous with its sharp fangs and claws. Now, should he fight Lee or play him around?

Naruto smirked when he reached his decision. He parried Lee's punches and after a minute of parrying at last he caught one of Lee's hand. Gai's pupil quickly changed his tactic and kicked toward Naruto's face. The blonde bent his knees and lowered his body. Lee twisted his kicking leg so it went down. With body still twisting, Naruto caught Lee's leg with his free hand. Lee had to twist his body when Naruto twisted his leg so to avoid broken bones. Naruto let go of his other hand from Lee's palm and used both of his hands to throw Lee to the nearest tree. Lee's feet landed on the tree trunk and he jumped to the ground, crouching on 4 legs. He had a happy smile plastered on his face.

"Wow, you're so great, Naruto-san!" he shouted loudly.

'…So naïve…" a malicious idea soon formed on his brain as he remembered what the data he gathered about Lee said. Strong in taijutsu, couldn't use genjutsu and ninjutsu because he couldn't use chakra, his apparent affection toward his teacher he saw as his role model, and other things. Naruto gave out a wicked grin that was noticed by a worried Kakashi. There was nothing good came out when Naruto grinned like that.

While he'd like to duel in taijutsu only with Lee, he had a better (read: more malicious) idea on his mind. He hoped that after he was done with him, Lee would change his annoying personality (and hopefully his green spandex, bowl cut hair, and fussy eyebrow too).

Naruto teleported out of Lee's front, effectively confusing the poor ninja. Since the arena was the wood circled by the red papers, he could easily find himself a place to hide from Lee to concoct his plan into reality. Afterall why didn't use the arena when it was big? No sense of wasting it. His bug henge-ed shadow clone was assigned to keep watch on him, so he would always know Gai's pupil's location.

Naruto took out a small scroll from his pack on his belt. He bit his thumb and smeared the blood on the scroll to summon the scroll's contents. The wound on his thumb was already healing. He glanced at the numerous flasks, tubes, and bottles there. All of them were his collection of poisons, potions, sprays, tablets, herbs, medicines, solutions and powders of various kinds. Most were made by himself, while the rest he bought via mail or he just plucked out of the forest.

Naruto took a small blue box and took out one of the brown colored tablet. He closed the box and put it back on the empty scroll. After he put the tablet on his pouch, Naruto did some handseals and there was a popping sound smoke covered the scroll. When the smoke dissipated, the scroll was tied back and there was no sign of those bottles anymore.

After crushing the tablet into powder, Naruto mixed it with a flask of fresh water. The tablet was actually a stimulant that could effectively affect a particular hormone. And from there the victim's brain would be affected indirectly. Since the result would heighten the victim's sense of fear, Naruto could just add a genjutsu in which Lee would project his own fear. It would be Lee himself who defeated himself.

Closing the flask carefully so its content wouldn't spill, Naruto created 6 shadow clones. He gave the flask to one of the clones. Naruto performed the Kirigakure no jutsu. The first time he created this jutsu 2 years ago, he didn't know that it wasn't a new jutsu, only after Zabuza said the name of the jutsu when he created the mist from the water around him did Naruto realized it.

They dashed toward Lee to incapacitate him. It was a quick work. First Naruto locked himself with a battle of taijutsu with Lee. It was admirable to see the boy still could respond his assault under such thick fog around them. Second, 5 of his clones attached themselves to Lee's hands, legs, and neck effectively stopped his movement. Third, the real Naruto pushed Lee to the ground. The clone that attached itself on Lee's neck jumped and sat on Lee's chest. It was then the last Naruto clone opened the cap of the flask with his thumb and poured its content on the waiting mouth of Lee. Lee struggled and tried to close his mouth, but the clone was ready and opened Lee's mouth with its fingers. Lee drank the rest of the drink.

The real Naruto put genjutsu by making handseals and put 2 fingers on Lee's forehead afterwards. After his job was done, he dismissed all clones. The blonde boy stood in front of Lee's body. The bowl haircut boy was moaning and even sobbing while he muttered his sensei's name. Naruto stopped his kirigakure no jutsu and the mist dissipated.

All eyes were pointed toward the sobbing Lee. His team members couldn't believe it. Lee was crying? That was something that was unexpected.

"…winner, Naruto," Kakashi muttered. The jounin headed toward Naruto sternly. "What did you do to him?"

"Nothing, just a simple genjutsu that affected his brain. You did say that we could use anything, didn't you?" Naruto smiled cheekily. "Don't worry he won't breakdown anymore in 10 minutes."

"What kind of false image you put on him?"

Naruto shrugged. "Who knows? The only one who knows about it is Lee himself. My genjutsu made his own brain displayed his worst fear," there was no use to tell him about the stimulant tablet. He'd like to keep the secret about it himself. "Since the training is over, I'll be on my own way. See you!" The rest of Konoha ninjas were circling Lee, wondering what they should do to the now incapacitated genin. Kakashi was hard pressed calming Gai from having nervous breakdown.

Naruto has taken 10 steps from his spot when Neji came at him, face frowning. "What was the drink you make Lee swallow?" to amateur, it would sound like neutral tone, but Naruto was no amateur and he quickly noted a sign of hostility on his voice.

Naruto smirked. "Wouldn't you like to now?" he raised an amused eyebrow. Inwardly Naruto reminded himself to put this byakugan ability to see through mist to his notebook later. "See you later!"

"If Lee isn't able to be a ninja after this…" he warned.

"You'll do what?" Naruto challenged. It seemed that he needed to reevaluate and change Neji's manners he had wrote on his book. The guy was unexpectedly loyal, if you could say that, to his teammate. "You'll close my tenketsu and torture me? Don't look so surprised like that, Hyuuga. It wasn't as if it was a secret," the fact was that there was a detailed restricted archive about Hyuuga taijutsu style and some of byakugan's ability, like seeing human's tenketsu. Naruto simply retrieved the data by transforming himself into the archive caretaker. He wanted to laugh at the lax of security placed on Hokage's tower. And they called themselves one of the 5 most powerful hidden villages. It was a wonder that Konoha still last to this day.

"It won't work on me, you know. I'm perfectly in control of my chakra. Infact you can say that my hm… ability is the counter of your jyuuken style. And about that drink, let's call it pest repellant, shall we? I bet that after this, your friend over there," he tilted his head toward Lee, "Will avoid me after this and won't reveal himself around me for a long time. If he doesn't, let's just say that there must be something wrong with the working system of his brain," Neji almost said something when he heard his teacher called his name.

"This isn't over yet!" Neji growled and turned around, gritting his teeth.

"You're welcome, Hyuuga. Anytime," Naruto grinned widely, as he watched the pupilless eyed boy's retreating back.

From the corner of his blue eyes, Naruto saw a short shadow behind a tree observing the matches earlier. It was Inari and right now he was gaping at the spot where Naruto had rendered Lee catatonic. The young boy looked at him in awe before he stared back at Lee in confused disbelief.

"Wow," he heard Inari muttered the word, staring at him as if he was to be his new hero.

Naruto smiled. Perhaps this kid could be saved afterall.

Inside him, Kyuubi was snorting at the thought of Naruto saving the kid. More like corrupting him, the fox muttered amusedly.

"Now, now," Naruto chastised his tenant. "I'm certainly not corrupting him. Call it my gentleman charm," he said innocently. "The kids are attracted to me like moth to flame!" Nevermind the fact that said animal would be burned when it touched the burning flame.

The fox barked out a laugh from behind his bar, obviously amused, knowing that his host was anything but innocent. And of course sandaime could give him proofs that he was no gentleman. Then again, gentlemen of old days fought between themselves using manipulation and brain instead of their brawn. Brawn was good and all, but it was always (read: mostly) the brain that decided the winner. And unfortunately for everyone who was Naruto's enemy, the blonde boy wasn't only backed by his brawn, but he also had the needed brain as well. Not a good combination to have in Naruto form, especially when said boy was such a mischievous troublemaker that generally always attracted chaos everywhere he went to.

Kyuubi sighed in relief, knowing that his trickster legacy was inherited by his host. Or was it perhaps merely enhancing the already devious mind the kid had on his birth? He didn't know the answer, but he didn't care. It was nice to see that his vessel, the son of yondaime who had sealed him inside the blond baby, wreaked havoc on the world. His reputation still needed to be upheld afterall.

Take that you goddamn asshole! Do you see that? Your son is mine! Hope you have fun watching your son and me over here! Kyuubi roared in satisfaction before he went back to plot his next course of action: thinking of the right ingredients to make a new potion for the next glorious prank. Target? Kyuubi tapped his paw on the floor, musing. Now that needed some more thoughts…

Whoever their next target would be, it was obvious that the result wouldn't be pretty for the victim.

But hey, why should a demon lord like him care? As long as the victim provide him amusement he had nothing to complain about.

TBC…

It is over! At last this chapter is finished! I'll have architecture classical history test tomorrow. Wish me luck!

Don't forget to review this fic. Next, it would be the battle on the bridge. You'll have to know that I'll effectively change a whole lot of the battle. More missing-nins, more Konoha-nins, and who knows what Naruto will do! The boy was a wild card. The result? Will Zabuza and Haku die? Who the heck are the missing-nins Gatou had hired? What is Team Gai's role on the battle? And how will Tazuna deal with the whole mess?

Stay in tune (in January I think)!