A/N: Thanks for all your reviews they were encouraging and informative. Someone asked if Naruto will be learning Diable Jambe, the answer if yes eventually. It won't be happening for a long! Time. He will most likely learn it after or during the time skip, when it's actually needed. Reason? Pre-time skip: verses Genin to Jounin (sometimes, when Naruto's bad luck kicks in), does not have dangerous S-class ninja's attacking him and his friends… post-time skip: 9 s-class actively seeking all the bijuu, I think he will need a powerful ace up his sleeve.
Normal
"Talk"
Think
Technique/Inner Character
Demon Talk
Demon Think
I do not own Naruto or any Naruto characters, nor do I own any one-piece references or characters that are mentioned in this story. I do own any OC's displayed unless I say otherwise.
BEGIN
MIND SCAPE
Naruto was once again looking at the Hokage monument in his head, looking at each of the cracks and faulty cuttings,
"Why and how would someone do this?" Sanji shrugged at the question and followed Naruto through the hall, entering the largest room 4 large statues stood proudly… well they would have if they hadn't been cracked, smashed, eaten and then spat out again, behind each of the statues was a portrait of what they should have looked like.
The first was a large image of a figure lying down on the ground staring at the roof; he was shaped suspiciously similar to Shikamaru; His name was intelligence, he had a large split down the centre of his head causing it to be cut in two.
The second was a statue of a girl poking her index figures together while 'blushing' not that you could tell it being a statue and all. It looked eerily like Hinata; her name was reasoning, she had lost her feet and she was cut in thirds.
The third figure looked like it had been Choji's 3rd lunch, bits and pieces were thrown around the room and left never to be touched again. The portrait showed that it should have been staring strait forward as if analysing your worth, he looked very similar to Shino; his name was logic.
The last figure had a smile on his face and had opened his arms like a grandfather would a small child, wearing the Hokage robes and all it looked exactly like the third Hokage; his name was Memory, unfortunately he had been cut exactly in half, from his crotch to the top of his head.
Looking at each of the figures Sanji watched as Naruto tried to put them back together only for them to fall back apart. Sighing he left the poor boy and went to annoy the oversized fox.
OUTSIDE WORLD
Kakashi groaned as he opened his eyes, squinting as the bright light hit his eyes then he attempted to get up,
"I wouldn't do that if I were you" Kakashi discovered he could barely move, shifting his position he peered at the person who spoke; It was Naruto. Looking around the room he saw his other 2 students there as well. Smelling something he saw Naruto holding a plate of food, giving a questioning glance at Naruto he observed as Naruto handed the plate over. Kakashi slowly ate it, his loss of mask hidden by a complex illusion. He was savouring every flavour unknowingly crying at the beautiful taste.
"Dobe, is your cooking really that good?" Sasuke asked observing Kakashi being reduced to crying at the taste, Naruto answered as Kakashi was nodding as fast as he could,
"I wouldn't know, I've always eaten my food, want to try some?" Sasuke just nodded still looking at Kakashi, Sakura curious desired to try some,
"Can I have some to?" Naruto visibly brightened up at he prospect of treating 'his' Sakura-chan to some of his delicious food, calming down he rushed towards the kitchen. Tsunami was silently crying because a 'boy' was taking over her kitchen.
As Naruto was buzzing away in the kitchen Kakashi had a distinct feeling something was wrong. Thinking back towards the hunter-nin he paused. Hitting himself over the head then cursing as it hurt he turned towards the only person still in the room.
"Sakura, what weapon did the hunter-nin use?" Sakura pondered over the question, she distinctly remembered the hunter using Senbon needles,
"Senbon needles, but they have a low mortality rate!" Kakashi nodded, peering at his hands he turned to the door, deciding to bring the bad news to the other two.
"Sasuke, Naruto what is a hunter-nin?" Naruto looked on in confusion while Sasuke paused in the eating of the 'best food in the world' to answer the 'test'.
"A hunter-nin is a specialised nin in taking down missing-nin so that the secrets they hold can't be discovered by any rival villages" Kakashi nodded while Naruto was inwardly cursing his brain, he had some idea at what they mean. Kakashi paused and looked at his blond haired pupal, Curiously (in Kakashi's opinion) Naruto appeared to be angry with himself for not understanding what they meant. It was as if something was wrong with his thinking process,
'Not possible though, the Kyuubi would fix any damage as soon as it happened'
"How did he dispose of the body?" Kakashi continued, Sasuke cursed he didn't see it what he did.
"I don't know, I never saw him do it. He took the body and left" Sasuke's eyes widened as Kakashi's point implanted itself in his brain,
"You don't mean?" Kakashi solemnly nodded, Sasuke cursed. Naruto being Naruto looked between the two of them in confusion. Sakura seeing Naruto's confusion decided to give the bond idiot the answer in terms he would understand.
"Naruto, Zabuza is alive" this time it was Naruto's eyes that widened,
"What? We barely won last time!" Kakashi looked at his three subordinates, hundred of answers to defeating Zabuza running unchecked through his head, after about 20 minutes of consideration 1 solution stood above the rest,
"Its time for advanced training" all three students looked at the their sensei, a silent agreement. They disappeared before Inari could do his usual complaining.
The next day found them landing in front of the tallest trees in the nearby landscape.
"Were going to be climbing trees" all three students looked at Kakashi confusedly, chuckling he explained,
"Your going to be using chakra to climb the trees without your hands!" again they all looked at Kakashi like he was a foreigner, Sighing he used he crutches and slowly walked up the tree using only he feet, standing on the nearest branch he saw all three of his students look at him wide eyed,
"Like this!" Sasuke was to first to snap out of his stupor, eyes Kakashi he spoke what was on his mind,
"What help is this?" Kakashi just smiled, not that you could tell. Looking at his 'cute' student he entered lecture mode,
"This will improve your chakra control, allowing you to theoretically perform any jutsu" finishing with an eye smile he waited for the question that was sure to follow, it was Naruto who asked it,
"Why haven't you taught us this yet?" Kakashi looked at each of his students lazily before speaking,
"You weren't ready, it is as simple as that" Sasuke and Naruto seemed to be negatively angered at that while Sakura just accepted the answer. Seeing the growing anger rising in two of his protégées he quenched their unrighteous anger,
"Sasuke, you firmly believed everything should be handed to you. Thus I had to literally train you to the ground and reach a point before I taught you anything." Sasuke's eyebrow twitched in memory of the training lessons they had, he had his expectation of everything being handed to him on a platter literally beaten out of him. Eyeing Sakura Kakashi spoke again,
"Sakura, you had such a fan girl thought process you had below average physical attributes. I had to build up your stamina to an acceptable level before I could even see your chakra control" Sakura lowered her head in shame, it was true she like 90 of the fan-girl club firmly believed the best way to get Sasuke to like them was to have a nice figure and not be bulgy with muscle mass or fat. Naruto was grinning he couldn't help it. Every flaw his teammates had was pointed out; luckily he had none (or so he thought).
"Naruto, you were by far the worst." Seeing Naruto's shocked face, Kakashi laughed, it was amusing.
"You had absolutely no ninja knowledge, you hadn't even mastered the academy chakra control exercises. You didn't know how to read and write properly it was no wonder you were the dead last at the academy. The only things that was going in your favour is your massive chakra supply, currently it is more than me, and your stamina which is about equal to mine and your unique taijutsu ability." Kakashi left Naruto's depressed look and focussed at his other two students, seeing Sasuke smug look and Sakura's brightened up. He was disappointed, he expected better, so he decided to let his blond student have some pride,
"Sakura, who taught you to read and write?" Sakura paused for a moment before answering,
"My parents" she gasped the reason why Naruto was so stupid finally implanting itself in her large brain, Sasuke looked at Naruto with a new respect. Kakashi continued,
"Sasuke, when you were learning what chakra was and they handed out the entire selection of text books, what happened?" Sasuke paused and thought long and hard, this was all before the Uchiha-Massacre, so he didn't like to think about it often. Putting such thoughts beside his eyes widened,
"They skipped Naruto, they never gave him the text book and when he spoke up they told him to leave the class for disrupting it. When a student asked why they told us he already knew all about chakra" this time it was Naruto's time to look up, seeing Kakashi in a new light for the first time he truly thought,
'he doesn't hate me, he truly doesn't hate me. Only someone truly interested in my capabilities would look that far back in my life' Sakura and Sasuke were ashamed now, earlier they had felt superior to Naruto. They had forgotten about all the early teachers had done to disrupt his progress. Seeing how all three of his students were humbled he threw all three of them kunai,
"Use these to mark your progress, get going!" sitting back he watched them begin to climb trees.
The evening each of team seven was eating his or her fill, they were starving. Surprisingly Sakura had finished the exercise first, before she could celebrate Kakashi explained that the only reason she did so well was because she had the littlest amount of chakra, he told her to run up the trees until she could go no longer. She somehow managed to make it for half the day before resting for a few hours watching the boys still going hard, it was then that the truth of the matter was she was the worst,
'Naruto has better taijutsu than Sasuke, Sasuke has the best Ninjutsu knowledge but the only think I have excess of is brain power' needless to say when she got back to Konoha she was going to put her brain power to use.
A week went past, every day from dawn to dusk all three students attempted to perfect the tree walking technique. Sakura had visibly improved her stamina and Naruto nodded with satisfaction as he could now produce double the amount of Kage bunshin as before. Sasuke also noted he could now perform his favourite jutsu using allot less chakra and his increased reserves. That evening Inari decided to put an end to there optimism.
"You don't understand, this isn't your town you don't know what true suffering is!" something snapped, Kakashi saw the tell tail signs of anger and rage coming from Naruto.
"So you think you can be the star of your own melodrama? Stop being so selfish you CRY BABY" Naruto jumped up and left the room. Kakashi sighed and when Inari left decided to tell him what Naruto meant.
Entering the clearing Naruto decided to relieve some stress, creating 500 Kage bunshin he got them to attack him. The fight ranged from on the ground to in the trees using the newly taught control to make the fight more interesting especially when he discovered that if he repeated an attack or technique enough mentally they would eventually do it themselves. Needless to say it came as a surprise when some of his clones started to dodge attacks using Kawarimi and henged to escape and sneak attacked Naruto. Unfortunately because of his fighting he never noticed his own skills at using Kawarimi and henge increase, or his sudden gain in experience due the gathered hours his dispelled clones contributed.
Haku was gathering herbs when he saw what looked like a massive battle sight, tree were broken every ware and some hard rocks had foot indents and others were shattered. Luckily for his purposes he saw a small patch untouched that contained the final herb he needed. Walking over saw in the side of his eyes a young male wearing bright orange, he recognised it as the mastermind behind Kakashi's rescue. Seeing him apparently sleep he decided to wake him up, do a little recon if you will. Walking over to the 'sleeping' boy he was surprised when the blond ass-kicker jumped in the air and landed on one of the branches. Naruto seeing it only a 'civilian' determined the intruder was not a threat and lowered his guard. A conversation insured,
"What are you doing here? And what your name?" Haku asked, although he had his suspicions, his thoughts were confirmed by Naruto's reply,
"I'm training, trying to get stronger! And my name is Naruto!" Naruto shouted with glee, happiness etched across his face. Haku chuckled,
"Are you a ninja? You look strong enough already!" it was true, although he wasn't bulky he had firm muscled all over his body. Each muscle gained through excruciating hours of physical training at some points so painful his muscles had felt like there were burning. Naruto answered,
"I have to get stronger to win my villages recognition, gain acknowledgment and then become the Hokage!" Naruto's point of view was literally yelled, it was his dream, and even a stranger should know it and have it stuck to their heart. Haku had a thoughtful look upon his face,
"Is this for yourself or for another?" Naruto couldn't grasp what the feminine boy meant.
"What?" Haku sighed it is always the blonds.
"Do you have someone precious to you? If you have someone precious to protect then you can become truly strong." Naruto sat there in silent contemplation, thinking about Iruka, the Hokage and his new team; he smiled and turned to Haku.
"Yes lady, I know that! So what are you doing?" Haku smiled then answered carefully choosing his words,
"I'm gathering herbs, someone I know is sick and we can't afford to go to a hospital" Naruto felt his heart go out to her; he felt sympathy to 'her' plight. Resolving himself he offered his assistance,
"Can I help you…" Haku seeing his confusion gave him 'her' name,
"Haku" Naruto sighed in relief and continued,
"Haku, can I help gather the herbs?" Haku smiled and agreed, gathering the herbs he stood up to leave,
"Thanks for the help Naruto-kun" walking away he stopped, turned and looked at Naruto saying,
"Oh, and I a guy" Naruto looked at Haku and his jaw dropped to the floor,
'He's cuter than Sakura-chan!' his mentor in his mind saying something similar… only a lot more mature
" WHAT! Tell me this isn't true Haku-CHHAAANNNNN" Naruto inwardly sighed at his teacher's behaviour
'you know he can't hear you?'
END
A/N: In the original chapter I had a rant about here how I just couldn't understand Naruto and his personality. Well I have learnt some more, I will be incorporating this into the story. Not only that, but I have met some people lately that are similar to Naruto (personality wise).
NEXT TIME: second Zabuza fight and Gato makes his appearance?
Please Review and honesty is appreciated. Thanks, The great David