Bodyguard of Azula

by Deus Swiftblade

Naruto is banished from Konoha but gives them the slip and boards a ship. Soon after, he is shipwrecked on Ember island and is saved by Azula. Three years later, Naruto is Azula's bodyguard while she hunts for the Avatar, but did he see the last of Konoha?

53. To Chase and To Ascend

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or The Last Airbender.

Bodyguard of Azula

Chapter 53: To Chase and To Ascend

"Talking"

"Thinking"

"Bijū/spirit talking"

"Bijū/spirit thinking"

(Location: Land of Fire capital)

The second their feet hit the ground; they went after the Akatsuki member. They tore through the street, people either getting out of their way or getting pushed aside. "Go higher up!" Kakashi told Naruto. "You'll be able to reach him faster!"

He nodded and veered off. He ran through the crowd, ignoring the screams and cries of surprise of people who leapt out of his path and over to a nearby building. He didn't stop once he reached the side of the building. He placed a foot on the wall and ran up it. Reaching the top, he leapt over the edge and raced across the rooftops. Without the people in the street in his way, he was able to run faster, gaining ground on Tobi.

But Tobi saw him on the rooftops when he looked behind him. "That's cheating!" he complained, reverting to the childish tone he used before. "If you're going to cheat, then I'm going to cheat too!" He started to duck, weave, leapfrog over people (making them briefly shout in protest), and run alongside building walls, all the while flapping his arms like he was an idiot or trying to fly. But it served a purpose as it made following him more difficult.

"Kami, he's more annoying than when the fox is right!" Naruto silently swore.

"Hey, I resent that accusation!" the Kyūbi protested. "Besides, we both know now that's all an act. If what we saw in the room was the real him, then we really have to be careful."

"Thank you, Captain Obvious!" He leapt across the gap between rooftops before turning right, staying on Tobi's tail. It was difficult, due to the fact he had to make to keep an eye on the Akatsuki member while also making sure that he didn't crash into anything.

Kakashi stayed on the ground, running through the crowd, who started to disperse after they chased the masked man. Normally, he would've tried to hit the target with a kunai so the target would be slower and would also leave him a blood trail to track. But what prevented him from doing that was the people in his way and the fact that Tobi was all over the place as he ran. If he had been a less experienced shinobi, he would've gotten angry and started making mistakes. But he wasn't, he kept his cool and tried to keep his target in sight.

Pretty soon, the three of them were running through empty streets, or in Naruto's case, empty rooftops. They had also traveled far from the royal palace and even the business district. They were now making their way through the slums. Naruto had to be even more careful now, one wrong step and he would fall through the ceiling. But as he ran, he saw an opportunity present itself to stop Tobi. He quickened his pace, running ahead of his target, and then stopped. Pulling out a couple of kunai, he threw them in the direction Tobi was running, hitting the ground just in front of him.

"Ah, there are kunai in front of me!" he screamed the obvious, skidding to a stop just short of them. "Who threw those?!" he demanded, looking around exaggeratedly. When he looked up and saw Naruto standing on the rooftop, he yelped and ran down a different street, away from the Paragon.

"Right where I want him," Naruto silently cheered. When he saw Kakashi make the turn to continue after Tobi, he knew he had to get back in the chase, otherwise they would never catch him. He backed up to the other side of the rooftop, took a deep breath, and charged to the edge. He leapt across the wide gap between the different sides of the street, feeling like he was just hanging in the air for a moment. The moment ended when he landed on the other roof, rolling his body on impact and coming out of it in a run, catching up easily to Kakashi and Tobi.

Kakashi was slowly gaining ground as Naruto caught up with them. He quickly drew out a shuriken and threw it at the side of Tobi's head. The sound of it flying alerted the Akatsuki member, as he did a sharp turn into an alleyway. Kakashi wasted no time as he made the same turn, flashing through handseals. "Doton: Doryūheki (Earth Style: Earth-Style Wall)!" he cried, slamming his hands into the ground. The ground in front of Tobi shot up out of the ground, blocking his way with a wall that had four bulldog heads sculpted on it. "You've got no place to run now," he declared as he stood in front of the orange masked Akatsuki member.

Tobi didn't reply, he simply looked at the top of the wall, gauging the distance to the top of it and the time it would take to get over it. "Don't even think about it," Naruto warned him as he landed on the wall. "We've got you, start talking," he ordered, pulling out a kunai.

"Very well," Tobi said, his voice once again losing the childish tone. "What is it you would like to know?"

---

"Well, now what do we do?" Sai asked as he looked out the window Naruto and his former sensei had leapt out of. He couldn't see them anymore, so he pulled his head back in.

"We really can't do anything now," Sokka pointed out from where he sat on the floor.

"What do you mean you can't do anything?" Nadare asked, looking frantically at them.

"You're not useful anymore, Nadare Rōga," Sasuke told him as he walked up to the chair, then around it so he stood behind him. "You know what that means."

"But…but I still have valuable information!" he protested, desperate to find a way out with his life. "You can't kill me when I have that to offer."

"You do realize that Akatsuki member offered us that same valuable information, which would probably be a lot better than what you would probably have, and all we have to do to get that information is to chase him down, right?" Sakura asked. "So, it's rather pointless to keep you around."

"But you don't know if they'll be able to catch him, so I'm still your best bet."

"You obviously don't know Naruto all that well," Azula said with a smug smirk. "He'll catch him, there's no doubt in my mind about that. So, again, you're not useful."

He tried to come up with something that would keep him alive, but came up with nothing, despite racking through his brain several times over. "Indeed, I am not," He admitted in a defeated tone. "So kill me already."

Sasuke raised his hand, ready to strike the killing blow, only to stop when Jiraiya shook his head slightly. "I have one question for you, Nadare, before you die. Why did you help the Akatsuki kill Koyuki?" the Toad Sage asked him.

He didn't answer for a couple of seconds. When it looked like he wouldn't answer, he did. "If I had succeeded in this mission, I would've become one of their members. It should've been my initiation mission." He gave a harsh, bitter chuckle. "How wrong was I? Go ahead and kill me. My greatest wish has been fulfilled, now I can serve Lord Dotō in the afterlife."

"Was your greatest wish killing Koyuki?" Suki asked him, anger in her voice.

His chuckle turned to crazed laughter. "I thought that would've been obvious. That bitch is dead and the Land of Spring with her. Long live the Land of Snow!" he declared loudly and with glee.

Everyone else shared a look with each other and all had the same thought. June walked away from the wall she had been leaning against and made her way to the door. She banged on the door a couple of times. "Hey, could you come in here for a quick second?" she called out.

The door opened. When Nadare saw who came in, his mind snapped. "No! No, no, no, no, no , no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO!" he screamed. "YOU'RE DEAD! YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD! HOW IS THIS—"

He would've continued ranting, had the sound of birds chirping not filled the air. He felt a shock hit his heart and filled his body with indescribable pain. The last thing he heard was "Chidori (One Thousand Birds)."

---

"How about we start off simple? Were the Akatsuki involved in Dotō's revolt?" Kakashi asked the masked Akatsuki member.

"Of course, we were," Tobi answered. "He paid us to help him overthrow his brother's rule and we did."

That answer threw them a little bit. "…That was too easy," Naruto told him. "Why would you answer so easily?"

"I told you, didn't I? If you wanted to get the information you so desperately wanted, all you had to do was catch me. You did, so I will tell you what you want to know," he explained patiently, not bothering to look up at him. "Was there anything else you wanted to know?"

Both Naruto and Kakashi shared a look that showed their disbelief and suspicion. They both knew something like this was simply too good to be true. Tobi was not going to reveal everything about the Akatsuki, they could tell that by his choice of words.

"Why were you trying to have the Daimyo of Spring and Princess Miki killed?" Kakashi demanded, turning his attention back to him.

He took a thinking pose that purposely annoyed them. "Well, if I had to be specific, Koyuki was for entertainment's sake, but Miki was business."

"What the hell does that mean?" Naruto asked. "You call having a Daimyo killed entertainment?!"

"No, I consider watching you all running around, trying to figure out how to keep her safe entertaining. Oh, don't look so surprised," he admonished them. "I told you already, I know how Konoha shinobi operates. What you were doing would be obvious if no one knew where to look."

"And Miki was business?" Kakashi repeated.

"You should have your ears either cleaned or checked, Kakashi. I already told you that."

"How is she different?"

"Well, I had to make a passing attempt at protecting my interests, didn't I?" He asked like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"What do you mean by that? How would killing the princess of the Land of Fire protect your interests?" Naruto asked, being baffled at what he heard.

"It would keep her father on the throne longer, for one," he pointed out. "Let's face it; the capital is one mistake short of having the Daimyo overthrown and placing his daughter in charge. If she's dead, that'll be delayed for a while."

That was when Kakashi made the connection. "The Fire Daimyo is working with you, isn't he?" he accused the Akatsuki member.

"He asked you to put the second hit on his daughter?" Naruto demanded, also realizing what that meant. "Who would ask to have their own daughter be killed?" he silently asked.

"Are you forgetting the Asshole?" the Kyūbi asked in return. "He was fairly mad after Zuko and Azula had left."

"That was a rhetorical question, fox!"

"You would both be wrong," Tobi announced, getting their attention again. "The Fire Daimyo does not work with us. We just pulled his strings. He is used to that happening to him, considering his first wife had been doing it to him ever since they were married."

"How do you know about his first wife?" Kakashi asked him, not liking where this was going.

"That's simple; we were the ones to have her killed," he answered with a straight face. "Once she was dead, we moved in and took her spot."

"You depraved a girl of her mother when you did that!"

"Irrelevant, and in the larger scheme of things, had Miki taken power without a regent, we would have simply killed her too." He shrugged his shoulders. "We just needed to create enough chaos to open up a power vacuum for us to take control."

Naruto became confused. Something wasn't clicking in his mind. "If you had control of the Land of Fire, you must have known about me being a Jinchūriki. Why didn't you demand the Hokage to hand me over?"

"A Daimyo demanding the Jinchūriki of the resident Hidden Village be handed over when he knows it has to stay in the village? That would've been too odd for anyone," he said, making it sound like he was explaining it to a child.

"I am not an it," he growled at the masked man.

"I don't care. Do you even realize what the term Jinchūriki really is? The moment you became the Kyuubi's vessel, you were not human anymore," he said, ignoring the growl. "You did give us a bit of a surprise when you left the Elemental Countries I'll admit. Thankfully, we had a way to correct that."

Kakashi immediately understood what he meant by that. "You let the investigation go through," he said aloud. "You could've stopped it, and you didn't."

"Investigation?" asked Naruto. "What investigation?"

"The investigation of you, Naruto Uzumaki," Tobi told him. "You didn't know? Remarkable."

"What's he talking about, Hatake?" he demanded of Kakashi, looking straight at him.

"Allow me to explain," Tobi said, stopping Kakashi from speaking. "After you left, Tsunade had asked the Daimyo to open an investigation on you when he got to the village. We allowed this to happen because we knew that everything the previous Civilian council had done would come out into the open, giving her the chance to get rid of them, although in the process, some of the members of the previous council was sympathetic to our cause. Then she had the Konoha Eleven look at your medical records, once they were done, she told them about what happened with the Kyūbi. Once they heard that, they looked for you everywhere in the Elemental Countries."

"Why waste resources and effort looking for me, when all you had to do was watch them?" Naruto muttered aloud.

"Exactly, you have improved in using your brain," he praised the blonde while also subtly insulting him. "Of course, we had occasionally sent a team to see if they had found anything, and to give the impression we were looking for you too. It gave them an incentive to keep looking for you whenever it looked like they were on the verge of giving up. It may have taken them three years to find you, but they did in the end."

"Wait," Kakashi interrupted. "You said that you had to make a passing attempt at protecting your interests."

"Yes, I did say that."

"Why would you only try a passing attempt? You have control of the Fire Daimyo; the Land of Fire is yours to command. You should've tried everything to make sure it stayed like that, but you only made a passing attempt. Why?"

"Very observant, Kakashi Hatake, you certainly live up to your reputation," the Akatsuki member praised him. "Yes, we would've tried harder to protect the Fire Daimyo from being overthrown, if he actually mattered in our plans. We have enough resources that the loss of a Daimyo and his country does not matter, even if it is one of the Five Great Shinobi Countries. Truth be told, controlling him and controlling the Land of Fire was nothing more than amusement."

"You call playing with a ruler and his country amusement?" Naruto demanded, outraged at the idea. He had spent enough time in Ba Sing Se watching Long Feng treat the place like his own personal toy to earn his hatred of anyone who did the same.

"Yes, I do. Watching those advisors scurry around and try to make sure that the damage was kept to a minimum was amusing, at first. Now, it's become a little boring. I've been looking for an excuse to get rid of the Daimyo for a while now and you've managed to do it for me. Thanks for that."

"What do you mean? The Fire Daimyo is still alive," Kakashi protested.

He turned his gaze over to him; the hole where his right eye should almost seem to bore straight through. "Do you think I'm an idiot? I knew what your plan was the minute I stepped into the dance hall and looked at the royal table, just like I knew what Naruto and his little team were doing when I saw his bounty hunter friend in the bar. I could've stopped your plans the second you all walked into the capital."

"Then why didn't you?" he asked as both he and Naruto searched through their memories of the dance, trying to figure who Tobi had been disguised as, despite knowing the fact it was a long shot. They still had to try.

"To let you think you had the advantage. But now, you know that you never had a chance. You've been dancing to my tune the entire time. You might as well hand over the Kyūbi's Jinchūriki now to save yourself the trouble of realizing it when it's too late."

Naruto leapt off the wall so fast he caused a gust of wind in the spot he had been in. He landed in front of the Akatsuki member, grabbed hold of his throat and slammed him against the wall. "There are three things you need to remember," he growled as he held the kunai close to the hole in the mask. "One: don't talk about me like I'm not here. Two: I don't obey Konoha anymore, telling them to hand me over would be pointless. And three: do you honestly think I would let you and your friends revive that thing willingly?" He asked, saying the word "thing" like it was the stuff of nightmares.

While Kakashi was confused, Tobi chuckled. "So, you know his origins. How did you find out?"

"Like I would tell you that," He replied. What he had learned that night was something he wasn't likely to forget.

(Flashback)

Night was in full bloom over the Fire Nation. Most people were fast asleep in their beds, dreaming of things they wouldn't really remember in the morning. The air was mostly quiet, save for the occasional crackle of a nearby or the sounds of a guard as one of them walked by. If one looked up into the sky, they would see that the stars were out in full, along with the moon in all its glory.

Naruto couldn't sleep, so he sat on the roof above Azula's bedroom, keeping watch over her while also stargazing. He found the practice to be somewhat relaxing (he had yet to find something that would rid him of his nightmares) and it allowed him to keep an eye on the princess. "The moon's full." He noted, looking up at it.

"How observant of you," the Kyūbi sarcastically remarked. "Next you'll be telling me that the stars are bright."

"What's got you in a mood?" he asked the fox. He had recently noticed that whenever the moon was full, the Bijū got incredibly grouchy.

"Nothing that concerns you," the fox replied. "I just hate that damn thing."

"How can you hate the moon? It's just a big ball of rock floating around the planet that also helps Waterbenders do their thing."

"Well, that 'big ball of rock' and I go way back."

When he heard that, he had to restrain himself from laughing out loud. "What? You slept with one of the fishes or something?" he asked with a grin.

"…Where in the name of Kami did you get that idea?" That idea was so far-fetched and weird; you didn't really expect it to be said out loud.

"How else would you have a history with the moon? I can't think of anything else that would imply having a bad history with the moon, and that's considering the fact we're talking about you," he pointed out.

"And what's that supposed to mean?" he asked, sounding offended.

"Out of the two of us, who was the one who kept giving a running commentary of women in boot camp who would probably be good in bed?"

"How many times do I have to tell you I was bored? There's only so much I could take of watching you doing laps, pushups, or whatever it was you were doing," he defended himself. "Besides, I have never met those spirits; I can't speak for the other Bijū."

"Okay, now you've got me confused. How would you have a history with the moon without knowing the fishes? Especially since one of them is the Moon Spirit?"

The fox scoffed. "Please, it's not that hard. Those two didn't realize that the old moon was destroyed and the new one had something inside it until about five hundred years after the fact."

"Oh, I see," Naruot said. He was about to turn his attention back to the sky when he computed what the Kyūbi had said. "Wait a minute. What do you mean by 'the old moon was destroyed'? What are you talking about?"

"It's a long story, really long. You probably wouldn't be interested."

"Oh no, you are not going to try to wave this off. How the hell do you know that the moon has something inside in the first place? That's the kind of thing that needs an answer. So, start talking fox," he ordered.

"You're not going to let this go, are you?" the Bijū asked, hopeful he just might.

"Of course, I'm not, now start talking."

"Fine, I'll talk." He stifled a defeated sigh. "What do you know about the Sage of the Six Paths?"

"Only what they told me in the Academy. He was the first to discover the truth of chakra and tried to use it to bring the world into an era of peace. He eventually created the Shinobi and was regarded as the Shinobi no Kami (God of Shinobi). He eventually had two sons, whose descendants would eventually become the Senju and Uchiha clan, respectively." Naruto remembered that part well, considering the teachers kept going over the sons.

"Did you ever wonder how he got that title?"

He thought it over for a moment. "Not really, no. I always figured he got it because he was the first actual shinobi." He knew the title had also been given to the Shodaime Hokage and the Sandaime Hokage, both legendary figures themselves (when he was younger, he had a hard time believing the fact that the Sandaime held that title).

"There was a little more to it than that. He also created the Bijū."

That caught Naruto by surprise. "Wait, he what?"

"I weep at the education you got," the fox told him in a deadpan tone.

"Shut up, that's not exactly general knowledge. So, you're saying that the Sage created you guys himself? He just made nine creatures of chakra from scratch?"

"You would be correct, from a certain point of view."

He groaned quietly. "Would you just give me a straight answer, Kyūbi? You're giving me a damn headache," he asked, using the whiney tone that the fox hated.

"Alright, alright, just knock it off with that tone of voice," he told his Jinchūriki with a snarl. "Look, the Sage of the Six Paths got most of his fame and his title from a single event: his victory over the Jūbi."

"The Jūbi? But I thought there were only nine of you!" he protested. He had never heard of a tenth Bijū and that was enough to make him nervous.

"If you stopped interrupting me, perhaps I could explain?" The fox asked pointedly. "Look, entire armies had been sent up against the Jūbi and were completely annihilated within the span of a few minutes. Everyone lived in terror and fear as it rampaged around the world, until the Sage fought it."

"And killed it?" Naruto's brain clicked at what the Kyubi had just added. "Hold on, you mean to say, that the Jubi was being controlled by the mother of the Sage?"

"No, they didn't. He sealed the Jūbi inside of himself and became its Jinchūriki. The Sage was able to harness and control the overwhelming power of the Jūbi's chakra."

"And so, he kept it inside himself for the rest of his life." That part he knew. If a Jinchūriki died, the Bijū within them died as well.

"That's where you would be wrong. If the Sage had died with the Jūbi's chakra sealed within him, it would seek its physical body and be free again, which would force whoever has to deal with it to start all over. So, he tried to find a way to prevent this from happening. Eventually he succeeded."

"How did he do that?" Naruto asked, curious.

"He used a jutsu called Banbutsu Sōzō (Creation of All Things) to separate the chakra of the Jūbi from the body. With the chakra, he used it to create nine beings and gave them life."

"Which would've been you and the other eight Bijū, right?"

"How very observant of you," he drily remarked.

"Thank you so much for noticing," Naruto replied in the same dry tone. "Besides, if he took the chakra out of the Jūbi, what the hell did he do with the body?"

"That's where the second moon comes in. The first moon had been accidentally destroyed during their battle, which put the Moon Spirit into a coma-like state and made Waterbending half as strong. The Sage used a jutsu called Chibaku Tensei (Heavenly Body Bursting from the Earth) to tear out an immense piece of the earth, placed the body deep within it, and then hurled it into orbit. That's also why you humans have never found any evidence of the battle between them. He used the battleground to make the moon."

"How much of the earth did he use?"

"Well, you know how there's a big ocean between the Elemental Countries and the Bending Countries?"

"Yeah, I sailed on it."

"That used to be a continent," the fox told him with a completely straight face.

It took Naruto a few minutes to understand what the Kyubi had just told him. "Okay, are you telling me about the entire battleground between the Sage of the Six Paths and the Jūbi was an entire freaking CONTINENT?!" he all but screamed.

"That's what the Sage told us."

"Oh, well that makes all the difference, doesn't it?" Then he heard what the Kyūbi had said. "Wait, whatthe Sage told you? You knew the guy?"

"He raised us. We learned everything from him, including his fight against the Jūbi. Hell, we thought of him like a father." He could still remember those days and he remembered them fondly. "And whenever he talked about his fight against the Jūbi, we could always hear the undercurrents of hatred and bitterness in his voice."

"So that's why you don't like the moon, because it reminds you of something you once were and something your father figure hated."

"We always thought that if we became the Jūbi again, we would be disappointing him. Besides, we could see where he was coming from."

"You mean you can remember everything about the Jūbi?" he asked.

"Not exactly," the fox admitted. "I don't know about the others, but I could only see the memories of the Jūbi in my dreams. Well, I say dreams, it was more like nightmares. All I saw was wanton destruction, death, complete and utter chaos and terror." He shuddered. "I may be a creature who enjoys a little mayhem once and awhile, but even I draw the line at trying to make the world I live in burn."

"Yeah, I guess I can understand why you would hate the moon if you saw that when you dream," he admitted. "I'll be honest with you, Kyūbi, that's a lot of information to take in. I do have one question though."

"What's that?"

"How in the bloody blue hell does one accidently destroy a moon?" he demanded.

"We actually asked him that once. He got embarrassed and mumbled something about 'one wrong jutsu at the wrong moment'."

When he heard that part, Naruto was very hard-pressed to not snigger or even laugh. It didn't sound right. A legendary (if not outright mythical) person who made out to be that he could do no wrong had accidently destroyed something that wasn't even on the planet. It just sounded like the beginning of a bad joke.

(End Flashback)

"Why the hell are you people trying to set it free?" Naruto demanded, maintaining his grip on the Akatsuki member's throat. "Do you honestly think you can control it?"

"Why yes, we do," Tobi answered nonchalantly, acting like nothing was wrong. "Why else would we be set on it?"

"Because you're all certified insane, that's why," he accused him. "Do you not realize what will happen? This world will become hell on earth if it gets free!"

"And that's where you would be quite mistaken. You see, we have no intention of letting it run wild."

"Then what are you planning?" Kakashi asked. Even though he had no idea of what they were talking about, he decided to play along, pretending to know what Naruto knew and hoped it would be enough to get the Akatsuki's plan.

"It's quite simple," he told them. He then proceeded to walk through Naruto's grip and through Naruto himself, his body passing through like nothing was there, making Naruto lose his grip and begin to fall forward. He would've crashed to the ground, had he not used the wall to steady himself, stabbing the kunai into it. "What we plan to do is use the Jūbi to create a reality without war or suffering, a reality in where no one dies," the masked man declared, looking up at the moon.

"And what would be the cost for that reality?" Naruto demanded as he turned away from the wall, leaving the kunai imbedded in it. He knew that there always would have to be a cost.

"We would simple take away the worlds' greatest weakness: free will."

That simple statement stunned both the Konoha shinobi and Fire Nation Paragon. "If you do that, then we would be nothing then slaves to a fake reality," Kakashi argued.

"That is infinitely better than this useless reality. Why would you want to live in a reality where everyone you've cherished will die? Where do you speak to a monument or a grave, hoping for a small measure of peace?" he asked the two of them.

"We do that so we can live in honor of those we've lost," Naruto told him. "Even in death, they're still your comrades. If you don't remember who you've lost and cherish the memories you have of them, then you'll live alone. And that is the most painful way to live a life."

"I had hoped that you would've grown up since leaving Konoha, Naruto." He gave a disappointed sigh. "I guess I was wrong, you're still as naïve as the day you left."

"No, I'm not. I've lost friends, people I've fought aside or led myself."

"But have you ever lost someone you truly cared for? Someone you cherished above all else? A person who if they died would make you feel like life had no meaning left?"

"…No, I haven't," he finally admitted, after an image of Azula wearing a slight scowl flashed through his mind. "But still, if they had died, I wouldn't try to bring them back. What would be done would be done, there's no changing that."

"And that's where you and I differ," Tobi stated. "You would still have faith in this reality, even if it had taken the one you cherished the most away from you. I would create a new reality where you wouldn't have to suffer such losses. Is that such a bad thing?"

"When you take away free will and make us puppets, yes, it is," Kakashi told him.

He turned to face the shinobi from Konoha. "You shouldn't open your mouth so easily, Kakashi," he warned him. "As I recalled, you were the one who caused the Akatsuki's plan to proceed the way it has. For that, I thank you." He looked up at the sky again, as if he was checking something. "I believe now would be the time for me to leave."

"Wait a minute, just who the hell are you?!" Naruto demanded. The fact that this masked man had allowed them to flounder around trying to stop the assassination from happening for the sake of amusement and also admitting to killing a mother just so they could rule from the shadows. That ticked him off to no end, but the kicker was the fact he let them go through with their plan just because he was bored with manipulating the Fire Daimyo.

"Ah, yes, of course. You would want a name to go with this person." He took the same mocking thinking pose. "What would you say if I told you that I was Madara Uchiha?"

"I would say you're full of it. You forget I've got someone who personally knows Madara Uchiha." He kept the secret to himself tightly.

He chuckled, sending a shiver up both Naruto's and Kakashi's spine. "In that case, you may continue to call me Tobi. But in truth…" He looked at both of them. For some reason they couldn't explain, the hole in his mask now showed an eye. But it wasn't an ordinary eye, it was a Sharingan. "I don't want to be anyone in this reality, since nothing in it matters to me."

He turned his gaze onto Naruto. "I will see you again, Naruto Uzumaki, and I will make you see why your ideals are wrong. When that happens, you will gladly surrender yourself to us."

"It'll never happen, I promise you that," he growled.

"If you say so," he said. "Until the next game." The space around the hole in the mask began to distort itself, swirling outward and began to suck in the surrounding air, almost like a black hole. Before either Naruto or Kakashi could stop him, Tobi disappeared into the hole, which disappeared afterwards, leaving the two alone in a blocked off alley.

The two of them stood in silence for a couple of minutes. "…What is the Jūbi?" Kakashi finally asked Naruto.

"And here I thought you knew," he replied. "You're a Jōnin, you figured it out. The more important question is how the hell do you know that man?"

"I don't."

"Why do I have a hard time believing you?" He demanded. "You heard him just as well as I did. And apparently, you're the one who started all this. So who was he!?"

"I told you I don't know!" the masked shinobi defended himself.

"Then start thinking, Hatake! That guy had us on a silver platter the entire time we were here. He seems to know everything about us, and we don't a damn thing about him, except for the fact that he has a Sharingan for a right eye!"

"Naruto, it doesn't help us if we argue with each other! We do that, the Akatsuki gets the advantage over us. Let's get back to the others and tell them what we know, alright?" he offered.

Naruto knew that Kakashi had a point, but he was still annoyed by the fact he had been led around by the nose by Tobi. "Fine, let's go." He marched out of the alley, shoving past Kakashi as he came back onto the street.

Kakashi didn't say anything; he just stared at the empty space where Tobi had stood. "Who was he?" he asked himself. "Why did he make it sound like he knew me once?" He shook his head, realizing that it wasn't the time to think about it. What was more important was to get back to the others and pass the information on. He turned around and walked away as well, tossing a kunai at the wall without looking. Wrapped around the hilt of the kunai was an explosive tag. Five seconds later, it detonated, causing a small, concentrated blast that destroyed the wall. The next morning, all that would be left would be some rubble and a little scarring, nothing people would be a lot of attention to.

---

Team Paragon were all waiting in one of the gardens in the palace; a few were quietly watching the fish swim around in a nearby pond. It had been a day since the dance. They had left the hotel they had been staying at and quickly moved into the palace, staying out of the way for the time. Things were already hectic enough without them adding fuel to the fire.

But that wasn't the only reason for their silence. After Naruto and Kakashi had returned and told them what Tobi told them of his own free will, they shared Naruto's annoyance. For most of the team, the plain fact that the Akatsuki had played them for fools with ease made them angry. Sokka and Azula were especially irritated; they had been kicking themselves for not catching on. What were the odds of June talking to the same guy who was also working for the Akatsuki in disguise? What were the odds that the person they would be working and the one who be doing the killing had a very bad grudge against the target? Those weren't even odds to begin with; they had been planned right from the start.

"You should've seen that, idiot!" Sokka yelled at himself. He stared sullenly at a nearby wall like he was considering how to exactly hack it to pieces with his Zanpakutō. Akela sat on his haunches nearby, patiently waiting. He knew that the mood Sokka was in would only be temporally.

June had also noticed his mood. "Sokka, lighten up," she told him as she leaned against Nyla's flank (the garden was big enough to hold the shirshu comfortably, as there was an entrance to outside the palace nearby). "We got duped. You can't let that get you down. You win some, and you lose some. That's all there is to it."

"This is coming from the best bounty hunter in the business?" Azula asked with irritation evident in her voice.

She shrugged. "Hey, even I made mistakes starting out. But I don't beat myself up over the fact I lost a couple of bounties. You let a couple of mistakes get to you; you'll be making a lot more. Trust me, I speak from experience."

"It's not that I'm angry about making a mistake," Sokka said, turning away from the wall and looking at her. "I'm angry that I was played. I'm supposed to be the idea guy and I had no idea about what was really going on."

"But this isn't the first time you were deceived, right?" she asked him. "You were deceived twice before."

"Those don't count," he objected. "Naruto did the deceiving and he's on our side now."

"Just because he's on our side now doesn't mean those don't disappear," she pointed out.

"She's right, Sokka," Naruto agreed, turning his attention away from the pond and to the rest of the group. "I led you on twice, that isn't going to go away. Neither is the fact that Tobi knew what we were doing from the start and let us do it."

"You don't sound too mad about that," Azula noted. She was still a little ticked off, but could see the reason in what June and Naruto said.

"Oh, trust me. I'm just as annoyed as you guys. But instead of getting angry, it makes me motivated to beat this guy."

"You're using this as an example of Lesson Number 9?" she asked, getting confused looks from the others. Sokka and Suki had heard the two of them talk about these Lessons before in passing and Azula had inadvertently told the Kyoshi Warrior what the eighth Lesson was during the Chūnin Exam. But they hadn't heard the other Lessons or what they meant.

"Yeah,I am taking it as an example," he answered. "I'm also taking it as an example of Lesson Number 1."

"Good point," she conceded, getting more confused looks from the others there.

"What are you two talking about?" Suki finally dared asked. "Could one of you please explain those Lessons you keep going on about?"

Before either Naruto or Azula could answer, Jiraiya came into the garden from another entrance. "What's up, F.S.-sensei?" Sokka asked the Toad Sage.

"My suspicions were right," he announced, not bothering to tell Sokka to stop calling him that. He had told them earlier about his suspicions on the aliases they had been using during the dance. "Those documents you sent me were legit. Not a single one of them was faked."

"We actually were using the identities of real people? What happened to them?" Suki asked. After hearing that Akatsuki had no problem murdering Miki's mother, she knew that there had to be more victims.

"Surprisingly, they're still alive. From what I could learn, it seems that every one of the people you impersonated had been helped by the Akatsuki. Five years ago, Manchou suffered a drought, causing a harvest failure. His lands were on the verge of starvation until the Akatsuki sent Kisame Hoshigaki to help him fix his problem. Gaiyuu and her sister had been abused by both their father and mother until she was eighteen. The only reason it had stopped was because the Akatsuki had sent both Sasori and Orochimaru to kill the parents, allowing Gaiyuu to inherit everything. Yoen was indeed Jieichou's bodyguard since they were ten. As they got older, they fell in love with each other, something Jieichou's father disapproved of. He would've had Yoen killed had Itachi and Zetsu not managed to get them away. Nowadays, they're living happily together. Kikan was a man who was struggling to make ends meet and was in a good amount of debt. That night he went into the casino, his playing partner was an Akatsuki member called Kakuzu."

"How did the Akatsuki know about each of them? The fact each one of these people were in trouble and the Akatsuki came to the rescue doesn't seem like coincidence to me," June pointed out.

"It wasn't. Either they had contacted the Akatsuki themselves or a friend had told them about the group. There's just one thing that connects all these things. The Akatsuki didn't take money as payment for those jobs. Instead, they asked for the client's entire history, their past, hobbies, everything, and anything about them. They were also told to deny any rumors they heard of them doing something that sounded out of character."

"How far back does this go?" Azula asked, astounded at what she heard.

"Gaiyuu happened when Orochimaru was still in the Akatsuki, which is the oldest one in this group, and what happened to Kikan occurred about four months ago, which is the youngest."

"So, the Akatsuki didn't just force people to give up their identities once they planned to assassinate Koyuki. They've been doing this for years," Suki stated.

"Which means either one of two things, either they've been planning this assassination for a long time, or they have aliases created for the long term," Naruto realized. "If a member of Akatsuki were to use one of these aliases to cause a scandal or kill someone, the real person would have a solid alibi, making any case the civilian or shinobi police try to open go cold."

"Thereby protecting both the Akatsuki member and the actual person," Sokka finished, realizing where Naruto was going.

"That depends on what you define as an Akatsuki member. Nadare had told us that his killing of Koyuki was supposed to be his initiation mission and if he succeeded, he would've become one of their members. The Akatsuki has only had ten members at a time, all of which were S-class missing-nin," Jiraiya pointed out.

They all thought over the information they knew, making the garden silent except for the pond and the fish inside its waters. "What if the Akatsuki had unofficial members?" Suki offered, getting everyone's attention.

"What do you mean by that, Suki?" June asked.

"I mean, like Akatsuki had members who worked for them, but weren't infamous. That way, they could work without being noticed."

"That's plausible," Jiraiya agreed, thinking it over. "It would also explain how they've managed to stay quiet until recently, but still complete missions."

"If that is the case, then what's with this 'initiation mission' Nadare was talking about?" Sokka asked. "If the Akatsuki members only have ten members, then the unofficial members would stay where they are."

"What if the initiation mission is the unofficial member's chance to become an official member?" Azula suggested. "They successfully complete the mission and they become one of the ten."

"But those ten are always S-class," Jiraiya pointed out. "I highly doubt they would allow an unofficial member who wasn't an S-class shinobi to become an actual member. I looked over Nadare's file; he was only a B-class shinobi."

"Perhaps the Akatsuki has influence over the Bingo Books? If they did, they could easily have his rank be upgraded to S-class," Naruto said.

"If they did have influence over the Bingo Books, then they would've to have agents in every single country that issues a Bingo Book."

That thought made everyone there nervous. Every one of them had the same thought. "Just how big is the Akatsuki?" If what they had speculated was true, then the organization would be much, much larger than originally believed.

"Everyone, look," Jiraiya said to the others, taking their attention away from their thoughts. "A lot of this stuff is pure speculative. For all we know, we could be wrong." They all knew he was trying to reassure them, but it didn't really help. The fact that the Akatsuki was possibly bigger than just ten members was enough to make any sane person nervous.

Still, it was the thought that counted. "He's right," June agreed. "Unless we've got evidence to support all this, there's nothing to prove. So, let's relax."

"Speaking of relaxing, we might as well get ready," Sokka said. "It's going to start soon."

"That's a good idea," Jiraiya conceded. "Speaking of which, could you guys keep an eye on her until it starts?" After they all nodded, he walked back over to the entrance he came through and signaled to someone on the other side, who soon came in through the entrance.

"How are you doing, Lady Koyuki?" Naruto asked the Daimyo of Spring.

"I'm fine, Naruto." She told him with a smile. "But I wish you would stop being so formal."

"My apologies, My Lady, but I have to stay professional," he told her before giving a small smile. "But it is good to see you made it through."

"Same here," she agreed. The official story was that the wounds she had suffered during the dance were surprisingly nonfatal and she was able to recover. However, the Fire Daimyo had accidently choked to death during the mass confusion, and nobody noticed until it had been too late, leaving his daughter to take the throne. But as a very wise man once said, "Only an idiot believes the official story."

The actual story was quite different. It was the kind of story that was more at home in a book than real life, and it all started after the negotiation meeting between the Spring Daimyo and the advisors of the Fire Daimyo.

(Flashback)

Team Kakashi and Jiraiya had just finished going over positions in the dance hall that would successfully stop the assassination attempt if everything went as the letter described. But considering that meant it was very likely things would change, it also meant that they had no chance of knowing if the positions would remain good or not. That left them with trying to figure out a plan of adaptation if things went south.

Ironically, it was Koyuki who came up with the idea. "Lord Jiraiya, may I suggest something?" she asked the Toad Sage.

"What's on your mind?" he asked in return.

"Is it possible to use this assassination attempt to our advantage?" That got everyone's attention.

"What are you thinking of, Koyuki?" he asked her, his tone suspicious.

She was quiet for a minute, unsure of how to answer. Finally, she looked him straight in the eye. "Could we not use this assassination to get rid of the Fire Daimyo?"

It was a grand total of five minutes before anyone said anything else. Kakashi was the first to break the silence. "Do you know what you're saying, Lady Koyuki?" he asked.

"Yes, I do," she confirmed. "You've all seen how the Daimyo acted during the meeting. If he's been like that ever since he came to power, then he has to go."

"Were you planning to take his place once he's dead?" Sai asked. If she was, Danzō would want to know A.S.A.P.

Koyuki frowned. "No, of course not, I have enough trouble running one country. I don't want or need to run another one."

"Then would you be suggesting that Miki should take the throne?" Sasuke asked. "Is she even ready?"

"Oh yeah, she's ready," Jiraiya confirmed. "She took lessons by watching her mother basically run the country and she also had to watch how her father rules now. I think it's safe to say that if the Fire Daimyo dies, she wouldn't shed too many tears over him."

"We would be plotting treason if we went through with this," Sakura pointed out.

"It's only treason if we get caught," he replied with a shrug. He turned his gaze back to the Daimyo in the room. "So, what did you have in mind?"

---

A few hours before the dance, the Fire Daimyo was alone in his room, writing a few letters before leaving for the dance. His concentration was interrupted when there was a knock on the door. "Yes? Who's there?" he called out, looking up from his desk.

"It's Jiraiya, my lord," the Toad Sage's voice spoke from the other side of the door. "There's something we need to discuss. It's about where we will be positioned during the dance. May I come in?"

"Yes." He stood up from his chair. "Please give me a moment, I locked the door." He walked over to the door and opened it. Before he said anything, his eyes rolled backwards, and he collapsed. The last thing he had seen was a spinning Sharingan.

"Alright people, let's get this going," Jiraiya told the others standing in the hallway as he held the door open. "Kakashi, please make sure the Daimyo doesn't hit the ground."

The face-masked shinobi quickly caught the falling Daimyo. "Got him," he announced as he quickly walked into the room, using his free hand to cover the Sharingan with his headband. Sasuke and Koyuki followed him while Jiraiya closed the door. Sai and Sakura stayed outside to keep an eye out on the hallway.

"Lady Koyuki, please sit on the edge of the bed," Sasuke told her. She nodded and quickly sat down next to the unconscious Fire Daimyo, who had been positioned in a sitting pose. "Are you sure about this?" he asked. If she wanted to back out of this, all they had to do was leave the room. The unconscious Fire Daimyo would wake up before the dance and no one would be wiser.

"Yes, I'm sure," she answered with conviction.

"Then let us begin," Jiraiya declared. He focused his chakra onto the tip of his forefingers and pressed them on a spot on both Daimyos' backs. Just underneath that spot was one of the Tenketsu (Chakra points) and when he injected his chakra into it, it would be enough to have the two civilians' chakra to briefly activate, giving them the power to use jutsu for a short amount of time. "Kakashi, wake him up," he ordered, pulling his forefingers away.

Kakashi nodded and proceeded to slap the Fire Daimyo across the face. He woke up with a jerk but went still as he gazed into Kakashi's Sharingan. Next to him, Koyuki was in the same situation with Sasuke. The two shinobi formed a handseal and the two civilians did the same. While all four of them were doing the motions, Sasuke and Kakashi were manipulating the Daimyos' chakra to activate the Henge no Jutsu, along with keeping the image of the target in mind.

"Henge no Jutsu," the four chorused together. The two Daimyos' were engulfed in plumes of smoke and when the plumes dissipated; they had switched places. Koyuki now sat where the Fire Daimyo sat and vice-versa.

"Everything set?" Jiraiya asked both Kakashi and Sasuke.

Kakashi nodded as he once again covered his Sharingan with his headband. "They now think they're the other person and will act accordingly until we break the hypnosis."

"With any luck, Nadare will fall for it and attack the Fire Daimyo," Sasuke finished as he deactivated his Sharingan. "Now all we have to do is pass the information to Naruto and his team."

"Are you kidding? That's the easy part," Jiraiya stated. He looked at the Fire Daimyo (Koyuki). "Thank you for your time, my lord. We'll be leaving now," he said formally. Once the Daimyo had nodded vaguely, Jiraiya, Sasuke, Kakashi, and Koyuki (the Fire Daimyo) turned and left the room.

---

Jiraiya quickly noticed Naruto walking into the hall and signaled him to come over. He acknowledged and casually made his way over to the Toad Sage. "What is it?" he whispered as he watched the rest of the people either dance or talk. There was a respectable distance between the two, close enough to hear each other but not close enough to make look like they were talking to each other.

"Small change of plans, don't try to stop the assassination," Jiraiya answered. "We switched Koyuki and the Fire Daimyo."

He could see where this was going. "Alright, you'd better inform the others then."

"Kakashi is taking care of that." Naruto walked away into the crowd. He was soon besieged by a lot of teenaged girls.

---

Azula pulled out the piece of paper that Kakashi had slipped into her breast pocket. There were only two sentences.

Don't stop assassination. Koyuki and Fire Daimyo are switched.

She passed it to the next person beside her after reading it. The process repeated itself as each one took a moment to briefly read the note before handing it to the next person. Once they were done, Suki handed the paper back to Azula. She closed her hand around it and burned it to ashes with a quick Firebending.

(End Flashback)

And so, the Fire Daimyo was dead, long live the Fire Daimyo.

They all stood in the throne room of the Fire Daimyo. Like the dance hall, it was very well done. High walls and columns supported a roof of rare dark wood, the same as the walls. The columns were made of a grey stone that had nothing carved on them. The walls also had nothing on them; there were no paintings, banners, or tapestries. The whole room was rather plain, but that didn't ruin it. In fact, it emphasized it. It all conveyed the simple fact that this was a place for business, not fun. If one had to define the room, the words "simple elegance" would be the first choice.

Everyone who needed to be in the throne room was there, lining the carpet that ran from the throne to the door. Naruto and his team stood close to the throne. They had gotten rid of their disguise and Sokka and Suki decided to dress a bit more formally than the others, Sokka in his armor (minus the face paint) and Suki in hers (plus the face paint). June, Azula, and Naruto, however, were content to be back in their regular clothes. Akela and Nyla had stayed in the garden because they would make quite a few people in the room nervous. Despite the difference in what they wore, all four Paragons wore their Medallions out in the open for everyone to see.

The door opened and everyone turned their attention to it. Miki came through, dressed in a black formal kimono. Even though she was technically supposed to be in mourning for her father, everyone knew for a fact that she wasn't. The only thing she had said when they told him of his death was "It was bound to happen." Now, she made her way towards the throne that he had sat on. Behind was Team Kakashi, acting as guards. Jiraiya walked beside her, because the coronation ceremony was on short notice, there was no time for Tsunade to get to the capital (though she had been informed). As such, he was acting in her stead.

They walked down the carpet, the sound of their footsteps muffled by the carpet. As they finally approached the throne, the senior advisor stepped in front of them. "Who are you to approach the throne of the Fire Daimyo?" he asked aloud, even though he knew her answer (formalities had to be observed).

She stepped forward, away from Jiraiya and Team Kakashi. "I am Miki, daughter of Hideaki, Daimyo of the Land of Fire. I have come to claim my right as his heir," she answered with a formal tone.

"Who supports her claim?" he asked, looking at the hall.

"I do," Jiraiya answered, stepping forward. "I am Jiraiya of the Sannin, Toad Sage of Mt. Myōboku. I stand in the stead of Tsunade Senju, the Godaime Hokage and as such, we both support Princess Miki's claim to the throne."

"Does anyone else support her claim?" he asked again.

"I do," Sasuke answered, stepping forward and standing next to Jiraiya. "I am Sasuke Uchiha, the Kurojishi no Sharingan, son of the Uchiha clan and their heir, Jōnin of Konohagakure. I stand here and declare my support for Princess Miki's claim to the throne, as does the Uchiha clan itself," he declared.

The way he made the statement and the way he looked as he spoke; Naruto wasn't surprised when he noticed the love-struck looks the girls in the hall were throwing at his back. "Of course, he would get all that," he thought to himself.

"Feeling jealous, are we?" the Kyūbi asked with a smirk.

"No, I am not!" he protested. "If anything, I'm glad that he's getting it and I'm not."

"You are jealous! I knew it!"

"Does anyone else support her claim?" the advisor asked for the third time. Silence filled the hall; no one was expecting anyone to answer the question. Miki already had the backing of the Toad Sage (and by extension, the Hokage) as well as the clan heir of the Uchiha. She didn't really need anyone else.

However, nobody told Naruto that. "Oh, fuck it. I might as well," he thought before stepping forward, deciding to indulge in a little vanity. "I do," he announced, getting the attention of everyone in the hall, his teammates included.

"Uh…Who exactly are you?" the advisor asked as he looked at the stranger who stood next to Miki, a little uncertain on what was going on. He hadn't been informed about this blonde-haired man declaring his support for Miki, so he decided to go with formality.

"I am Naruto Uzumaki, child of the lost Uzumaki clan and son of the Yondaime Hokage, Paragon of the Fire Nation, bodyguard to Princess Azula, sister to Fire Lord Zuko. I am the Jinchūriki of the Kyūbi and Princess Miki has my support for her claim," he stated with complete confidence, no hesitation, and no fear. His eyes dared the advisor to say something in response. If he had looked back behind him, he would've noticed the girls were now giving him the love-struck looks. He also would've seen Azula giving all of the said girls death glares.

The fact that he had so brazenly announced who he was stunned the entire audience (minus the love-struck girls who were being glared to death). It wasn't exactly common knowledge that the Yondaime Hokage was his father and the fact he had just stated it out loud, along with the fact he said he was in what sounded like a high position as well as being the guard to royalty got the attention of quite a few people there. His status of being a Jinchūriki made a couple of people nervous, but many of the people there just ignored it for the other titles he had.

The senior advisor regained his composure and turned his gaze to Miki. "Do you accept these claims?" he asked her.

"I do," she answered.

"Do you accept the burden of which you ask for?"

"I do."

"Are you willing to stand for this land, through good and bad?"

"I am."

"Then kneel," he commanded. She knelt onto one knee and bowed her head. Another advisor came forward and handed him the headdress of the Fire Daimyo. He took it, holding it in both hands, and placed it atop her head. "Stand and take your seat, my lady," he told her, taking his hands away. Jiraiya, Sasuke, and Naruto stepped back away from her, joining the front of the crowd along with Team Kakashi.

She rose and walked towards the throne; a simple chair made of wood. She walked up the three steps and sat on the throne of the Fire Daimyo. Once she had sat down, everyone in the hall knelt. "Hail Lady Miki, Daimyo of the Land of Fire!" they chorused as one, their combined voice rang through the room and reverberated against the walls. "Long May Her Ladyship Reign!"

"Thank you," she said with a smile as they stood again. "I know a lot of you were waiting for the day I took the throne. That day is here, and I promise to make sure that your patience will not be wasted. But there are things that need to be done." The smile disappeared as her expression became neutral. "Madam Shijimi, come forward."

The stepmother of the new Daimyo stepped out of the crowd and walked up to the throne. It was obvious from the pleased look on her face and the smug smile that she was expecting a reward. She stood in front of the throne, not bothering to kneel to her stepdaughter. "Madam Shijimi, ever since my mother died, you became my father's new wife. You've lived with me and yet, you placed a greater importance on your cat than me. You only saw me as someone to play dress or someone that had to be married right away. So, I give you my first command as Daimyo." The smile on Shijimi's face (despite the things said about her) couldn't have been smugger. "Leave."

"…What?" Shijimi asked as the grin she had on became uncertain.

"Get out."

"I'm afraid I misunderstood you, Miki, could you pleas—"

"YOU WILL ADDRESS ME AS LADY DAIMYO!" she thundered, making most of the people flinch and take a small step back (the shinobi, as well as Team Paragon, didn't budge). "And you misunderstood nothing! You are to get out, to leave, to never been seen in my sight again! As of this moment, I strip you of all titles and powers that are related to the status of the Daimyo's wife. Now get out of my sight before I strip you of all your titles and powers and give your Kami-damned cat to Konoha!"

The five shinobi (and one ex-shinobi) were quickly filled with hope. "My lady, please give us the cat," Jiraiya asked of her. "I know many Genin, both former and current, who would just love the opportunity to kill that cat. Just give us the word and they'll be on the creature like a pack of dogs. Actually, the Genin from the Inuzuka clan would be on it like pack of dogs," he noted.

That was enough to get Shijimi bolting out of the hall, screaming for her "precious Tora." As she left, everyone was wearing some sort of smile because that was one hell of a way to get rid of the stepmother you detested.

"Now that the fat bitch has been taken care of…" Miki said, earning a couple of chuckles from the crowd. "Naruto Uzumaki, come forward." The hall fell silent as he took a few steps forward, stopping at the base of the first step. "It is thanks to your warning of the assassination that I was able to have an excuse to walk away from the dance hall."

"All I did was dance with you, milady," he replied modestly. "You came up with the excuse yourself."

"True, although I was a little disappointed when you come to my room," she told him with a smile that would've made lesser men go weak at the knees (which would've been evident in the crowd, if you knew where to look). "I was interested to see what kind of 'moves' you had at your disposal."

"I'm sorry, Lady Miki, but I am in a relationship, and she is present in this very hall."

"Could've brought her," she replied with a shrug. Once again, jaws were being picked up from the floor when the crowd heard that.

"I'm afraid that isn't my decision, My Lady Daimyo," he replied, struggling to make sure he didn't blush (it was getting difficult). "You'd have to take that up with my girlfriend."

"It's not a bad idea, if you think about it," Azula spoke up, getting everyone's attention. "Actually, it sounds like it could be both interesting and entertaining." The jaws that were in the process of being picked up fell to the floor again. They could believe what they had just heard. His girlfriend had just given him permission to have a threesome with her and the new Fire Daimyo! Several of the young men there were cursing Naruto's luck. To them, only an idiot would pass this kind of chance.

But unbeknownst to them, Naruto was that kind of idiot. "I must respectfully decline, my Lady," he said to Miki. "I do not wish to sully your honor while you remain unmarried, and there may be diplomatic complications, should there be a pregnancy involved." That simple statement endeared him to many of the women there.

"Are you fucking crazy!?" Someone from the back of the crowd yelled out at him. Nobody battered an eyelash and kept facing forward (although there were sounds of someone hushing the person).

"Well, it's a pity, but I won't push you," Miki told him (which made him take a silent breath of relief). "Back to the matter at hand, I want to reward you for saving both my life and capturing the assassin." The senior advisor reached into a pocket and pulled out a folded piece of cloth. Unfolding it, he revealed it to be a sash that had the symbol of fire on it. "I ask you, Naruto Uzumaki, to become one of the Twelve Guardian Shinobi. I also offer you the position of being my personal guard." The crowd was surprised to hear that second part. To be asked to join the Twelve Guardian Shinobi was one thing, but to be asked to be her personal guard was another thing. If he accepted, odds are he would've become one of the most powerful people in the Land of Fire, second only to her. Practically everyone there (with a few exceptions) expected him to accept the offers.

However, he disappointed them once again. "I'm afraid I will have to decline your offers, Lady Miki, considering I already have a similar job protecting the Fire Lord's sister," he told her.

"Is there any chance I could persuade her to give you to me?"

"Again, you'll have to take that up with her."

Azula walked up and stood right by his side, looking up at the Daimyo. "I said it might be interesting to share him," she told her, looking her straight in the eye. "I never agree to letting you have him to yourself,and I never will." There was an indirect challenge in the sentence. It was as if Azula was trying to make Miki challenge her for him.

But she didn't rise to it. "Very well, I will not try to push you into something you do not want to do." She gestured to the advisor to put the sash away. "But I still feel like I should reward you."

"That isn't necessary, my Lady Daimyo," Naruto told her. "I do not need any reward."

"And I feel that you do. At the very least, let me give you a title so people will remember your name."

"I already have a title, ma'am. I am the Paragon of the Fire Nation." He tapped the Medallion hanging from his neck.

Her face took a thoughtful expression when she heard that. "Just what is a Paragon? I've heard that the people in the Bending Countries could control the very elements themselves, without the need for chakra or handseals. Does being a Paragon mean that you are the most powerful wielder of that element?"

He gave a brief laugh. "No, it doesn't mean that. Besides, I'm not a Bender. You're born with that. All four Paragons, including myself, are Nonbenders." He gestured towards Suki, June, and Sokka.

"But what is a Paragon?" she asked again, being genuinely curious about them.

Naruto didn't say anything. He just turned and looked at June. Being the eldest Paragon among them, she was probably the best at describing what they are. She met his gaze and nodded in agreement, before looking up at the Daimyo. "To be a Paragon is to serve your country, completely and utterly. You embody that country and to do that, you must be the best. The reason that only Nonbenders can become Paragons is because we push ourselves to the very edge of our limits and break those limits to be known as the best."

"I see." The Daimyo was silent for a moment before turning to look at Naruto. "If I remember correctly, you used the name Kikan during the dance." She told him.

"Yes, my Lady, but I think whoever was trying to have you and Lady Koyuki assassinated was trying to be funny," he replied. It was a little more obvious now that he thought about it. Konoha had found about him around the beginning of spring and the actual Kikan became a rich man only four months ago. "What are the odds of those being a coincidence?"

"Those are no odds. It was deliberate," the Kyūbi told him.

"You make it sound like I hadn't figured that out myself," he replied with heavy sarcasm.

"Naruto Uzumaki, when I had found out that it was you who managed to save me and that you were a former Konoha shinobi, I was curious," Miki said aloud. "So, I read up on you. You have quite an impressive track record, despite it being short. You kept pushing yourself to be the best every time you came up against that tried to stop. You were an amazing shinobi and if what your fellow Paragon said is true, then you are most definitely worthy of being one. Therefore I, Miki, Daimyo of the Land of Fire, hereby name you the Shinobi Kikan (Shinobi Paragon). Let the countries know you as such."

He could only bow his head. "Thank you, my Lady, I can only hope that I do the title you gave me justice."

"I'm sure that you will. Oh, and I'm quite surprised at your impeccable manners, Naruto," she assured him with a smile. "You may go." He back away and Azula followed, joining their friends in the crowd. "And now, the people will see their new Daimyo," she declared, standing up from the throne.

She walked down the steps and onto the carpet, making her towards the door, where she would go through and walk onto a nearby balcony so she could greet her subjects.

They gathered near the gates of the city. Once Miki had stepped out onto the balcony and the people saw, there was a great amount of cheering. To them, she was the hope that they had been waiting patiently for during her father's rule, the hope that she would be a better ruler than he had been. Miki had accepted the cheering humbly; she bowed her head in thanks while also smiling and waving.

Once that was done, she got down to business. Within two hours the trade agreement between the Land of Fire and the Land of Spring, which had been hashed out and haggled over long before Koyuki had arrived, was signed. Koyuki would stay in the capital to help Miki get used to being Daimyo, where she would be surrounded by guards 24/7 (even though the shinobi knew it wasn't likely for another assassination attempt to happen).

"Is everyone ready?" Jiraiya asked the others. Because Sokka, Suki, June, and Azula couldn't run through the trees (as well as having Akela and Nyla), they would have to stick to the road. They could go a little faster, perhaps shave off a day or two, but it was still slower than he'd liked.

"Yeah, we're ready," June told him as she stood next to Nyla. As she double-checked everything she had, Sasuke walked up to the other side of the shirshu and began whispering in his ear.

"Alright, then let's get—" He was interrupted when Nyla began to growl loudly at Naruto, getting everyone's attention. It looked the shirshu was very angry at him for some reason.

"What's the matter with you, ugly?" Naruto asked him, only to hit the ground when he shot his tongue at him, letting fly over. "Whoa! Will you be careful? Now's not the time for—" He didn't finish the sentence due to the fact Nyla kept shooting his tongue out at him, forcing him to roll around on the ground. In the end, he took off down the road with the shirshu in pursuit. The others could only look on as this happened.

"What in the name of Yue was that all about?" Sokka asked. Sasuke couldn't take it anymore. He started to laugh out loud. Both Team Kakashi and Jiraiya looked at him in surprise. Sure, he smiled more than before Naruto left, he could chuckle at a joke (even crack one himself with a completely straight face). But they had never actually heard him laugh. To her surprise, Sakura found it pleasant. She couldn't help but laugh along with him.

"What did you do?" June asked him, turning around to face him.

"I might've told your shirshu that Naruto said a couple of unpleasant things when he wasn't around. I'm surprised it worked. Considering the way those two fought on the way here, I had thought it would take a bit more to get a rise out of him," he told her as he tried to stop laughing. She couldn't help but agree. Naruto had been insulting Nyla for so long, she had also thought it would be a little difficult to get the shirshu angry.

"Perhaps we should go after them before the creature tries to eat him?" Sai pointed out. The rest of them agree with what he said and began to run after Naruto and Nyla. Sasuke's and Sakura's laughter had dwindled down to sniggers. While the others could find the situation a little funny, they were more focused on either getting home or making sure Nyla didn't kill Naruto.

"What an idiot," Azula thought to herself as they ran, looking over at Sasuke. "He never should've done that."

(Location: Konoha)

They stood in Tsunade's office, delivering their report to her while Akela and Nyla waited outside of the building. It had taken them about three and a half days to get back (the half day was due to chasing after Naruto and Nyla, whom they found collapsed on the ground against each other, exhausted). "Is that everything?" she asked Jiraiya.

"So far as we know, but a lot of this is pure speculation," he replied.

"That may be, but if a single bit is true, then we're in a lot more trouble than we originally thought," she pointed out as she leaned back in her chair.

"There is one way to confirm some of it," Naruto said, getting their attention. "We could pump Kabuto for information. He served under Orochimaru, and that bastard was a former member of the Akatsuki. He's bound to know more than what's written down." He saw the uneasy looks on Tsunade's, Jiraiya's, and Kakashi's faces and covered his face with his hand, pinching the bridge of his nose. "What happened?"

"…Two days after you, your team, and Jiraiya went back to the Bending Countries, Kabuto broke out of the cell we were holding him in," Tsunade told him. "He killed about half of the guards who tried to stop him. Once he got out of the building and onto the street, we lost him. From the tracking reports from both the Inuzuka clan and the Hyuuga clan, we believe that he was out of the village within an hour."

"And now you have no idea where he is," Sokka summarized, stifling a groan. "This is going to come back and bite us in the blubber, I just know it."

"Well, it's not going to happen right now," June told him, leaning against the wall. "We should just focus on the main problem right now."

"She's right; we need to focus on the Akatsuki, not Kabuto," Sakura agreed with her. They all knew the two were right. The Akatsuki was the more pressing issue. But they couldn't deny that if Kabuto ever showed himself again, there was bound to be trouble.

"Regardless, both Teams Kakashi and Paragon have done well," Tsunade told them. "Even I cannot deny the fact that it's a relief to see Miki on the throne. You've obtained the information that was needed and possibly more if we can get it confirmed. You are dismissed." The two teams turned around and walked out of the office while Jiraiya and Kakashi stayed behind.

"I don't know about you guys, but I'm going to see if I can find a place to train," Sokka said as he closed the door behind him. Sai just walked off without saying a word to the others. He had to report to Danzō.

"You want some company?" Suki asked with a smirk. "I could toss your rear to the ground again."

"The pleasure would be mine, Suki. Although, I'm sure that I'll be doing the same to you," he replied with a grin.

"You're welcome to try." The two walked off together, eager to get in some sparring time.

"I gotta make sure Nyla hasn't attacked anyone," June told them as she walked down the hallway away from them, leaving Naruto and Azula alone with Sasuke and Sakura.

The situation would've been awkward if Naruto didn't turn around and walk away. "Where are you going, Naruto?" Sakura asked. Both she and Sasuke had been hoping he would stay a while, so they could have a conversation.

"I'm going to see someone," he answered curtly, not bothering to turn and face them. "Don't bother asking me who it is, it's not your business."

"I'll see you back at the house then, Naruto?" Azula asked him, not bothered by the fact he was leaving her alone.

"Yeah, you have a good night, Azula."

"You too, and try not to get into trouble, okay?"

He stopped and looked at her with a grin on his face. "No promises," he told her. He turned back around and kept walking, soon disappearing from their sight.

---

Naruto stood in front of the classroom door, unexpectedly nervous. A small part of his mind urged him to forget this idea, to just keep on walking. "Are you going to go in or not?" the Kyūbi asked in a bored tone.

"I'm a little nervous here, okay? I haven't seen him in three years," he told the fox. There was a part of him that wanted to turn around and walk away from the door.

"And now, you're standing outside the door to his classroom. Would you just open it already? It's boring just watching you stand there."

"Well pardon me for boring you." He took a deep breath, opened the door, and saw Iruka Umino sitting at the teacher's desk, looking through papers. The sight gave him a nostalgic grin. "It's well after school hours and you're still here, grading tests," he said aloud, getting Iruka's attention. "Do you not have a life, Iruka-sensei?"

"Naruto?" he asked in surprise, standing up from his chair.

"In the flesh, Iruka-sensei. How have you been?" Iruka didn't answer, he just walked over to him and gave him a hug so tight, he had a difficult time breathing. "Iruka-sensei…I need…air… for… continued existence!" he managed to choke out.

"I should let you suffocate!" Iruka growled out, but he released him anyway, letting him breath. "You were in the village a whole month before the final Exam. A month! And you don't bother to come and see me once!"

"In my defense, I was a little busy during that time," he protested as he got the rest of his breathing ability back. "I was going to fight Orochimaru, so Jiraiya was training my ass off!"

His old teacher smiled. "In any case, it's good to see you again, Naruto."

"You too, Iruka-sensei."

"You sure have grown," he noted as he looked over his former student. "I'm finding it hard to believe that you used to be the shortest in the class. Now look at you, whatever you ate in the past three years has definitely agreed with you."

"That and a lot of working out, I went from being in one military force to another in the span of a few weeks." He winced slightly. "That was an entirely different experience from the classroom."

"Did it do you any good?"

"Of course it did." He was a little offended at Iruka suggesting that it wasn't worth it.

"Then why are you complaining?"

"I'm not! I could even beat you now, Iruka-sensei," he said with a scowl.

He laughed. "Of that, I have no doubt." The scowl lasted for about two seconds before he joined in the laughter. "So tell me, did you find any good ramen over there?" Iruka asked him after they had stopped laughing.

"No, there wasn't any over in the Bending Countries. Besides it was no big deal," he replied with a shrug. "I haven't had ramen in three years."

"You mean to tell me you haven't been to Ichiraku Ramen ever since you got back? Who are you and what you have done with Naruto Uzumaki!?" his former teacher demanded with a look of mock shock.

"Very funny, Iruka-sensei, very funny," he told him in a deadpan tone.

"Sorry, I couldn't resist. How about we go there for a bowl or two? It'll be my treat," he offered, hoping that he would accept.

Naruto grinned. "Sure, why not? I just got back from a mission, so I could go for a bowl."

"That's the Naruto Uzumaki I know!" Iruka told him with a smile as they walked out of the classroom, the papers lying on the table, forgotten.

---

"Welcome!" Teuchi called out as he heard people come in. His back was to them, so he couldn't see who it was. "I'll be right with you so please take a seat." As the sound of chairs being moved filled the place, he stopped washing the dish in his hands and turned around. "Now can I get…ya…?" he asked, the question trailing off as he looked at who was sitting in front of him.

"I don't know about Iruka-sensei, but I could go for a bowl of miso ramen," Naruto said, casually sitting in the chair.

"I'll have the same," Iruka added.

Teuchi looked at Naruto, unable to speak due to the surprise. When he finally could, he turned to face the back. "Ayame, out favorite customer is back!" he shouted with joy.

"What?" Ayame shouted in return. After listening to the sound of someone moving quickly through a kitchen, she appeared in the front, a look of hope on her face. "Is that you, Naruto?" she asked the blonde sitting before her.

"As I told Iruka-sensei: in the flesh," he replied with a grin. The grin disappeared with a yelp as he ducked his head to avoid a swipe of her ladle. "What was that for!?"

"You don't show up here ever since you got back, you don't even bother to drop in to say hi!" she accused him, shaking her ladle at his face. "Did you find someone who was better at making ramen?!"

"No! I didn't, I swear! Nothing can compare to Ichiraku Ramen!" he promised the two of them. The last thing he wanted to do was insult Ichiraku.

"Oh really?" asked Teuchi. "And we're supposed to believe you? You, who didn't bother to come once during the Chūnin Exams?"

"It's the truth! Besides, I haven't had ramen in three years."

"Why didn't you say so?" Ayame asked, her angry mood completely disappearing. Both she and her father went to work making the ramen, serving it in record time. Naruto broke the chopsticks apart, quickly gave thanks, and dug in with gusto.

"Ah, still the best!" he declared as he slurped down the noodles and the broth. "Another one, please!"

"Coming right up," Teuchi told him.

"You really should eat more slowly, Naruto," Iruka told him as he ate his ramen.

"I can eat slowly, but like I said, it's been three years since I had ramen. I couldn't hold it in." Teuchi gave him another bowl and this time, he did it more slowly. The two of them enjoyed their meal with Naruto mainly telling him some of the things he's done. A couple of those things managed to make Iruka laugh, which made him smile. "You know, there is one thing that's kinda been bugging me ever since the Chūnin Exam."

"Oh? What's that?" he asked, curious. It didn't seem like a lot of things bugged Naruto recently.

"How in the name of Kami in heaven above did you and the crazy snake lady get together?" he demanded, pointing his finger at his former sensei, who could only stare him before laughing. "Hey, don't laugh at me! It's a serious question!"

"Sorry, sorry, I couldn't help it." Iruka apologized as he tried to stop laughing.

"Well? How did you two get together?"

"I'll be honest with you, Naruto; I'm not quite sure myself. But I think it started when she walked in on me when I was undressing in the Academy bathhouse." The bathhouse was adjacent to the Academy and was available to teachers after a rough day or just wanted to quickly clean up. "She kept looking me over like I was a piece of prime meat. She wasn't embarrassed in the slightest." He could still remember her eyes roaming up and down his body while he stood in surprise, wearing only his underwear.

"But I'm guessing you were," Naruto asked with a grin. He would be too if he was in that situation (all he had in his experience was trying to make sure that Fangirls didn't break down the door to the room he was in at the time and running for his life away from them).

"Of courseI was. After that, whenever we met, she kept giving my ass a squeeze and purring in my ear. Kurenai usually had to pull her from me. I eventually asked her if she wanted to go out sometime and she all but pounced on me!"

"And how did the date go?"

"Surprisingly well, actually," Iruka admitted. "She didn't try to molest or anything like that the entire time we were out. It was only after I walked her back home she started up again."

He grinned. "Let me guess: you tried to say goodnight and she pulled you into a round of tongue wrestling?"

"…I haven't heard it be put like that, but yes. Then she dragged me up to her apartment."

"You must've completely worn out by the morning," he said with a chuckle.

"Yes, I was," his former teacher admitted, before giving his former student a grin that was a little perverted. "But the sex was well worth it."

The blonde quickly found his ramen more interesting. "That I don't need to hear."

"Are you sure?" he asked, the grin getting wider. It disappeared when they heard the faint sounds of feet stomping on the ground, a lot of them. "What's that noise?" he asked, not really expecting an answer.

He got it when he heard Sasuke run past, screaming "HELP!" at the top of his lungs. What soon followed were the high-pitched squeals of his Fangirls as they screamed his name and chased after him.

"If I had to hazard a guess, I would say that would be Sasuke getting punished for that prank he pulled back at the capital," Naruto nonchalantly said as he continued to eat his ramen, while everyone else in the restaurant looked at him with surprise.

"What did you do, Naruto?" Iruka asked him.

He shrugged. "I just told them where he would be and that he wanted them. I had a clone shadow him until he was alone. Then I used a wireless radio to let them know his location. They took care of the rest."

"That's a little cruel, Naruto," Ayame accused him. Both she and her father had hidden Sasuke from his Fangirls enough times to know how scary they really were.

"So was having a shirshu who hates my very existence and who would love to see me dead go after me for a laugh," he replied, looking her straight in the eye. "This is just the return prank. Besides, I have to maintain my reputation as the best pranker in Konoha."

"You're still the same as ever, Naruto." Iruka said with exasperation.

"I'll take that as a compliment, Iruka-sensei," he said with a mischievous grin, making the others laugh.

But there was also another reputation that he had to protect, one that was mandatory. There was a reason Azula had silently called Sasuke an idiot. To her, since he had worked with Naruto before he "left", he should've known and remembered the most important lesson of.

You don't prank an Uzumaki. They will prank you back.

End

Author's note: Thank you for all the reviews you've sent me.

Thus ends the Daimyo arc. For those of you who were hoping to that it would last a little longer, sorry. I'm still getting used to writing an arc, not separate chapters.

Yes, Naruto knew about the Jūbi. Why else would he be up at the North Pole stopping the fish monster and killing Zhao?

The time when the moon was gone will be back much, much later. If you're going to tell me that the Waterbenders must have had some record of that event, let me point out this. 1: The event happened long before any of the current Waterbenders were alive. 2: It's one thing to have your power completely disappear and another thing to have it weaken. Personally, I think having it weaken is the more embarrassing of the two.

As I had said before, I like to think the Akatsuki is just more than ten members. Hell, the reason I think there were only ten in the first place is because that was how many fingers the Gedō Mazō had. If the Akatsuki had unofficial members, then they could have an invisible empire stretched across the entire Elemental Countries. Just look at when Deidara and Sasori invaded Suna. I'm pretty sure they don't wander around the countries, looking for the Bijū and/or the Jinchūriki. They must've had informants and spies to tell them where to go.

Yes, that quote came from Joker in the first Mass Effect. That's just one of the many reasons why we love that guy.

I'm not quite sure how an actual coronation ceremony would go, so I kinda made this up. And the reason Naruto announced who he was wasn't because he was trying to show off. It was more along the lines of "oh what the hell" kind of moment.

For the record, when Miki and Azula were talking about the threesome, they were kidding. Please remember that Miki made the offer to Naruto during the dance with full knowledge of it never happening.

Yes, I did say that Naruto shouldn't make a direct beeline to Ichiraku Ramen every time he comes back from the training trip or from exile. But that also doesn't mean he should avoid it completely. It's the same thing with Iruka. If anything, that's the first person he would be honest with in the village.

I would like to thank the writer Dragon6 and his story A Family of Foxes & Snakes (both the original and the rewrite) for the pairing of Iruka and Anko. Ever since I read that story, I don't think Anko belongs with anyone else. I also hope that he adds in more scenes of Iruka and Anko in his new chapters, because those were always the funniest parts in the original version.

I'll see you all next chapter!