Chapter 29: Plans and Plans

Disclaimer: Naruto is the work of Kishimoto

When Naruto woke up again at the start of the Loop, he considered raging at Haku.

He had to die the same way as before the last time he fought the girl in the mask and at the same time he still couldn't do anything to counter that all range Sebon attack of hers. His learning of Fire Jutsus to counter her was rendered useless when he had to use several Shadow Clones together to melt a few of those Ice Mirrors.

In battle, Naruto wouldn't get the time to do so over and over again until Haku was left with no more Ice Mirrors to use.

Then there was the issue of Sasuke being trapped in said Ice Dome and becoming a hindrance. Despite all the credit Naruto gave him because…really the raven haired boy was always above to the point he could never match him before.

"Have I surpassed Sasuke already?" he wondered.

Sure without the use of Chakra to enhance his limbs and thus his speed and power, Sasuke was still a bit higher than him but with it, Naruto vastly outstripped him. Furthermore he was starting to learn Elemental Jutsus which he could spam unlike Sasuke.

Finally there was really no good reason for Naruto to allow Sasuke to learn Chakra Compression and the likes if he wasn't going to win either way. Was he really giving Sasuke too much credit? He did mentally call the Teme as Genius in his own mind.

'I mean, that guy was always perfect and all during the Academy and he did everything without effort!' he mentally complained remembering all the times where he got a perfect test mark, perfect accuracy and perfect in everything because he just was.

Naruto didn't want to think Sasuke wasn't because he still wanted to be acknowledged by him as an equal since it was part of his life for so long. Plus what was the point of it all if Sasuke wasn't as good as he thought?

Then there were the other teams. Kiba, Shikimaru, Chouji, Shino, Hinata and Ino are all parts of clans and have their support as far as he knows. Naruto was more than sure that all of them were Genin level before they graduated and were most likely stronger than him in one way or another.

He wasn't sure where they were at right now but he was pretty sure that even if their Sensei were lazy and didn't teach them much, their clans would instead. Kiba had his dog related skills, Shikimaru with those shadows, Chouji and his expansion jutsus and so on were things that Naruto could never get.

If he were to face them directly in where they are clearly better in, he would frankly lose. Well maybe not Hinata since she seems to faint whenever he's near for some reason…

"Kiba is still way stronger and faster than me last time I checked and is probably still stronger when he uses that beast mimicry jutsu of his, Shikimaru is crazy smart and can capture me in his shadows no matter how I may want to out-think him, Chouji's expansion attacks can one-shot me which is something I can't counter, Shino's bugs…well I heard rumours that his clan has flesh eating ones…" Naruto shuddered.

"I can't hide from Hinata's eyes and she could possibly disable me with a poke and Ino has her mind related jutsus that can take my body over but…" he placed his hand on his stomach not sure that 'that' would affect it.

Slapping his cheeks to snap out of it, Naruto had to stop putting himself down and instead look at the more positive side of things.

None of them had his stamina, his chakra reserves or even an endless Time Loop to aid them. He was going to make sure that he could beat all of them even in the areas where they are best at. No one would follow a Hokage who couldn't do that.

The only person that seemed to be ahead of everyone else seemed to be Sasuke and now Naruto was frankly stronger than him in the right situations which were increasing more and more as times passed on.

Taijutsu and Genjutsu skill wise, he might be below Sasuke right now but he could literally outlast Sasuke in a fight and bombard him with Ninjutsu after Ninjutsu if he wished using Shadow Clones especially.

There was still the issue of standing behind said Uchiha or leaving the shadow of dead-last completely to consider as well. Well he could figure it out later, depending on his 'future' plans he may need Sasuke to be stronger like before instead of Naruto just cutting off any 'training tips' all of a sudden.

"Sasuke can probably handle things without me…I hope" he said though frowned at the thought of Sasuke depending on him. That would be way too creepy and sad in too many levels

Walking outside and to the opposite direction where Sasuke went - he wanted privacy - Naruto took a stick and drew four circles and labelled them 'Family Protection', 'The Bridge Battle', 'Gato' and 'Wave'.

Each of these areas were connected in some way and often overlapped each other but each had to be dealt with differently. If he failed in one task then the rest would snowball later on causing dozen more problems as a result. And Naruto especially didn't want Tazuna and the rest of Wave to deal with the problems left over by his mistakes.

"I know where my priority are at least."

First things first was the protection of Tazuna and his family. There would be too much guilt if he managed to fail in that…though apparently he couldn't fail that else the Loop stopping.

Tazuna's protection was all but ensured no matter thanks to Kakashi but then came the issue of the rest his family. They were attacked in the last Loop where Naruto was there to stop him. That was most likely the cause of one of the previous Loops to end as well.

A Mizu-nin…or was it Kiri-nin? These things were confusing to Naruto but someone of that level would never fail in tracking and killing their targets and in this case a Widow and Kid. And because of this, and out of good conscious Naruto would make sure they would be fine.

Naruto drew another smaller circle and connected a line to 'Family Protection.'

"Pretty sure Gato was the one to hire him as well" Naruto muttered remembering said enemy-nin while drawing another line to 'Gato'.

Gato was a mean mean person to try to use a person's family as a hostage else just killing them out of example, but at the same time Naruto couldn't see the petty man shelling out more money to hire actual Ninjas rather than use his thugs.

And then it hit him.

"Oh Shit, this is my fault."

The Traps, the traps that he laid around the house quite extensively was the cause. Something like that would make it practically impossible for any thugs to come in or even come near the house without someone tripping over something and being filled with holes as a result.

Ninja traps were to not be underestimated and his traps even more so. Didn't help that most Ninjas didn't specialise in traps and are just as bad in spotting them.

"But would Gato have hired them without the traps being there?" wondered Naruto before writing the words 'Traps' next to the line connecting 'House Protection' and 'Enemy Ninjas.'

"I could do a Loop without traps to see the results in that but sparing Loops to test things out will just make a bad habit. Some things are best left me ignorant of" said Naruto nodding in his reasoning.

Not to mention he would never want to see the results in what would happen if he just failed to do something. If he tried to kill Gato early and fail, would he send in countless thugs to massacre everyone? If he targeted Zabuza and manage to kill him, how would Haku react to him?

Yes, there were things he just didn't want to know.

Now that was figured out for the most part though still needed a lot of work, Naruto moved onto 'Bridge Protection' since it was the next one. For the most part he wasn't worried as these kinds of things were more of a spur of the moment kind of plans.

Drawing circles for 'Zabuza' and 'Haku' and connecting them to 'Bridge Protection', Naruto wondered about the sequence of events.

"Zabuza and Haku will attack the bridge no matter what. The former will face Kakashi-sensei while the latter will face Sasuke."

If the battle between Sasuke and Haku would be first if left unchecked and Sasuke would eventually lose to Haku due to her Bloodline Limit which was Ice and being above lots of water. Enough said on how that could end up as. The only other place worse to face Haku was in an ice storm.

Haku also said something about Sasuke awakening his own bloodline limit which was probably the Sharingan which was impressive of Sasuke since everyone powerful knew of those eyes. But he still lost so it didn't matter if he awakened those eyes.

Sharingans were just tools to use in the end and if Sasuke couldn't win, there was really no reason to take the time and effort to allow him to fight to get said eyes.

"I'll probably either use him as a distraction or take him out of the fight completely" sighed Naruto not liking either options. It wasn't just right to use a comrade as a scapegoat…repeatedly as well.

Next was the fight between Kakashi and Zabuza. Naruto in no way in hell was getting near that battle for one reason. Two Jonin fighting bad things which usually meant death to anyone weaker than them being caught up in the battle.

It wasn't a matter of power, speed, technique, Jutsu or even Experience but rather all of the above for reasons you could die looking at the battle if you're not careful. Not to mention how Iruka once put it; the pressure itself would crush lesser men. Add in the fact that not only he but his team-mates experienced this first hand as well.

Hell, the usual stoic Sasuke was badly affected by it

Naruto had all the reasons not to interfere in a battle between experienced Jonin. Which led to the other problem he had to deal with.

"However how to deal with Haku…?" Naruto asked to no one particular.

The easily way was to make sure Haku was not an enemy but that was impossible since she follows Zabuza that was impossible. That would only lead to him trying to convince Zabuza of all people on why he shouldn't slaughter them for a pay check.

Genin and some Chunin, maybe due to Kakashi alone. But a Jonin and veteran of a war as well as someone known as The Demon of the Mist who was equally as feared as Kakashi of the Sharingan? Hell no.

"So it's really impossible to get out of this situation without a fight…not to mention whatever Gato would do."

So that way was gone and done with. The only other solution that Naruto could think of was to get rid of Gato or turn them against him…well thinking about how Gato works, he wouldn't be surprised if Gato was really going to turn on Zabuza and Haku in the end.

Actually that probably would happen sooner or later. Naruto only doubt it would happen now in this fight, though he could be wrong.

But even if he brought proof of Gato's betrayal, what was keeping Zabuza from fighting anyway. And not to mention how could Zabuza even think about believing him? Maybe through Haku but he doubt the girl would go against Zabuza.

It was the kind of submissive feeling she gave off to the man that made him think that. The kind that refused to oppose anything other ways…to anyone they consider precious that is.

In all Haku was more similar to him than he thought, both fought for their precious people in the end and didn't like killing. Though that really was all that was similar between them, but it was enough to both of them who really hadn't had many bonds before to connect.

Naruto still felt his stomach turn a bit thinking about the recent event that never happened due to the Loop. And besides, if Haku really wanted to kill him, she would've done so back at the forest when he was vulnerable.

Otherwise, it was certain that both sides would at least spare each other no matter the outcome of the fight. Due to that thought, Naruto decided he would at least be the one to beat Haku, not Kakashi, not Sasuke (who lost anyway) but him!

Haku was…an enemy and yet a friend and someone who was kind. Someone that he really didn't want dead.

'That at least is what I can do for her at least…even if Zabuza dies Haku wouldn't do something stupid like suiciding on a blade to protect that monster' Naruto thought grimly. He could really see Haku breaking down and taking her own life if Zabuza dies.

A few months ago, timeline wise he would've done the same if Iruka died as well.

But then he also had to deal with Sasuke and his pride and need to fight strong people no matter the Time, Place and Situation.

'Perhaps I could bribe Sasuke with a fight against that enemy-nin…though I highly doubt I could convince him. Maybe if I get Kakashi-sensei and Sasuke was injured? No that would be still bad, maybe if I spy on Gato and find out that he was sending someone to target Tsunami and Inari' Naruto mused.

He could possibly infiltrate Gato's hideout and while he would not be able to slaughter everyone in it without anyone knowing, he could sure obtain more information on Gato's plans and how he controlled Wave and from there how to counter his plans.

That way he could at least loosen the iron grip Gato had on the country.

Writing the words 'Infiltrate Hideout' Naruto circled it and connected it to both 'Gato' and 'Wave.'

"Next is the food problem…" Naruto muttered making more plans.

-Break-

Naruto now had a pretty decent plan if all things went right.

However this meant a lot of manipulating from his part which he was never good at and tended to avoid as best he could in order to focus on more important things. That was why he was currently training with his Shadow Clones on burning the leaf with his chakra in order to increase his affinity to fire and more importantly the intensity of his flames.

Else he could give up on that and focus on his natural wind affinity instead using Wind Jutsus to boost his Fire Jutsus instead.

He really wanted to at least have a decent amount of affinity to Fire Jutsus since he live in the Land of Fire! Where there are tonnes of Fire type Jutsus out there to learn and use. It was just…stupid to not use the resources that he had to get stronger.

And the reason was definitely not because Fire Jutsus were way flashier than Wind Jutsus or the fact that he was already half-way there with his Fire Affinity and he didn't want to stop mid-way and start on a new one.

Since Wind Jutsus were quite rare in Konoha and apparently he was one of three people in Konoha who had a Wind Affinity, it was only logical to go the route which had more resources.

But back to his plans.

For starters Naruto decided it was better to just place up the Traps around Tazuna's home than taking a risk. As a safety to anyone other than a Chunin enemy-nin that could get through it, it didn't mean it didn't also keep out the other thugs that Gato had.

"Probably for the best even if I'm wrong."

Narrowing down the amount of enemies that could harm Tsunami and Inari was good and Naruto didn't intend to let anything bad happen to them if he could. And of course his Traps were a combination of actual Traps and Fuinjutsu and dong so increased his skills in the latter bit by bit in that area.

Though Fuinjutsu was something that needed constant training and supervision so he wasn't progressing in that area particularly fast.

He was pretty close in making a proper 'Key' of his seals since condensing of sealing scripts weren't that difficult when you had the hang of it. It was just layering large amounts of seal writing into something smaller that you could willingly expand if you need.

The only issue was actually the Chakra Control needed to do so without the Seal exploding.

"So many Shadow Clones…dead due to that. Don't even want to think of how many fingers I would have left if I didn't have that Jutsu" said Naruto thanking he Gods he learnt the Shadow Clone Jutsu.

Second of all in his plans to NOT get Sasuke to fight Haku, he was going to use Shadow Clones to learn of Gato's plans and then use that to convince Sasuke that a skilled and trustworthy person could only protect the civilians.

Hopefully that could convince both Sasuke and Kakashi that his idea was a good idea. Gato couldn't have hired anyone else as strong as Zabuza in a short while and Jonins were much more expensive than Chunins.

Third in his plans was to help out Wave directly. Simply taking out thugs, supplying food and making sure those people who had given up would rise against Gato or anyone else that would dare try and take away their freedom again. While Naruto was bad at manipulating people he was good at motivation speeches.

There's a difference. Really, he was good at making people do things he wants when he's not trying to intentionally manipulate them. When he wants to, the opposite happens instead and everyone knows that Naruto is trying to get something.

The final part of his plan?

Simply get strong enough to defeat Haku, simple as that. He could plan and plan until his head burst from all the strain but in the end in order to complete this mission, Haku needed to be defeated, Zabuza needed to be defeated and Gato needed to be defeated. There was no way out of that since none of them would back down.

"But how the hell do I counter that Ice Style?" Naruto wondered. Even Fire Jutsus seemed ineffective compared to that Bloodline Limit and Naruto wasn't even sure that Haku was strained during the fight at all.

She perfectly baited him to the point where she had him and he couldn't even react in turn. No, Naruto shook his head. He could react but couldn't do anything in the end at all; THAT was the main problem he was having.

Taijutsu and Ninjutsu wise, Haku outclassed him in how she used them both. She used them both perfectly well enough to counter him and being the fight into her own advantage with ease. Naruto had his own Taijutsu style with Shadow Clones but its main weakness will always be against those with rapid fire, wide spread attacks that can clear out countless Shadow Clones with ease.

Palming his face Naruto muttered, "I don't want to kill her…"

The experience with that enemy Chunin was still traumatising to him and the thought of killing someone was still fresh on his mind. Doing that to Haku was unthinkable especially since Haku was a friend to Naruto even if it takes a single conversation for that to happen.

But at the same time as he knew he didn't want to kill Haku…did he have a choice?

In the end, as a Ninja of Konoha he was obligated to fulfil the mission no matter what and no matter how much he didn't want to do something.

"I bet that's one of the reasons so many rookie Genin are forced to take up D-rank chores" he snorted. Development of skills otherwise, it was already good practise in learning to deal with missions that you're not pleased with.

But back to the issue he was currently having.

"If I screw up and someone dies…and the checkpoint happens…" Naruto mused with a shiver in his spine. He didn't want to deal with that. Kakashi was already quite…unstable in his habits and compounding the deaths of students with that?

The man could break down just like that, Naruto wasn't that unobservant to the point that a year worth of interactions with the man even in a Time Loop to not notice how he looked at that damn stone all the time and that he was always early and always became late due to it.

At one point Naruto was even tempted to destroy the stone to see what kind of reaction he had. But then the thoughts 'Elite Jonin', 'Enraged' and 'Unstable' made those plans scrapped, burnt and ashes sent very far away.

In all, there were some things that Naruto refused to see even if the time looped saved him.

"That means I can only polish myself up and hope that I have the ability to defeat Haku…though with the Kyubi's Chakra" he mused before a flashback of ragehotredrageandangerbeforehewouldeverfeel went through him.

Nope, he was NOT going to use the Kyubi's chakra at all if he could help it. Hell he didn't even know how to use it at all and that feeling it gave him…he was beyond empowered by it and at the same time losing himself as quickly as he got more power from it.

Plus…there was so much hate in using that chakra that Naruto felt that he would change for the worse if he kept on using it.

If anything, using the Kyubi's chakra was akin to a Forbidden Jutsu of almost the highest level that would permanently risk your mind the more you use it. That means he was left with using his rather fragmented Taijutsu style that mixed in with Shadow Clones, some support Earth Jutsus and some ranged Fire Jutsus.

But then there were other things he had to train as well. His use of weapons like Kunai and Shurikens could be brought up a level and the infinite amount of Chakra Control he needed as well was another thing he would need to work on. Not to mention those other techniques like Chakra Compression and so on he needed to hone.

As he found out before, Shadow Clone Training really didn't pick up unless he completely focused on a single training method and pounded every single instance of it into it to give the maximum effect. Which meant he really had a week's worth of Shadow Clone Training in one area at a time until he faced against Haku if his plans went right.

"Might as well focus on my Fire Jutsus" said Naruto, "I wanna see if I can get my flames hot enough to melt those Ice Mirrors easily! And if I can't…well I suppose I could work on Chakra Compression to see if punching those Ice Mirrors hard enough will break them."

Or perhaps he should try to avoid the battle altogether. That may be good but he decided it was best to fight since there were times where he couldn't just run away.

-Break-

Three Loops and a week later Naruto was dragging Sasuke's unconscious body away while dodging a hail of Sebon raining down both on them.

"Of course he doesn't listen! I give him bloody help in getting stronger and what does he do? Run into a fucking death trap to test himself! God! This is worse than the last three when I tried to convince him not to fight Haku!" complained Naruto as he quickly made another Shadow Clone and pumped out lots of Chakra into them with surprising precision so they can take more hits.

One thing that Naruto noticed that the more 'perfect' his Shadow Clones were, the more hits that they could make but also mental backlash.

It was difficult and took Naruto two whole Loops of practise to make one more durable Shadow Clone under strain of battle. Luckily enough, since he used the damn Jutsu so many times, he actually made a couple of such Shadow Clones without knowing during training for a while now.

And funnily enough, he really only got into the practise of making more durable Shadow Clones on accident when one of his Fire Jutsus went wrong and exploded in the face of said Shadow Clones and it lived.

'The mental backlash for that incident was particularly bad as well.'

On another note, low powered Shadow Clones disguised as Inari and Tsunami were perfect in getting rid of that Mizu-nin without worry of a large battle. You would expect for a Chunin to have enough Chakra sense to tell if a person was a civilian or a transformed ninja!

But as he got the memories of his newly dispelled Shadow Clones, he paused for a split second which was enough for another Ninja to take advantage of to attack.

"Ice Style: Ice Spear!" Haku roared as she threw the more dangerous attacks to Naruto. Man he shouldn't have groped her that one time this Loop. It was a spur of the moment thing! It wasn't his fault!

'Oh the possibilities with durable Shadow Clones' Naruto sighed thinking about said event even when Ice Spears were being thrown at the duo to which Sasuke was still knocked out from the more dangerous than usual fight the two had.

It was a good thing that he sent a Shadow Clone to meet up with Haku this loop else the Loop would've ended there.

In all, through the three Loops plus this one, Naruto hadn't made much progress. His Fire Affinity grew a bit better but he was in no way that far in mastering the damn element within the year. He started his Wind Affinity soon after realising that he was getting nowhere with his Fire Affinity for now even with Shadow Clones and his control over Chakra Compression was slightly better while Chakra Cycling and Chakra Folding was still considered too dangerous for him to use personally.

"Get back here!" Roared Haku once again completely different from the usual calm self she was killing the previous Shadow Clone before stumbling a bit at the same time.

Seeing a chance, Naruto dropped Sasuke and flicked through hand-seals and shouted, "Fire Style: Grand Fireball Jutsu!"

Immediately seeing the threat, Haku used the Body Flicker Jutsu to dodge the giant Fireball that was less of a flamethrower and more like a ball of intense fire before throwing some Sebon forcing Naruto to stop the Jutsu and dodge as well.

Unfortunately he still had problems using the Body Flicker Jutsu without being fling all over the place.

Which made sense as Naruto leaped too far forward and landed right in front of one already furious Kunoichi with a very powerful Bloodline Limit. Luckily enough he didn't manage to leap right into her chest.

That would make everything much more painful when she killed him...or at least froze him until the Loop ended.

"Ice Style: Frozen Hell Grave!"

As Ice rapidly encased him completely, Naruto could only sigh and think that he wouldn't piss Haku off next time. It was so much easier for him when she was holding back on the fight. Plus, at least he knew now that one of his plans was working. He didn't need to worry for Inari and Tsunami and didn't need to bother Sasuke to not go to the bridge and failing each time.

There was progress and that's what important to Naruto.

Checkpoint 4: Loop 9 End (Total Loops 67)

A/N:

Hello people!

It's been...a month? Two month since I last updated? Yeah, blame my writer's block for this chapter. Ironically enough, now that I'm back in Uni with lots and lots of work to do, I actually finished this chapter in one go while I slowly added words over my break.

Yeah, still don't get how I managed to write more when I'm stressed about other stuff than when I'm relaxed.

There isn't much of a battle scene in this battle but rather Naruto sorted though his thoughts on Wave and how to fix it. If you think about it, Team 7 while taking out Gato pretty much left Wave in ruins.

People were still starving, there were probably still some thugs around and the only thing that they got was really hope for a better future.

Other than that food of thought, Naruto in this chapter has a couple other revelations about his own strengths compared to other people. Partly because he and Sasuke aren't exactly even equals when the former teaches the latter.

Also, Naruto can probably take any of the Rookie Nine right now and win but it'll be due to his mass Chakra Reserves and not in his other abilities. I mean Kishimoto made a pretty unique bunch as part of the cast after all.

Too bad most of them were glossed over else faced enemies too difficult. For a normal ninja, Ino would be frightening considering what she can do using Mind Based Jutsu.

Shino has his Bugs. Bugs. Reading the Web Series Worm made me appreciate him a LOT more on the possible damage he could deal out in mass. All it takes is a small highly poisonous bite and most would drop dead. If not? Bite a couple dozen more times.

Also, does no one ever think of how Chouji is a one hit kill type? He's slow, but he literally has enough power to kill most enemies in one go if he's not careful. Not much of an enemy of you're turned to paste. Also too bad that he had to face monsters who can take that hit and more like Akatsuki.

So yeah, food of thought for now.

Not really wanting to write a few pages on another subject in Naruto. Hyugas and their Byakugan...how the fuck are they close-combat specialists?

Another thing is that I reworked my plot for later on in the series. The characters I've listed that would be in the story? May not be there later on. I've got something a lot more interesting for the Chunin Exam Arc.

Though I may take a break for some months at that point to dish out a dozen chapters later on.