Chapter 16: D-rank Purpose and Zabuza

Disclaimer: Naruto is the work of Kishimoto

The moment he asked that Kakashi actually groaned while the Hokage chuckled at the question which left Naruto very confused on what was happening since it was a simple enough question to be answered.

"What?" Naruto was looking wearily between his Sensei and Hokage-jiji, "Did I say something wrong?" he asked.

Shaking his head the Hokage continued to chuckle saying, "Nothing wrong with what you said. That question had been on the mouths of many young shinobi and I believe many have forgotten the true purpose of D-ranks."

Puffing out some smoke, the Hokage continued, "As you were taught at the Academy; missions goes from D to A rank with S rank being the exception of being a mission involving high risks, low survival rates and/or vital information. It is only from C rank onwards that young Shinobi could face combat while D-rank missions are ensured to not have any risks."

"I hope it's not to make us do the chores of the entire village on hire" Naruto commented.

"That is actually part of the reason. A ninja should be able to do any mission without complaint or at least keep their grumbling to themselves" shaking his head the Hokage smiled, "But the real reason is to prepare you for C-ranks."

Kakashi was the one who spoke up now, "One of the reasons for D-ranks is to make team-mates of newly formed groups cooperate between each other. If they cannot do that in a simple task then how could they in a serious fight."

"Yes like Kakashi-kun said, cooperation is something that is needed. Teamwork is a core aspect of Konoha which managed to win us all the Shinobi Wars to date. The second reason for D-ranks is actually for the Sensei's sake."

"Huh?" Naruto could not figure out how D-ranks could help them on that.

The Hokage looked at Naruto and answered his unspoken question, "It is to give time. A Sensei can determine any problems in their team in the time it takes for them to go from D-ranks to C-ranks and back. It is to allow them to better know how they will train their team and judging by the Resistance Seals, Kakashi-kun seemed to be doing a good job so far."

Naruto nodded and agreed that without his Sensei's help even though the man was extremely lazy he would not know where to go with his training.

"However there is another reason for specific D-rank missions out there beside chores. Certain D-rank missions are designed to make a Genin get better as a ninja" the Hokage explained, "Missions like babysitting, walking dogs and helping the elderly are designed as something akin to bodyguard missions. In those, teams are split between an attack and defender and if the client gets hit…then it would be the result of your client dying in an actual bodyguard mission."

Naruto's mouth was left open in shock. They actually had such a purpose? Then why did they not do all of this before?! Hell he haven't even heard of teams doing this kind of thing!

But the Hokage continued to explain as if Naruto wasn't thinking rapidly on the nature of those D-rank missions.

"Grocery Shopping missions often give you a certain amount of money to buy and the Genins can keep the spare amount they got from the mission. This D-rank is designed for information gathering which is another skill a ninja needs."

"Package delivery of any kind are similar enough in nature that by doing them Genin are trained in delivering messages in time in sometimes great distances. This is an example of D-ranks that have mission types in the higher ranks."

"Gardening allows for you to identify different plant life and which ones you can eat and which ones are often poisoned or worse. This mission is used to train up your survival skills in the wilderness."

"There are also missions involving the slaughterhouse where you have to work in a place where there is lots of blood and killing. This is to prepare Genin for what could happen in combat with C-rank missions as well as to determine who has the attitude to stay as a ninjas despite all the chaos or not."

"Even catching Tora has a purpose for a reason. Do you think that cat really escapes that often?" the Hokage chuckled, "Despite all belief we let that cat escape to train our Genin in the art of tracking and hinting down targets which is another task a ninja needs to be able to do."

"Furthermore these kinds of missions can be done with parts of a team attacking trying to make the rest of the team fail it while the other part of the team tries to complete it without failing it and stop the plans of the other member(s). And doing these kinds of missions where you take on jobs of civilians will allow you to infiltrate such places much easier without standing out."

Taking out a note, Naruto quickly scribbled the list of missions and what their purpose were which caused the Hokage to smile seeing the dedication Naruto had in his career. He was growing up from a prankster that wanted attention to a fine Shinobi already.

"Jiji" Naruto suddenly said, "What about missions that involve painting, garbage collection and the likes. You haven't explained those yet."

"Oh, those missions are a bit different besides forcing people to work together" Kakashi started to explain, "But they have recently become something along the lines of a chore now due to the nature of the work."

"Indeed" The Hokage mused, "Those missions involve a person's nature transformation skills" which caused some shock in Naruto. He had heard of nature transformation and how a person has an affinity to one of them but nothing else. Not even how to find out which element of the five you have.

"For painting, you use your Chakra to manipulate the water without tools to paint the walls or fence. Too little water and the paint will become stall and too much and it will run off the fence. This is used to train your control water chakra."

"For garbage collection you use wind to blow said items into large piles. Too little and you do nothing and too much and you blow it all away. This is used to train your control over wind chakra.

"For Bakery related missions where you cook bread for the owners with fire, it is to train your control over that fire. Too little and the bread won't cook and too much and it will burn. Naturally this is to train your control over fire chakra."

"For farming, you manipulate the earth in order to till the land or to harvest crops. Doing so will increase your control over earth chakra else you can do them manually for physical effort and training."

"There are also missions which involve fixing electrical wires around the village as well. By channelling lightning chakra into a wire, you can tell whether or not if the wire needs to be fixed. Naturally this is to train your control over lightning chakra."

"However these days, most Jonin-senseis don't bother with such things and its when their students become Chunin that they take such missions to build up their foundations with elemental jutsus."

By the time the Hokage finished his explanation; Naruto also finished writing down what the Hokage said, fully intending to practise what was said in the explanation.

From what he could tell the parts where you split into teams to attack and defend was like pranking. You pass if you stop the prank but if you fall victim to the prank then you lose.

The month passed and Naruto managed to get the C-rank mission from the Hokage sending them off to Wave again. Rather than just screaming about it, Naruto surprised everyone by logically telling the Hokage on why they should get a C-rank mission. Needless to say, he succeeded though Naruto felt it was more because Kakash was their Sensei and he would protect them.

During the walk where he was pretty much waiting for those two enemy-nin to appear; he recounted what he did in the month and what he achieved.

In 4 weeks with an average of 4-ranks a day with his Shadow Clones on weekdays only, Naruto completed a total of 92 D-rank missions in which 12 of them involved his team. Because of this he made a solid 500K in Ryo which would keep in the good zone for cash for a long time if he didn't spend any of it. The Hokage actually requested at the end when he wanted a C-rank that he would not do any D-ranks without his team since now the village was getting a shortage of D-ranks ironically.

He sniggered at Hokage-jji begging him that time but those reports were a bitch to do.

He sniggered at the fact that he had money to spend now; during the month and the sudden excess gain in cash; Naruto made some improvements to his outfit. While it looked the same, he was now wearing chain-mail underneath it and under the arms and shins were armoured as well to increase defence.

Adding onto this were a total of 3 sealing scrolls which he managed to create with some ease where in them were in order; food, weapons and spare clothes. Because of this he didn't need to wear a backpack and instead hid the scrolls in his outfit. Naruto was not sure on what level he was at with sealing; just that he finished all the basic stuff pretty easily…he would need to later get Hokage-jiji to give his clan's scrolls to him later.

In terms of progress he was also quite happy as well. While his Chakra Control needed months…if not years of work to even get into the Chunin level; the other aspects of the Shinobi he had been working at improved a lot.

His work with the Resistance Seal made him up to his usual speed with the seal on and tuned to 1.75x in strength. Because of this, his speed was actually now around Genin level because of all the physical conditioning which Gai and Lee placed him through. Not bad for a month.

The Physical Transformation Jutsu he had now only made a mist around him for a few moments when he transformed compared to a small explosion of smoke. He had to intentionally make the smoke and mist for the Sexy and Harem Jutsu due to this. He was pretty sure he could do the Jutsu without smoke or mist and without any hand-seals eventually with his constant use of it.

The Substitution Jutsu was also something he worked on, especially when he found out it was easy for him to substitute with his Shadow Clones than other objects in general. The 3 hand-seals he needed before turned into 2 and it only took him a second to prepare the Jutsu compared to 3 seconds before as well.

And finally the Shadow Clone Jutsu which by far was the best and most useful Jutsu he had ever learnt or heard of. When the month started he was at 100 Shadow Clones using them to train but now he was up to 150 Shadow Clones at once with him getting more comfortable with the backlash of memories.

And in battle he could easily make 10 times the amount compared to training if he was really pressed into it. All of this was why Naruto was at least confident that they would make it through the first part against those two enemy-nin.

Oh speaking of which they were about to that point now with that puddle.

'Should I do things similar to last time…? I don't know if Kakashi made it or not…better not' Naruto thought as they passed the puddle. After a good distance, Naruto heard chains rattling around Kakashi and then ripping him apart like before without warning.

Wide eyed at the scene with blood; he almost didn't see that the lumps of flesh turned into pieces of wood.

'So that's how it is…' Naruto narrowed his eyes as the rest of the team plus Tazuna turned to the enemy. He quickly made a Shadow Clone and made it Transform instantly into a rock as he took a couple steps backwards.

"One down" the duo masked ninjas said coldly before charging at him again.

As the claws were about to get him; Sasuke charged in like before pinned the chains onto the nearby tree with a Shuriken and Kunai before kicking the two. The Chains broke off due to the two detaching them from their claws as they charged to Naruto who smirked.

"Two down."

In that moment Naruto turned off his Resistance Seal allowing him to move 75% faster than before; which at this point was almost comparable to Sasuke's speed at the beginning before the training.

Making two hand-seals for the substitution jutsu; Naruto disappeared; replaced by the rock on the ground which was his Shadow Clone from before.

"What?!" the enemy-nin who went to attack him was shocked while the other continued to Tazuna. Clicking his tongue, Sakura was beginning to abandon the old man already after she was recovering from freezing.

'Have to fight two at once…Sasuke may get there in time but I'm not taking any chances!'

Quickly making a cross hand-seal; Naruto called out, "Shadow Clone Jutsu" making three Shadow Clones as they all charged from the back of the enemy. Two of the Shadow Clones went to deal with the one who went to attack him while himself and another Shadow Clone went to save Tazuna.

The Two Shadow Clones with Kunai managed to stab the enemy in the back quite literally while disabling them enough to take him down while Naruto and his other Shadow Clone was quite hard pressed trying to get to Tazuna.

"Fire Style: Phoenix Fire Jutsu!" Sasuke shouted from the side moving to fire at the space in between the enemy-nin and their client.

Seeing the stream of small fireballs heading the way where he was going to run at, the man stopped and just in time to allow for Naruto and his Shadow Clone to disable that enemy as well. It was only then that Naruto sensed that Kakashi appearing behind him when he patted his shoulder.

"Good job Sasuke, Naruto. Both of you took down the enemy while protecting the client…Sakura we will need to work with you freezing up in the time of need" Kakashi said firmly while grabbing the two enemy-nin easily and tying them up to a tree.

"Not bad Dobe" Sasuke praised his team-mate a bit on his abilities at least.

"You too Teme" Naruto commented as well seeing Sasuke was actually better than the first time they got through this.

"Sensei…" Sakura muttered shocked, "How did you…you were cut into pieces in front of our eyes!"

"Substitution Jutsu is a wonderful Jutsu to use in these situations" Naruto commented pointing at the cut up pieces of a log.

"SHUT UP NARUTO-BAKA! YOU TRIED TO STEAL SASUKE-KUN'S LIMELIGHT!" she shrieked the moment she hear Naruto and remembered what he did and ignoring what she almost did which no one was commenting on.

"Be quiet Sakura" Kakashi ordered which with change in mood caused her to shut up quite quickly before turning to Tazuna, "Tazuna-san."

"W-What is it?" Tazuna was now sweating not looking at anyone properly.

"I need to talk to you" Kakashi spoke up getting the attention of the team, "These guys are Chunin class missing-nin from the Hidden Mist Village. They are ninjas known to keep on fighting no matter what."

With two missing-nin seemed to have awoken at this point as one of them said, "How did you read our movements?"

"On a sunny day like this when it hasn't rained in days a water puddle shouldn't exist" Kakashi offhandedly explained.

Tazuna looked shocked that Kakashi knew of this but didn't do anything, "Why did you let the brats fight when you knew that?"

"If I had wanted to…I could've killed these two instantly but…" Kakashi glared at Tazuna, "There was something I needed to find out; who the target that these two were after."

Tazuna had another confused look on his face as he asked, "What do you mean?"

"Meaning…were they after you or one of us?" Kakashi explained, "We haven't heard that there are Shinobi after you. Our mission was to simply protect you from thieves and bandits" looking at the missing-nin, "This has become at least a B-rank mission. This was supposed to be simple protection until you completed the bridge."

"…."

Tazuna looked downwards with some shame in his face as Kakashi continued to speak, "If it was known that ninjas were after you, this mission would have been an expensive B-rank. I'm sure you have a reason but it causes problems when you lie about the mission details, we are now operating out of our duty."

Hearing that and the threat of enemy ninjas again Sakura was the first to speak up as soon as she could, "We aren't ready for this mission! Let's quit! We need to get back before any other ninjas try to attack us; we don't need to get hurt for this!"

There was a single line in the thoughts of Naruto and Sasuke towards Sakura at that moment.

'Coward.'

"Hmm…while for the wrong reasons, Sakura does have a point. You all aren't ready for live combat against other ninjas yet; this might be too much" Kakashi said shocking his team though only Sakura had clear joy in his words.

"Kakashi-san…" Tazuna spoke up for the first time since Kakashi's explanation and said, "I need to talk to you about this mission."

Walking over Tazuna sighed, "You're right that this job is most likely outside your duties. It turns out that a super dangerous man is after my lie" he had the look of a resolved man who was ready to die for his beliefs.

"Super dangerous man?" Kakashi pondered, "Who?"

"You've probably at least heard his name before" Tazuna sighed, "The wealthy shipping magnate, a man known as Gato."

Kakashi looked shocked at that moment exclaiming, "Huh?! Gato? From that Gato company said to be the world's few extremely weathly people."

"Yes…officially he runs a lareg shipping company but secretly he sells drugs and other illegal items using ninhas and bandits as gangs members to ake over businesses and countries. He's a very nasty man."

"It was about a year ago when he set his eyes on the Wave Country. Through money and violene, he quickly took control o fthe country's shipping industry. Gato now has a monopoly on all business traffic in the county and the only hing he has to fear now is the completion of the bridge" Tazuna explained.

"I see..since you're building the bridge your in the way" Sakura commented mostly to make herself look good in front of her Sasuke-kun.

"So…those ninjas were hired by Gato?" asked Sasuke.

"…."

Naruto stood there silent getting the information in case they were to continue with the mission which was very likely.

"What I don't understand is if you know Ninjas could be after you, why did you hide the fact when you hired us?" Kakashi asked. There were clear penalties in breaking those rules and they weren't pretty.

Tazuna looked down, "The Wave Coutry is super poor, even the feudal lord has no money; of course we don't have much money either…not enough to pay for an expensive B-Rank mission" Kakashi stared at the man with a bit of pity.

"Well…if you quit the mission now, I will definitely be killed but…" Tazuna started laughing cheerfully, "Don't worry about it! If I die, my cute 10 year old grandsom will just cry for a few days! Oh yeah, and my daughter will live a sad life while hating Leaf Ninjas forever. But it won't be your fault. Not all all!"

'This man is guilting us…and its working' the team thought at once.

With a puff of breath, Kakashi simply said, "Well I guess we have no choice. We will protect you at least until you get back to your country."

'I win' thought Tazuna at that moment.

On a boat with a man steering the way, the team plus Tazuna were moving slowly and more quietly through the deep mist where they couldn't see anything.

Naruto wasn't so worried since he could walk on water though Sasuke and Sakura seemed more tense the deeper into the mist they all went.

"What a thick mist. I can't see ahead" Sakura commented like nothing was wrong with what she was doing when they were supposed to be as quiet as possible.

The man steering the boat glared at Sakura before saying in a hush tone, "We should see the bridge soon. The Wave Country is at the base of the bridge."

Soon enough they passed by and they all saw the large form of the bridge. Naruto knew to keep quiet since they could be spotted. Unfortunately Sakura did not get that memo.

"WOW! IT'S HUGE!" she shouted. Naruto felt the need to drown her at that moment. Why exactly did he have a crush on her again? Right; popular, had lots of attention and liked the Teme. All the wrong reason for liking someone; mind you.

"Hey! Be quiet! Why do we are hiding in this mist and not using the engine? We'll be in deep trouble if Gato finds us out" the man exclaimed irritated more than before while sweating in nervousness.

"…."

"…."

Both Naruto and Sasuke glared at Sakura who tried play it off by making a sort of fake cute face at them but it didn't work. Kakashi was thinking of something else in the meantime.

"We'll be there soon. Tazuna it looks like we've avoided detecton so far but…just in case we'll take the route that has vegetation. It will make the enemies harder to spot us" the man said while Tazuna thanked him.

Eventually they passed under another bridge that connected the islands that made of the Wave Country to reveal a series of trees stationed in the wate with thick roots keeping them up while wooden houses were built on the edge where there were land.

"Wow…" Naruto quietly exclaim seeing the beauty of this place. However soon enough they stopped at the end of one make shift port and they got off. The man looking at Tazuna said, "This is it for me, goodbye and good luck."

"Yeah" Tazuna smiled at the man, "Thank you so much."

With that, the man started the engine of his boat and sped away.

"OK! Get me home safely" Tazuna commanded in a more happy tone than before with the fact he was near home again.

Meanwhile…Kakshi was thinking of what could happen now.

'If we get attacked again…it will surely not be a Chunin but a Jonin level enemy Ninja. Sigh…' he thought while keeping his senses sharp around the area. If they were going to be attacked; it would be on the path they were currently on.

Naruto was thinking on a similar line as Kakashi but did not expect any Jonin level foes getting in their way. He didn't want anyone to die and force him to spend another month on preparing to get t this point again; that walk to wave took them almost a week already!

'Eh?' one of his Shadow Clones which he sent out to scout ahead was destroyed by someone. Frowning Naruto eventually after a while felt the presence of an enemy and acted immediately sending a Shuriken into the bushes.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING BAKA!" Sakura shrieked to the point where if they weren't detected already…they would be now while trying to attack her and failing again. Idiot girl.

"There was something there" Naruto pointed to which Sakura did not believe him at all shouting out, "YEAH RIGHT!"

Meanwhile Kakashi took the more practical and went through the bushes to see what Naruto was aiming at. It was a perfectly white rabbit that was frozen in fear with a Shuriken almost hitting it on the head; stuck just above its head.

"NARUTO! What have you done?!" Sakura shouted at him while Naruto was frowning. He was sure he detected a human's presence just then. He was VERY good at that due to his series of pranks.

"Oh just a rabbit" Tazuna commented seeing the rabbit and calming down.

However Kakashi was the opposite and was starting to sweat seeing the true meaning of a white rabbit at this location.

'The snow rabbit changes colour based on the amout of sunlight meaning it is white during winder and brown during spring. This is a rabbit that has been kept in a cage for the purpose of body switching….so, they're here already.' He quickly thought scanning the area over and over again with his senses trying to pick of something.

Russel.

"EVERYONE GET DOWN!" Kakashi shouted.

Seeing that Sakura was not reacting, AGAIN, Naruto tackled her to the ground as Tazuna, Sasuke and Kakashi went to the ground as well. Soon enough the giant flying object slammed into the trunk of a tree and in the next instant a man was standing tha handle of the blade.

Kakashi frowned seeing who the man was.

Naruto felt the presence of the man and…shivered. There was a whole deal of killing intent spilling from the man…no it was leaking out of all things. This man didn't even start to direct it to them at all. He gulped seeing this man was really a monster.

Sasuke tensed at the man, feeling he was powerful. Kakashi level power at least.

Sakura on the other hand wanted to run away.

"Well well, if it isn't the Hidden Mist's missing-nin Zabuza-kun" Kakashi said in an almost mocking tone. Moving an arm out to stop any of his Genin on trying to fight the man; namely Naruto though it was good that he wasn't and could tell the threat level of the enemy; he said:

"Everyone get back. This one is on a whole another level" Kakashi moved to grab his headband and pull it up, "This will be a little tough unless I do this"

"You appear to be Sharingan Kakashi" Zabuza commented, "Sorry but the old man is mine to kill."

'Sharingan?' Naruto was confused on why that word was associated with Kakashi when he wasn't part of the Uchiha Clan.

"Surround and proect Tazuna-san, do not enter the fight" Kakashi commanded, "That is teamwork here" he stared at Zabuza and said, "Zabuza first…fight me" revealing the three tomoe eye to everyone.

Naruto and Sasuke were shocked that Kakashi had a Sharingan. Naruto remembered that was a Dojutsu part of the Uchiha Clan but Sasuke was thinking otherwise.

He remembered what his brother said to him that night…the other man who aided in the destruction of his Clan…

Zabuza started to chuckle, "When I was a member of the Hidden Mist's assassination team, I kept a handbook and it included information on you. And this is what it said; the man who copied over a 1000 Jutsus…'Copy Ninja Kakashi'"

Swatting down on the long handle of his sword, Zabuza prepared himself for a fight, "Now…let's end all the talking. I have to kill that old man."

In an instant, the team surrounded Tazuna to protect him.

"But it seems that I have to beat you first Kakashi" Zabuza growled before disappearing into the water.

A/N:

At last, Zabuza Fight Ver.1!

This is the part of the story where things really diverge from Canon. Well not so different first time round this particular fight happens anyway, in Canon Kakashi gets trapped while everyone else in Team 7 watches which will be the ultimate result if Naruto doesn't do anything.

However Zabuza is a Jonin on the same level as Kakashi.

Naturally things won't be easy for this fight.

But onto other things that are relevant to this chapter, to be particular those D-rank missions.

I must admit, I ripped most of it off from 'Chunin Exams Days' since they actually made sense. D-rank missions are training tools one way or another. I'm pretty sure that most would disregard D-rank missions as useless but those people really aren't being creative enough.

Else they really want to get that part of the story over with.

But on other things that relate to missions, the structure of the D-C-B-A-S mission ranking system doesn't make that much sense to me. Sure, they're the guidelines to what mission should go to who but...it's kinda generalised.

I mean you have bodyguard protection duty and bandit extermination being put on the same level as C or B rank missions. Same as Assassination and Delivery missions at times as A or S rank missions.

Quite literally this mission system is based off two things.

The first is how 'difficult' the mission is actually is. That's fine, that makes sense as well.

The second however is how 'important' the mission is. You could literally have a S-rank mission on finding a lost child if said lost child was the child of a Kage or something along those lines.

But then again, S-rank missions are priority #1, do NOT fail type missions.

Throw enough money for a missions and the rank of the mission and thus it's 'importance' will increase as well. The amount of money placed for a mission is ironically also the guidelines that a Shinobi Village uses to determine how 'difficult' a mission is.

You can have A-rank missions that are less intensive than C-rank missions as a result of this. Wave Arc is a clear example of this even though technically should've counted as a A-rank.

Then again, why the hell was that mission counted as a C-rank later on?

Does the system really not adjust these kinds of things?

I mean according to the databooks Naruto had the follow missions on record:

Databook 2

7 D-rank, 1 C-rank, 1 B-rank, 2 A-rank, 0 S-rank.

Databook 2 is just before the Timeskip. Databook 2 says a hell lot.

Remember the mission which Kakashi gives Sakura and Co. to save Sasuke from Garaa? Yeah, that's one of the A-rank missions. Trying to get Sasuke back from defection probably counts as an A-rank as well.

The B-rank probably comes from Jiraiya bringing Tsunade back to Konoha to be Hokage.

Then there's the C-rank. Team 7, Naruto had only ONE mission in Canon that ever counted as a C-rank and that's the Wave mission, that was and should've been elevated into a A-rank mission.

And they bloody didn't put that into the records.

Not to mention that apparently the mission requirement to get a C-rank is probably 7 D-rank missions.

Nope, look at Hinata's stats for Database 2. She has 5 D-ranks and 3 C-ranks. Shino's one doesn't have the mission stats but Kiba's one has 7 D-ranks, 4 C-ranks and 1 A-rank. Team 10 has 8 D-ranks, 3 C-ranks and A-rank missions for only Shikimaru and Chouji on their stats.

Apparently the lowest D-rank mission count to get a C-rank could be 5 D-rank missions else there's none and its all up to the Jonin.

I don't want to even bother with why Hinata has less D-ranks than anyone else.

Plus she has 10 D-rank, 14 C-rank, 8 B-rank, 1 A-rank, 0 S-rank which is a hell lot more respectably than Naruto's 7 D-rank, 1 C-rank, 2 B-rank, 6 A-rank, 0 S-rank in the same period even if Naruto has a lot more A-ranks under his belt.

Fun fact: At the same time Kakashi had the following, 197 D-rank, 190 C-rank, 414 B-rank, 298 A-rank, 42 S-rank.

Moreover at 10 he had this: 48 D-rank, 21 C-rank, 63 B-rank, 8 A-rank, and 0 S-rank

Yep at 10, Kakashi was way better than timeskip Naruto.

Yeah, it's this kind of thing in Canon that makes things really confusion to write about. You have Kakashi who is a genius who has all these mission even at a young age and powerful but then you have Naruto who while not a genius but just as powerful later on having less missions than even his other peers who aren't as strong.

In conclusion, Missions are screwed up in Canon, Naruto had to face a couple S-rank enemies as a Genin. He should've gotten a couple S-rank missions ESPECIALLY after the Kazekage retrieval mission.

Bloody Team 9 got that S-rank missions on their records.

Hell Sakura didn't get that S-rank mission record as well with Naruto and probably Kakashi.

That is the reason why missions are fucked up in Canon. No logical manner of doing things and characters not getting anything on their records while other do.

God, its really sad when fanfic mission records are more logical and correct then in Canon.