A month had passed since Naruto's last discussion with Kurama. The fox told Naruto that he would be quiet for a while, focusing intently on the source of the energy that was disrupting Sage Mode. Kurama had not spoken since then, but Naruto trusted his partner to call him if something came up.

In the meantime, Reks had continued his training. His stamina had improved greatly; he was now fighting two dozen clones at once while taking very few hits. Naruto had started Reks on training with kunai as well, since the boy had showed prowess with daggers. The smaller weapons would benefit him at higher speeds.

All of Reks' other training paled in comparison to the night that he had finally accessed his chakra. The boy had been ecstatic when the powerful warmth had spread over his entire body. Naruto had quickly started Reks on studying the easiest of ninjutsu; Naruto had called them the "academy three."

Reks had already accomplished the Transformation Jutsu, which Naruto had expected. According to him, it was the easiest of the three to learn. The Clone Jutsu required creating a copy of oneself, which was difficult to accomplish even if the clone had no physical body. The Replacement Jutsu was currently proving rather difficult to master, as it required switching oneself with the position of some item nearby, typically a rock or log.

"Hey Reks, come over here for a moment."

A plume of smoke rose from a seemingly normal cactus to show Reks standing in its place. "What do you need?"

Naruto pulled out two small slips of paper from his coat pocket. "I wanted to wait until you had a decent control over your chakra before doing this," he explained. "This paper is made from a tree specially treated with chakra; it's incredibly rare nowadays, as you might imagine."

"So what does it do?" Reks asked as he sat down in their camp.

"It shows which of the elemental natures a person has an affinity for. All you have to do is focus a bit of your chakra into the paper and it responds accordingly." Naruto held one of the papers between two fingers and focused a small amount of chakra into it. After a moment the paper split in two, each half floating lazily to the ground. "The paper splitting in two means I have wind-natured chakra, which I already knew." He handed the second sheet to his student.

"Just focus chakra into it?" he asked. Naruto nodded his head and smiled. Reks nodded back and attempted to focus his chakra into the paper. He hadn't practiced much with focusing chakra into specific parts of his body yet, but the paper seemed to absorb what little he could build right away.

An instant later, the paper had wrinkled between his fingers. The ripples in the paper spread out from the center to to the edges. "Lightning." Reks looked up. "Your chakra is lightning-natured," Naruto explained.

Reks thought back to what Naruto had told him a month ago about the five chakra natures. "Lightning chakra is strong against earth, right?"

"Correct. It's also weak to wind nature. That's pretty good; it means you'll get a lot of practice against the element you're weak against. It'll help improve the strength of your jutsu."

'Thin, speedy, lightning-natured… It's like Kakashi-sensei all over again,' Naruto mused. 'He's even got the silver hair for it.' "I don't actually know that many lightning jutsu, but I do have scrolls that will help you learn some low-level ones." 'Now that I think about it, Reks has never seen me use the Summoning Jutsu. This should be interesting.'

"Wanna see something really cool, Reks?" The boy nodded curiously. Naruto responded by biting his thumb to draw blood and performing some hand signs. He slammed his palm down flat on the ground. "Summoning Jutsu!"

A large cloud of smoke appeared, causing Reks to start coughing loudly. The smoke slowly dispersed, revealing a toad that stood knee-high. The toad had orange skin and wore a small, deep blue yukata. "How's it goin' boss!" the toad spoke.

Reks yelped and backed away from the small creature. "It talked!"

"Of course I can talk, ya numpty." The toad had a high-pitched voice, showing he was rather young.

"Hey, Gamariki," Naruto greeted the small summon. "This is Reks. He's my new student."

Gamariki looked over at Reks curiously. "Student? You haven't trained anyone in ages, boss."

"Yeah, he doesn't know about all that yet, Gamariki."

"I've heard of summons," Reks muttered as he approached the toad, "but I've never heard of any that can speak like that."

This surprised Naruto. "There are people that can summon in Ivalice?" 'Maybe some of the shinobi aren't dead.'

"Yeah, but not like that, Naruto," Reks answered. "That was ninjutsu, right?" His teacher nodded in the affirmative. "The only summoning I've ever heard of was just magic, no ninjutsu."

"Ah, that would explain it then." He shook his head. "Anyway, Gamariki, do you have those elemental scrolls I gave you all a few years back?"

"I can pop back and grab them real quick, boss." Naruto nodded. "Back in a flash!" Another plume of smoke and the toad had disappeared.

"I don't think I'm ever gonna get used to ninjas," Reks muttered.

"It's better if you don't, to be honest. Getting complacent just means you're an easier target." Reks just nodded.

Another explosion of smoke signaled Gamariki's return. He was holding a scroll under his arm. "Got it right here, boss!"

"Good work, Gamariki." He pulled out a small bag from his pocket. "Here's your usual pay." He handed the small bag over as he took the scroll. "Tell Gamakichi and the others I said hey."

"Gotcha!" And once more the toad was gone.

"What did you pay him with?" Reks asked.

"Candy. All the toad children love candy."

"There are others?"

"Of course, there's hundreds, maybe even thousands at this point." Naruto unrolled the scroll on the ground to get a look at it. "Though I only ever summon the main family unless it's a specific situation. Gamariki is the son of Gamakichi, who is the current Boss Toad and son of Gamabunta who was Boss Toad when I was younger."

"So they change bosses every few years?"

Naruto shrugged. "Something like that." He rolled up the scroll and handed it to Reks. "This scroll should help you learn some low-level lightning jutsu to get you used to elemental manipulation." Reks unrolled it and looked at the first few illustrations. "Typically it takes a long time before a ninja would practice with elements, but you've been using magic for a while already."

"And magic is much more in tune with the elements, right?"

Naruto smirked and nodded. "Yeah, that'll help you along with your elemental training." Naruto paused for a moment. "Elemental training will also improve your overall control of your chakra; it'll make your jutsu easier to use. It helps you waste less of your chakra."

Reks rolled the scroll back up and tucked it away.

Later that night…

"So what are you saying, Naruto-boy?"

"There's some kind of strange chakra or magic in the air that's messing with my Sage Mode."

Naruto had travelled away from camp so that Reks couldn't overhear his current conversation.

"And Kurama told you this?"

Naruto sighed. "I know you don't trust him, Pa, but I do."

"Fair enough."

Sitting across from where Naruto was standing was a short toad, even shorter than Gamariki. This toad was clearly elderly, sporting white hair on his goatee and large eyebrows. Fukasaku was part of the duo at the head of Mt. Myouboku, the place where the toad summon clan lived. Fukasaku had been the one to teach Naruto to use Sage Mode 1000 years ago.

"Do you know any way to get around it?" Naruto asked.

"How does this strange chakra affect Sage Mode?"

"After I gather the natural energy in, Sage Mode activates but it disappears after a few seconds."

"Hmmmm…" Fukusaku closed his eyes and focused. "You're right, the natural energy in the air is very strange." A few seconds passed as Fukasaku spread his senses. "It's like… the chakra in the air is saturated with spiritual energy."

Naruto snapped his head up. "Of course! Why didn't I think of that?"

"What is it, boy?"

"This world doesn't use chakra anymore, Pa," Naruto explained. "They use magic, which is comprised entirely of their spiritual energy. After hundreds of years of magic users, the natural chakra in the air was tainted and turned into something else; something foreign to us."

"So this 'magic' is the cause then." Fukasaku shut his eyes and focused once more. "There seems to be some concentration of natural energy to the southwest of here, Naruto-boy. I can sense this strange… 'magic' as well, but there is definitely pure natural energy."

"I still don't know much of the geography in Ivalice, so I don't know what's there."

"That boy travelling with you ought to know, eh?"

"If it's not far from Rabanastre, he would probably know, yeah." Naruto tapped his chin in thought for a moment. "Yeah, I'll ask him about it, see if he knows much about the area."

"You should summon us more often, Naruto-boy," Fukasaku chided. "Ma hasn't seen you in decades." Naruto smiled as the elderly toad dismissed himself.

"Where did you run off to last night, Naruto?"

"Do you think I would do my training in plain sight, Reks?" Naruto laughed. "I have to head out further into the desert just so I don't wake you up."

"Do you really make that much noise?"

"Haha, Reks, you have no idea. When I was younger they called me the '#1 Most Unpredictable Ninja.' Do you really think I'd have a name like that for no reason?"

"I suppose not."

"Nicely done on noticing that I had left the camp, though." Naruto clapped the younger boy on the back as they walked. "I even left behind a clone to try and fool you, but you still saw through it."

"You told me to 'look underneath the underneath,' right? 'Awareness can be a shinobi's greatest asset.' That's what you've been teaching me."

"That's right. I've been thinking about that, too. I don't know anything about Ivalice. I said before, I know where the 3 big nations are, and I know we're in the Estersand cause of that merchant we passed by a few weeks ago, but other than that I haven't a clue where we are."

Reks looked over at his teacher. "I could teach you a bit about the geography. I don't know everything, obviously, but I'll be able to help you with the main places around Rabanastre."

"I know about the Estersand and the Westersand," Naruto explained. "I know about the desert past the Westersand, too."

Reks was suddenly curious; Naruto rarely spoke of his past, even vaguely. "Have you ever been to Rozarria?"

"Technically, yes."

"Technically?"

"Remember what I told you? Finish your training and I'll tell you everything."

"But you also taught me a shinobi's training is never done," Reks complained.

"That's true, but I just meant waiting until you've got a real handle on your chakra so you can easily perform jutsu in actual combat. And not just the academy three."

"I read over that scroll last night, but a lot of it was just over my head." Naruto ruffled the boy's hair.

"Aww, don't worry, Reks. We'll have you in fighting shape in no time!"

Chapter 4 End

More set up here. Next chapter will definitely have some interesting developments, and after that we start getting into the meat of the story. Thanks to everyone who's been reading, and I apologize for the somewhat boring chapter. See you guys next weekend!