Chapter 9: elemental training, plus more missions.
We find our two genin at training ground seven, again waiting for Kakashi to arrive. They spend the time waiting for him by working on fuinjutsu, making sure they're ready for more complex seals.
After three hours, Kakashi finally arrives. "Sorry I'm late, I had to help an old lady cross the street." He explains.
"Now that I'm here though, I'll explain the next step in your training. So you each learned a c rank jutsu in your respective elements. Neither truly requiring mastery of your elements. Today, I'll show you what you need to start the process."
"Tenten, for fire it's simple. You'll take a leaf and focus fire chakra from the middle, burning the leaf while leaving the edges intact. Be careful not to burn yourself." He says to the girl before handing her a leaf.
"Naruto, for earth, you'll need to mold earth chakra into your hands, and scoop dirt without spilling it. If you do it right, it'll stick to your hands." Kakashi explains.
"Why do I have to do that though? I'm just picking up dirt right?" Naruto asks, somewhat confused.
"Not quite. You see, the goal is to properly mold earth chakra. Doing this will help with that, thus reducing how much chakra you'll have to use on an earth jutsu. This is only the first step though, but for now you'll work on this." Kakashi explains to him, patting Naruto on his head.
Naruto nods and creates five shadow clones, each attempting to scoop dirt with their hands with hardly any success, dropping much of it.
Tenten takes the leaf that Kakashi handed her and tries to mold fire chakra into it, attempting to burn it. She focused really hard, and lets out a yell. "Ouch, son of a…." She says as she drops the charred lead on the ground.
"Careful now." Kakashi chides her. "Too much and it'll be charred, remember control is the name of the game here." Kakashi advises her.
Tenten nods her head, and tries again after getting a new leaf. She puts it between her hands and tries to burn it with fire chakra.
This time she does a bit better, managing to somewhat burn it, but not nearly enough. "I'm getting it! How are you doing with your dirt Naruto?" She asks her teammate.
Naruto dispels his clones and tries again, this time getting a bit of dirt to stick to his hands. "I'm not quite there, but I think I know what to do now." Naruto answers her.
The two keep at it, working diligently. Once the day begins to end Kakashi dismisses them, informing them both to meet back up with Gai the next morning.
The next morning they arrive at their usual training ground and meet with Gai and Lee.
"Ah good morning my youthful students, how was training with my eternal rival Kakashi?" Gai asks his two students.
"It went well, Gai sensei." Naruto answers. "He taught each of us a jutsu and had us start on elemental manipulation training."
"Ah, very good. Make sure to work hard, elemental manipulation is advanced work, but it will help you both become truly splendid ninja." Gai says, smiling wide.
"Now, today we will be taking a few missions, some d ranks." Gai tells his genin. They all nod their heads as they head to collect their mission for the day.
They all arrive at the mission desk and find the hokage and a chunin handing out missions.
"Team Gai is here to request a mission lord third." Gai says to the Hokage. Hiruzen nods and looks through the available missions.
"Ah, here we go. I've got just the mission. It seems Tora has escaped and needs to be found." The hokage says handing Gai the mission scroll.
Gai reads it over and nods. "Very well, we shall accomplish it in no time flat!" He says giving a thumbs up and flashing a blinding smile.
"Tenten, you will be lookout for the target. Naruto, I want you to funnel it to Lee, and Lee, you are to capture Tora, understood?" He asks his team.
They all agree and head out to look for the demon cat from hell.
Thirty minutes later we find them on the hunt.
"I've got my eyes on the target, Lee, Naruto, are you both in position?" Tenten asks her two teammates over the radio.
They both answer yes. Tenten gives the signal, and with that naruto herds the cat towards Lee who grabs it, however it mauls his face and escapes.
"Ah, my face!" Lee screams, clutching where he was attacked.
"Quick, he's getting away!" Tenten says to naruto. He nods, making two clones to chase the cat while he goes underground with his new earth jutsu.
Naruto pops up above the ground and grabs the cat holding on for dear life. With Tora captured, team Gai makes their way back to drop him off and get paid, and tend to Lee's face.
And this'll be the end for this chapter. It's a slow process but we've got a jutsu for the two, and started the training to master their elements. Next time I think we'll do a month or so long time skip, by chapter 20 I'll want us to hit the start of the canon series ideally, though I'm not sure yet on that.
also I do want to note that I'm taking inspiration on the earth elemental training from the fanfic titled a nugget of advice, in it Naruto has earth release and is actually trained by Ebisu for the exams. It's a pretty good read being about 36 or so chapters. I definitely recommend it.
As always please leave a review, thank you so much for reading!
Doton: Moguragakure no Jutsu - earth release: hiding like a mole jutsu
Katon: Gōkakyū no Jutsu - Fire style: Fireball jutsu