Pages: 10

Words: 5, 205

Chapter fourteen: Test

"Ebisu-san arigato for coming I have some matters to discuss with you. I hope I'm not taking you away from training your squad members."

"Hai, you requested to see me Hokage-sama? Iie, my squad members are perfectly capable in training themselves with or without me there. I have been teaching those two shinobi all the skills they need to know to become as successful as I am. They are quite blessed to have such a highly skilled Jounin instructor looking over their fragile young inexperienced shoulders." Ebisu appeared in the room with a puff of smoke.

"That's good to hear Ebisu-san. I want to give you another student today, since you are so capable, to see if she can be added to your squad. Last night it was decided she would graduate. So she will be behind your other squad members. However you know the Chuunin exam is coming up this year and you are only permitted to enter with a team of three." Sarutobi replied. He originally planned to make the Jounin his grandson's tutor, but he changed his mind when he figured out, after of the birth of his grandson, from the scores the academy sent him that there were going to be more students graduating the year before Naruto, hopefully, did.

"Last night you mean-?" Ebisu pushed the sunglasses he always wore back up the bridge of his nose, out of habit, even if they weren't sliding down his face.

"She was involved with the missing scroll incident because she didn't want to graduate."

"What do you mean by didn't want to graduate? That's the only reason why children attend the academy for, so they can graduate and get a Konoha hitai-ite." Ebisu was slightly confused, what sort of child was the Hokage dumping into his lap? He already had a strange team of two. There was a freakishly strong girl who relied mainly on taijutsu and was a weapon specialist. But she had poor ninjutsu skills and chakra control. The other was a boy who was easily distracted by girls, wasn't as strong in taijutsu but excelled in genjutsu, charka control and had the Kazaana, a Kekkei genkai that Ebisu had never heard of before, in his right hand. Miroku often used spiritually infused or reiki infused papers called ofudas and there was Kirara, Sango's two tailed fire neko who would turn into a fearsome beast in a blink of an eye and not to mention the neko could fly. He had almost had two accidents in his pants the first time he saw the small kawaii neko transform.

"Iie, this girl is different. She could easily perform the graduation jutsu perfectly in class. In fact she excelled in that area. Out of the twenty seven graduated she came out ranking fourth, she managed to surpass Haruno, Sakura by two percent. Anyways the girl I want to put on your team had heard that Naruto didn't graduate. Because of that she didn't want to either since she is such a loyal friend to him. Mizuki was the one responsible for tricking the children into stealing the scroll of sealing and the rest, as you know, is history."

"What's her name?"

"Higurashi, Kagome. When she was six she attended the academy for a short while, until a woman I was familiar with and Kagome-kun recognized her too calling her 'Obaa-chan' asked if she could take Kagome-kun and train her reiki powers. You are familiar with reiki, with Miroku-chan on your squad. Well her reiki powers greatly surpass his, on a whole new level. She was trained in solitude by the old woman, only allowed to visit the friends she had already made here every so often. I allowed Sango-chan and Miroku-chan to visit her on their short breaks in between switching academy levels. I had you postpone testing your first new team in their teamwork because the old woman, with my deepest regrets passed away. I had Kagome-kun move back here and attend the academy again at the level she would have been at, had I not allowed her to leave the village. She remarkably showed no signs of struggling with the curriculum. If she had I would have dropped an academy level or perhaps I would have given her a tutor."

"You mean to say that Sango-chan and Miroku-chan already know this girl?" Ebisu asked wondering how he was going to test the team on teamwork with a girl they already knew. Maybe he would just test the girl separately from the rest of his squad or he would think up of something. However she was that youkai's friend so maybe he would have her fight him by herself and if, more like when, she failed he would send her back to the academy.

"I do, she lives with them. They were all brought here to Konoha by Hatake, Kakashi they were the only survivors of their village attack."

"Alright, I'll take this Higurashi, Kagome under my wing!"

"I have to warn you though, since she hangs out around Naruto-kun, she's become quite the troublemaker and I'm not sure what other things her 'Obaa-chan' taught her other than to control her reiki, but this girl seems to be very promising in becoming a strong shinobi."

"Ho hoho….I'll direct her off that troublemaking pathway she's been led on. You can count on me Hokage-sama. Once I'm done with her she will be a model citizen of our wondrous village, so when do I get to meet this Higurashi, Kagome?"

"I've already have a shinobi on his way to inform her. Ebisu-san I have a favor to ask of you. I would like you to go find my grandson. He ran off with Naruto earlier this morning and hasn't come back yet."

"Don't worry I'll retrieve your grandson from that boy's clutches unharmed." Ebisu said with his eyes narrowed and in a puff of smoke he was gone.

'He has such distain and for Naruto like all the other villagers….Kagome will definitely not have any respect towards Ebisu if he acts that way about Naruto in front of her. She really is a one of a kind….' Sarutobi mused to himself as he watched the Jounin leave his office. 'Maybe I should have warned Ebisu- Iie, he needs to learn this lesson on his own, even if that lesson is taught to him by an eleven year old. I am eager to see what she learned while away from the village.'

Knock. Knock. Knock.

"Sumimasen, onegai [excuse me, please] open up I have a letter from the Sandaime for a Higurashi, Kagome! Is anyone there?" The shinobi was getting impatient. He had been probably standing outside this apartment door for thirty minutes. He had to deliver this message! It was a direct order from the Hokage himself! The shinobi paced around outside the beaten looking door for five minutes before banging on it again. "Sumimasen! Open up!"

"Oi Mister what are you doing?" A small girl asked looking at him with big blue eyes.

"I have a message to give to a Higurashi, Kagome. I was told that this is where she lives and I have been out here for thirty five minutes waiting to deliver it!"

"Gomen, I had to have my picture taken this morning since I graduated yesterday," Kagome said sticking her tongue out the side of her mouth the hitai-ite she had received was loosely tied around her neck. "So what's the message?"

"Oh thank Kami!" The shinobi yelled looking up at the ceiling before looking back at the person he had to deliver the message to. "Here follow the instructions that are written in the letter I have no time to read them to you. I have other things to do!"

"Hey Kagome! What are you doing here?" A wet Sango asked, her body slowly sinking down into the river. She cursed and tried to regulate the Chakra on her feet but ended up being dunked into the water, again. "Urusai Miroku! Just because you've already accomplished this stupid training exercise a long time ago doesn't mean you can laugh at me!"

'I followed the instructions given to me on this scroll. So why did it lead me to Sango and Miroku? I thought the scroll said that this would be the Shinobi team I was placed in- wait…does this mean-?' Kagome looked at the unraveled scroll in her hand again then she looked up at Sango and Miroku. Then back at the scroll, then two her bickering friends, the scroll, her friends, scroll, friends until it had clicked.

"Ha ha, well I'd rather be doing that exercise then being forced to punch this hunk of wood," Miroku answered rubbing his sore raw knuckles after hitting the wood again. "Honestly I'm not going to be able to destroy this log by the week of today at this rate. I don't know how or why you choose to do this every day Sango!"

"I think I've been assigned to your squad!" Kagome said happily jumping up and down laughing at their shocked expressions on their faces. Sango accidentally submerged herself completely under water and Miroku punched himself across the face.

"NANI?" They both yelled once they had regained their bearings, startling the nesting birds in the trees around them straight into the skies.

"Un! Read this!"

Miroku the person, who was closer and most importantly dry, grabbed the letter Kagome was waving around in her hands. "I-it's true! But I think before you are officially accepted as a member on the team Ebisu-sensei will want to test you."

"Not another one of those, I'm going to send you back to the academy if you're not able too- things," Sango said rolling her eyes as she dragged her soaking wet body onto the shore and squeezed the water out from her hair before sighing. She then stepped back onto the water balancing for a longer time before toppling over backwards into the river again.

"Last time he didn't know Sango and I knew each other so he tested us on teamwork. I'm sure this time he'll find out that we all know each other. He might just do another one of those 'I'm going to try and scare you by threatening to send you back to the academy' tests Sango was talking about." Miroku pondered out loud holding onto his chin.

"You're doing that weird think again where you talk to yourself and hold your chin. You're going to get acne there if you don't stop." Sango said spitting out small fountain water from her mouth as she stood in the center of the river.

"ACNE, oh no oh no, I can't have acne! Girl's don't like guys with acne on their faces!" Miroku said rushing over to the river so he could look at his reflection to see if any blemish had popped out from his well cared for skin. He wore a cucumber and avocado mask at least once a week to keep his face well hydrated and looking soft to the touch.

"Mou….Guys where is your sensei anyways?" Kagome asked she was actually kind of curious to finally put a face to the name. She had heard about 'Ebisu-sensei' from stories Miroku and Sango told her when they did those missions that sounded so exciting.

"I was wondering where he was too…he just disappeared, one moment he was there telling us what we had to work on next thing I knew he was gone," Sango said shrugging her shoulders. "He'll come back eventually. Until then you can practice walking on water with me because it's just so gosh darn fun to fall into the water all the time."

"Okay I'll do it at least it's something to do so I won't get bored, so what is it I have to do?"

"If you really want to practice that exercise Kagome you should start off learning to walk up a tree first. That's where we started off, we didn't just start walking on water like that, and the training exercise teaches you how to control your charka! Bringing out a specific amount to a certain area of your body, in this case it's your feet. Ebisu-sensei told us that this skill can be even difficult to master for a skilled ninja, since the amount of chakra needed to keep your feet attached to any surface is small but it must be exact," Miroku had turned around and closed his eyes as he recited the information. "It's said that the bottom of your feet is the most difficult area on your entire body to gather your-"

"This doesn't seem hard at all! Ha ha look at me I'm walking on water!" Kagome jumped up and down on the liquid surface only when she deicide to do a cartwheel she forgot to put chakra on the palms of her hands so she ended up dunking her upper body into the water. She spat out a mouthful of water before talking. "Bleh! Anyways this is so cool! This is so much better than those painful training exercises Obaa-chan always made me do! Whoopie!"

"Nani?" Miroku and Sango yelled in unison watching the half wet girl easily dancing around on the water for the first time

"Even you got soaked Miroku the first time you did this exercise but it wasn't because you were trying to do a cartwheel and forgot to attach Chakra to your hands."

"…She skipped right over the tree exercise and went straight to the hardest one there is, unless there is a fire walking one of these, I'm sure that one would be the hardest. No wait, I believe there is one where you use your chakra to control the air…" Miroku said he knew it had to be because of all the time Kagome spent training with their Obaa-chan.

"How did she do that?" Sango asked in amazement, Kagome was just walking along the length of the river making faces to scare the fish below her.

"Kagome's a master at controlling her reiki, that's why. She has to have more than perfect control over it and to be able to gather it at any part of her body like it was second nature to her. Otherwise the reiki could and it has exploded back into her face. Reiki is a lot more difficult to handle but with Obaa-chan's harsh training Kagome is able to do it with extreme ease. On the other hand, if she finds her reiki easy to use, then using her chakra- well it must be a joke to her." Miroku told Sango as they watched the small girl they were watching in awe.

"That was fun but I want to go do something more exciting than this." Kagome said looking at her feet and reflection in the water before walking back to where her friends where standing.

"You could try and climb to the highest branch on that tree over there," Sango said as he pointed to the tree that she had spent an entire four grueling long weeks trying to climb. "If you need some momentum you can run at it."

"Hai!" Kagome saluted walking over to the tree Sango had pointed at looking at the base of it she placed her foot on the trunk of the tree and then backed up and ran up the entire length of the tree. 'This is kind of like when Obaa-chan had Kirara placed me on top of a tree trunk then tied my hands and feet directly onto eight thick wooden poles she stuck in the ground around me. Then said until I was able to use my reiki to blast my way out I was going to have to stay there. I didn't get to eat a proper meal for two and a half weeks…Kirara saved me by bringing scraps.'

"She's not having any troubles at all." Sango said breathlessly as Kagome was hidden away by the branches of the tallest tree in the entire training area.

"See and you didn't believe me! I told you it has to do with her being able to control her reiki," Miroku said going back to kicking and punching the log, if Ebisu-sensei came back and saw that they weren't doing what he asked them to do he'd give them a big boring lecture about slackers and what happens to Shinobi who slack. "That's why I happen to have excellent Chakra control too. Obaa-chan trained me how to use my reiki also, so my chakra just comes naturally."

"You look two look so itty bitty from way up here!" Kagome said as a giant grin spread across her face, she started sliding off the slippery surface of the branch. "Uh oh!"

"Kagome!" Sango yelled her eyes wide open in fear, if she fell from that height she could die!

"Just kidding, I'm not going to fall!" She dangled upside down on the underside of the branch swinging back and forth.

"Yo-You did that on purpose! You're such a little gaki Kagome get down here right now!" Sango yelled clenching a fist to the side of her face when she thought Kagome was going to fall that had made her heart skip a beat, thinking about Kagome falling had really had frightened her.

"No need to yell at me when I can hear you perfectly fine," She grumbled jumping from branch to branch until she landed safely on the ground then throwing her hands behind her head she looked at Sango and said, "Obaa-chan taught me how to do something similar to that, cept she could always find a way to make it more painful."

"I better get back to practicing walking on water. I have a feeling that Ebisu-sensei is going to return any second now and just as I was starting to get dry too…." Sango said making her way back to the river glaring down at her liquid tormentor. She swore to herself that she was going to be completed this exercise by the very end of the week, at the very most.

"Ebisu-san why do you have two bloody pieces of tissue shoved up your nostrils?" Kagome said slyly sliding her way over to the strange looking man who wore his Konoha hitai-ite like that Mizuki guy. He also had sunglasses that were just too circular for her taste.

"That's none of your business!" Ebisu roared, that boy had embarrassed him in front of the Hokage-sama's grandson! Not only that, but demon gaki had taught Konohamaru-san such an obscene jutsu and then combined that dumb jutsu with the Kage Bushin no jutsu into something he created and called the 'Harem no jutsu' which was a bunch of naked girls.

'I don't like the way his eyes are looking at me…they're hard and cold. They're the same eyes…. the villagers look at Naru-kun calling him all those hurtful names.' Kagome's face became strangely expressionless for the girl who had been so animated only moments ago.

"So you're Higurashi, Kagome correct?" He asked Kagome pushing up his glasses that had slid down his nose. While thinking about the reason he had to shove the tissue up his nostrils. It was all of that boy's fault using such a jutsu that made many blonde naked girls appear out of thin air. How could this normal looking girl be a friend to that he might just never understand? The two were on complete opposite sides from each other when it came to the academy Naruto came out as the person with the lowest scores, while she was able to rank fourth out of the twenty seven graduates, Uchiha, Sasuke ranked first place followed by Aburame, Shino then Hyuuga, Hinata finally Higurashi, Kagome.

"Hai."

"And you're Naurto-kun's friend, are you?" Ebisu had to ask to see if what the Hokage had told him was true or if he had been just pulling his leg.

"Un! Naru-kun is one of my best friends and I am his." Kagome said with her head tilted slightly to the side, she did not liking the tone this man was talking, one bit. It made her reiki bubble beneath her skin and that was never a good sign since. Her Obaa-chan had warned her if she didn't control her reiki from lashing out it would lash back at her and cause her bodily harm. Those wounds would heal like a regular person would since they were caused by her own power. Another thing she found out was that she could heal a lot faster than regular people. This came in handy whenever her Obaa-chan decided to hurt her or she got hurt doing a training exercise her Obaa-chan had made up.

Even Sango and Miroku had picked up the odd behavior Kagome was displaying right now. They had stopped their training exercises all together, now that they thought about it Ebisu-sensei was acting a lot different than he normally did too. Both of their behaviors greatly confused them and what was with Ebisu-sensei suddenly asking about Naruto? Nothing was making sense anymore.

"Sou desu ka [Is that so]?" Ebisu looked down at the rather short girl maybe the Hokage was wrong about her being a promising shinobi. She was shorter than average children her age like that Naruto gaki and overall, in his opinion, she just didn't appear to be very strong either.

"Hai is that a problem Ebisu-san?" She was just sick and tired of everyone treating her friend like he was the fox youkai when he clearly wasn't! Everyone was lucky she didn't have the burden of having a sealed fox youkai inside of her. If it had been her she might have gone berserk and released it and torn everybody into shreds by now.

"Iie, Kagome-kun."

"What's with this suffocating atmosphere?" Miroku asked laughing nervously as he used his hands to fan at his face.

"It's nothing Miroku-chan, you should get back to training. Remember I told you that I wasn't letting you go home today until that log has at least dents starting to form in it! You've been working on the same one for nine days now if my calculations are correct and you have been doing the training exercises I asked you to do you should break the one you're on in the next few days." Ebisu said turning away from the girl the Hokage wanted to put onto his team.

"Ebisu-sensei how are you going to test Kagome to see if she can be placed into our squad, it can't be that simple, you're not just going to allow her to join are you? What are you going to make her do?" Sango questioned suspiciously at she suspended herself over the water for a good ten seconds before she slowly sank to the very bottom.

"You're right Sango-chan I can't just let Kagome-kun join. She needs to be tested it's only fair all other graduating shinobi are," Ebisu said as he turned back to face Kagome who was still looking at him devoid of any emotion. "I'm going to give you the same test that I gave them. You are going to have to take my glasses off of my face in order for you to pass. They are not allowed to help you otherwise it's an automatic fail and I have to send you back to the academy."

"Nani? Ebisu-sensei that hardly seems fair at all, there were two of us against you not including Kirara! There's only one of Kagome-" Miroku was shocked that Ebisu-sensei had come up with such a ridiculous test.

"Kagome-kun has to do it and that's final! I'll give her a choice, she can quit now and go back to the academy or she can stay here which mean she has chosen to fight me and have a chance on joining my squad." Ebisu said crossing his arms over his chest.

"This is absurd and you know it sensei! Did she pull one of her pranks on you or something? Just what kind of vendetta do you have against Kagome?" Sango yelled jumping out of the water soaking wet, pointing her finger at him her brown eyes flashing angrily.

"I have nothing against her, she does however need to be tested today because tomorrow I am leaving on that mission which was assigned to me that I told you guys I had." Ebisu answered, Sango and Miroku appeared to be really loyal to Kagome that was good sign.

"Guys you don't have to worry 'bout me. I'm going to have no problem kicking your ass Ebisu-san! And all of your training exercises look like their completely lame, laaaaaame, lame! My Obaa-chan invents better ones in her sleep than those ones," Kagome said pulling the flesh underneath her eye down and blew a giant raspberry in his direction intentionally spraying her spit all over him. "So how much time to I have to kick your butt?"

"GA-GAKI!" Ebisu cried wiping his face dry. Then he pulled out a timer and set it down on a tree stump. "I'll give you until dinner time-"

Kagome's stomach grumbled at the mention of food and she frowned, "Oi Ebisu-san do you promise me that you'll treat me to all the ramen I want from Ichiraku Ramen if I manage to get those glasses off of your face?"

"Huh?" 'What kind of request is this kid making? Oh well it doesn't matter, she won't be able to defeat me after all I'm a Jounin and she's just a mere Genin.' "Hah aha fine I promise-"

'He…really…doesn't know what he's getting himself into…' Miroku thought already imagining all the empty ramen bowls piling up and the bank breaking tear jerking cost of the bill. 'Kagome I know that you can beat him, you've probably become stronger and a force to reckon with all of Obaa-chan's violent training methods, I believe you can defeat him Kagome!'

'He'll surely be broke, when Kagome's done…that is if she can beat him, I really hope she does. He's much stronger then he looks, but then again so are you Kagome.' Realization flickered across Sango's face. She knew what Kagome was doing! She was motivated herself to win, with food on the line she was going to be fighting the hardest she could.

"-but if you fail, not only do you have to go back to the academy but you won't be allowed to become a shinobi ever." Ebisu said with his eyes closed allowing himself to raise the stakes higher than he had ever before. He could make an exception for the demon's friend.

"Did you say something after you said you promised me to buy me all the ramen I wanted when I won?" Kagome asked innocently looking confused after she pulled her pinky out of her ear.

'This gaki- was cleaning her ear out and not paying any attention to me when I was talking?' Ebisu raged in his head this girl really knew how to push a person's buttons. "AHEM as I was saying you have until dinner time to get my glasses, if you win I promise you on my shinobi title itself that I'll buy you all the ramen that you can eat, but if you fail you'll quit being a shinobi-"

"I'm hungry now…." Kagome whined clutching her aching stomach interrupting Ebisu she held out her fingers unintentionally in the shape a W. "Three hours!"

"Nani?" Ebisu didn't understand what this kid was getting at.

"I'm not going to go easy on you, I'm going full out! So three hours," Kagome sat on the ground before patting down her body….she supposed it wasn't very smart that she wasn't carrying around any weapons… "Sango, can I borrow your stuff?"

"You mean you're just walking around unarmed even when those instructions given to you said 'bring all your shinobi tools' you didn't think to grab your weapons?" Sango asked angrily as she removed her pouches off of her body. "What ever happened to those Kunai and Shuriken I made especially for you? Are they just sitting around and collecting dust, or what?"

'HOW DARE SHE IGNORE ME!' Ebisu cried out in his head opening and closing his jaw.

"I left them at home because have nothing to carry them around in and I don't want them to get damaged!" Kagome said as she attached the pouches to her body then pulled out a Kunai she was twirling it around on her finger trying to decide whether she should cut off the bandages that covered her weights or not.

'What is Kagome thinking right now?" Miroku wondered then realized, she must be taking the fight really seriously if she was contemplating taking off all her weights. Their Obaa-chan had told them to keep them on because they would be mostly fighting youkai and most youkai were a lot faster and stronger than regular shinobi she said that some were even faster than the best shinobi there was, without even trying. She told them that if they wanted to be able to keep up with youkai they had to wear weights to make their muscles strong.

'Nah, he's not worth it.' Kagome thought replacing the kunai back into its pouch.

"Kagome-kun what were you saying about three hours?" Ebisu asked his face have a spasm from all the stress this one small girl was giving him.

"Oh right, I say in three hours or less I will have your glasses in my possession and then you will have to treat me to all the ramen I want and you know why that is?" She said with a massive grin on her face giving him no time to respond to her question. "It's because you're going to lose!"

"You're very confident for someone so short, how old are you again?"

"…what do you expect I'm only eleven years old!" Kagome yelled failing her arms around.

'Eleven? This girl is a year younger than the rest of the shinobi that graduated this year and she still somehow managed to rank fourth, that's pretty incredible for someone who is stupid enough to actually become friends with that demon boy.' Ebisu looked the girl over again pushing his glasses up his nose. 'Looks like the tables have turned, who's annoying who now?' He thought. "Well you're still puny, even for an eleven year old kid."

"That's it I'm going to kick your ass, right now and when I get those glasses of yours I'm going to crush them, and that's a promise I'm going to make to you, just you wait and see!" Kagome growled sliding down into a fighting position her eyes glaring through Ebisu's glasses and into his cold hard eyes. 'It's that look in his eyes again!'

"You like to talk big don't you? Fine we'll have it your way I'll set three hours on the clock. You know what's at stake and I have Miroku-chan and Sango-chan as my witnesses," Ebisu said turning his back to Kagome and turning the dial on his timer. "Okay three hours are now on the clock are you ready?"

What's the most challenging thing you've had to do?

Best reviews for the last chapter: ChocolateBunnyChan & yorushihe