Chapter 12
Training and Finals
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto
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In a small clearing with large towering trees, lush knee-high green grass, and a beautiful sparkling blue lake a few metres away. Naruto sat in the middle of the clearing with his legs crossed, hands brought together in a prayer like form and eyes closed.
The grass around him started to rapidly grow; flowers sprouted from the ground and bloomed within the spam of a few seconds. Large tree roots suddenly burst out from the ground, growing straight up until they started to tower over the very large trees around them. Naruto breathed out slowly, calming himself, and the large roots started to slowly shrink down until they sunk back into the ground.
With his eyes still closed, Naruto heard the sounds of metal cutting through the air.
'Wood Style: Wood Wall'
A wall made entirely out of wood burst out from the ground and a second later multiple 'thunks' could be heard, as the metal projectiles hit the wooden wall.
Still in his sitting position, Naruto disappeared into thin air and not moment later, the area where he had been seated on exploded. He reappeared a few second later, standing on top of the lake that was near the small clearing.
The water he was standing on burst upwards, and two large water dragons with glowing yellow eyes, formed and with a primal roar, they attacked him. Acting quickly, he threw several kunai with explosive tags tied around them at the first water dragon, the kunai hit their target and exploded, taking out the first dragon. He back flipped from the spot he was standing, avoiding the second water dragon as it hit the very place he had been standing.
Unfortunately for Naruto, even though he managed to avoid being pummelled when the water dragon hit the water. The force behind the dragon created a large explosion of water that soon turned into a large tidal wave, a wave that Naruto did not have time to avoid. The wave sent him sprawling towards the land and carried him over the clearing; he stopped when he hit a tree with his back.
'Maybe this wasn't such a great idea' Naruto thought to himself, groaning in pain from the impact. He closed his eyes again in concentration.
'There!' with lighting fast reflexes, he jumped into the air, avoiding a punch from his clone, the punch was so strong that it created a fist sized crater on the ground. Still in midair, Naruto drew out several kunai and added chakra to them; he quickly threw the chakra enhanced kunai at his opponent. When the kunai hit their intended target, Naruto flinched slightly.
'Two down, one more to go'
"Earth Style: Mud River!" A voice exclaimed, surprising Naruto.
The ground where Naruto was standing on started to liquefy until it turned into completely mud. Naruto tried jumping away, but found he could not as his feet were buried in the mud, preventing him from going anywhere; he slowly sank into the mud until he was buried whole.
"Earth style: Earth Burial". His opponent exclaimed again, pressing his hands firmly on the muddied ground. Upon doing this, the ground hardened until it was a solid rock, crushing everything and anyone who was unfortunate to have been in it.
"Wood style: Binging Roots" Naruto's voice rang throughout the small clearing. Roots burst out from the ground, around his opponent, catching him completely off guard. The roots wrapped around his surprised opponent, preventing him from moving or escaping.
Naruto walked towards his opponent with a slight limb to his steps and sweat could clearly be seen on his face and cloths.
"I win" He declared with a bit of relief in his voice.
His opponent, who in fact was another Naruto, shook his head and gave the original Naruto an accusing glare
"You cheated" the clone said with a small glare.
"We are ninja, we are supposed to cheat"
"But you used THAT jutsu to escape, and that was against the rules" The clone said. Naruto paused in his response, his clone had a point.
"Well I...I'm not arguing with a clone. Especially one that I created" Naruto retorted, his voice holding an annoyed edge to.
The captured clone gave him one last glare before it dispelled in a burst of small wooden spikes. Naruto had to jump away to avoid being impelled by the wooden spikes.
"Tsk, sore loser" He grumbled lowly.
A few hours ago he had come into his private training ground and started training in different aspects of his skills. First he trained his taijutsu stances, then his shuriken and kunai accuracy. After that it was his sharingan skill and finally, and his most favourite, Ninjutsu. Well he mostly concentrated on his earth and water Ninjutsu, and the few mokuton jutsu that he had learned thus far.
The scroll he had received from his grandmother which was written by the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju, really helped him improve in his water and earth manipulation in ways he would never do on his own. There was a clear description of how best to improve his control of the two affinities and even had multiple earth and water jutsu to go along with it.
After he had gotten his control over the two elements to a substantial level, which took him nearly 3 months, he then proceeded to learn about his new Kekkei Genkai. At first it was very difficult, nearly impossible to control the Wood release. Every time he tried to create a Wood style related jutsu, the justu would fail or he would create a bastardized version of the jutsu. With enough practice and many attempts, with equal failures, he finally managed to create a Wood style related jutsu.
From then on, he spent countless hours reading over the information about the Mokuton from the scroll of the First Hokage. A few weeks later he did it, he managed to create another jutsu; Wood style wood clone. It was a jutsu that created a clone made from the user's water and earth chakra.
The clone could only use water, earth and Mokuton related jutsu and could take more severe damage than an average clone. Another peck of the Wood clone is that it could be sustained even it was a large distance away from the original; add to that, it could not be identified from the original as it was an exact copy of the original.
As it is he can control trees and plants to a curtain degree, for example he can make tree roots and even the tree itself rapidly grow within minutes. He can also make plants like flowers and grass grow quickly and can shrink their size by absorbing the chakra within the plants, however this only applies to plants that he had created.
After learning the Wood clone jutsu, he learned 3 more mokuton jutsu; Wood style; wood wall, Wood style; Binding Pillars and Wood style; Four Pillar Prison. There were more jutsu in the scroll, many more, but unfortunately the time to learn them all was rather limited, thus the challenge.
He created 3 Wood clones and fought against them, with some...limitations. The first being, he couldn't use his sharingan, and secondly, he wasn't allowed to use any Ninjutsu aside from the Wood jutsu that he knew. The reason for doing this you might ask, well he had figured that the best way to gain a sharper control of his new abilities was by using them in battle, and what better way to do that than by fighting versions of himself with half his strength?
It also helped him hone his rather lacking sensing abilities. At first the battle had been in a stalemate, with him holding his own against the Wood clones. But as the battle was progressing, the clones began working together and that was when the battle shifted in their favour. Working together, the clones managed to land several hits on the original Naruto. That was until he managed to get rid of the first one by impelling it through the stomach with tree roots.
The two remaining clones tried winning the fight by combining their attacks and pushing him into the defensive. In the end he managed to get rid of the second clone by killing it with several well thrown kunai.
The last clone however, before he could kill it, surprised him by trapping him in a pit made out of mud. Just as the clone was about to finish off the attack and win. Naruto used his new jutsu, Kumui, and phased right through the hardening mud before it could cause any serious damage or worse, kill him.
The clone had been right, he had cheated, but in his defence he was curious to see how just how the jutsu worked and that seemed like the perfect opportunity to experiment with it, that and he couldn't think of any way to escape the deadly trap.
He was still learning more about the new stage of the Sharingan that he activated. So far he had learned that Amaterasu was a fire based jutsu that when cast, would set ablaze to anything that they touched and were impossible to exqushe by normal means. He had yet to test for how long exactly the flames would burn for.
As for the second jutsu, Kumui, so far he had discovered that with his right eye he could become intangible and phase through solid objects. With his left eye, he could create a spiralling void that could 'suck' anything that he used it on, the object would be taking into the spiralling void and would never been seen again. He hadn't been able to discover just where exactly the objects were taken to, hopefully one day he would.
As powerful and amazing as the new abilities were, there was one thing that was worrying him about them. Ever since he awakened his new sharingan and used the two abilities that it provided. His eyes would bleed and would sting for a few minutes before they healed.
A few minutes ago, after using Kumui to escape the death trap that his clone had caught him in, he noticed that his vision had blurred for a very brief second. It got back to normal a second later but something was different, his vision wasn't as clear and sharp as it was before. The difference was hardly noticeable but it still worried him, was it going to get worse as time progresses? And more importantly was using his new sharingan the cause of it, the bleeding of his eyes was a very big indicator to that.
He was cut off from his thoughts when he felt someone approaching him and hid behind a tree, thinking he wouldn't notice them. Naruto turned his head to the side, looking at a particular spot behind a tree with narrowed eyes.
"You can come out now" he said out loud.
"How did you know I was here?" A male voice responded back
"I can sense when someone is close by" Naruto responded back in a slightly bored tone
"Oh"
"What are you doing here...Tou-san?" Minato rubbed the back of his head and gave his son a rather unnerving grin
"I heard you had no one to train you for the finals and decided to train you myself" Minato said, his voice holding a hopeful edge to it.
Naruto considered his father's proposal for a moment. Truth be told, he really didn't want any help. After the preliminaries were over, Kurenai-sensei had offered her help to train him and Shino, Shino had refused stating that he was going to train with his clan. He refused because there were some things which he wanted to train alone in, in secret. Like the two Justus's he had used in the forest of death and his Wood release... call it paranoia but something told him he was going to need them.
Hitomi was training with their grandfather, who had come to the village for the exams, and Hikari was training with their mother. He was hoping that his neither of his parents or grandmother would offer their training; he doubted he could say no to them. Thinking about it deeply, his father was THE Hokage, a man hailed as one of the smartest, fastest and strongest ninja alive, maybe he could help him with his new abilities after all.
"Thank you Tou-san, I would really appreciate it if you did". The moment those words left his mouth, he felt a cold chill run down his spine, like a million souls had just screamed out for him to turn away before it was too late.
"Great! Now all we have to do is asses where you are currently, what you are lacking and how best to improve it!" Minato said excitedly...too excitedly for Naruto's liking.
"Ok?" Naruto responded..
"As it is you rely heavily on Ninjutsu and genjutsu. You have mid level chunin speed, jonin level chakra reserves and very good chakra control. Above basic fuinjutsu and you have the ability to sense people within a specific range of cause" Naruto did not bother asking how his father knew all this, being the Hokage he probably had files with details about every ninja in the village.
Minato rubbed his chin in wonder, overall there wasn't really much he could help his son train in, aside from helping him refine what he already knew; there was not much he could do. For a genin, his son was pretty well balanced out.
That made him frown, he had created several shadow clones to take care of his paper work just so he could come and help train his son, that and he wanted to spend some time with his son. His children were growing up so much so fast and he felt like he was missing it all. He was always in the office and he hardly had time for his family.
He wrecked his brain, trying to think of something he could teach him, something that his son would be instantly interested in, something that only he could teach him and wouldn't take him very long to learn. His eyes lit up when it suddenly came to him, he had been planning to teach his children that particular jutsu as a graduation gift but work got in the way. But now was the perfect chance to teach his son his second most prized jutsu, a jutsu that took him three years to complete, a perfect father-son bonding mechanism.
"Truthfully there isn't much I can help you with..." Minato began. Naruto frowned.
"But! There is something that I can teach you...". Minato held out his hand. From the palm of his hand a swirl of blue visible chakra appeared, the swirl soon turned into a rotating glowing blue ball easily the size of his head.
"This is the Rasengan!" He said loudly, pushing the spinning ball of chakra in his hands right through a tree. The ball easily tore through the bark of the tree, easily grinding through it like it was paper until it exploded, sending millions of pieces of bark flying. After the explosion had died down, all that remained of the tree was a small stump on the ground. The rest of the tree could be seen a feet from where its stamp rested.
Naruto looked at the area where the tree had been mere seconds ago; he had to admit that was a powerful jutsu. It did not require any complex hand seals to use, which was a VERY good thing. It was all good and well to know how to cast many jutsu, but it meant nought if you couldn't cast them fast enough to hit your opponent, a lesson that his mother had long ago taught him. And the rasengan was almost instantaneous to activate; meaning that catching any opponent by surprise with it was almost curtain.
A rare look of excitement appeared in Naruto's eyes
"How do I begin?"
-Some Time Later-
A battered, exhausted and panting Naruto glared at the rubber ball in his hand. He looked up at his father, hoping to get some free advice, but all he got instead was an amused smirk. His sharingan, which had been active, turned off showing just how much exhausted he truly was.
The rasengan at first glance looked very easy to create, after all, all you had to do was to release your chakra, compress it, and make it spin right? NOT! It was actually a very hard technique to learn, one that took HIS father 3 years to create and master. It took his grandfather, THE Jiraya, a year to learn. If it took THEM such a long time to do, how long would it take him?
He pushed the depressing, self depreciating thoughts down. If it took his father and grandfather a long time to do the jutsu, then he would take a fraction of that time. His dream was to surpass them all, and he'd be damned if he allowed himself to be outdone by them! His sharingan flared to life again, spinning madly.
He concentrated on the rubber ball in his hand, adding more and more chakra into it until it started bulging. He concentrated harder, pushing more chakra into the ball, a small windswept around him as blue chakra swirled around his hands. With a mighty explosion, that sent Naruto skidding a good distance away, the rubber ball bust.
Naruto stared at his hands with a look of disbelieve and surprise in his eyes, he had done it? He had done it! He looked at his father, who was leaning against a tree, smiling proudly at him. Minato gave him a small nod and walked towards him with a very proud smile on his face.
"Good work son, you managed to get the first and second steps within one day...not even your old man was that good" Minato said proudly, gaining a weak smile in response from his son.
"What...is the...final...step?" Naruto panted.
"I'll teach you the last step tomorrow, when your arm is all healed up...right now I think you've exhausted your body enough"
"No...I can...still...keep going"
Minato reached down and grabbed Naruto's right hand, examining it. It was viably shacking and he could see a small amount of smoke coming off from the hand.
'Probably from expelling so much chakra' He deduced.
He let go of the hand and looked at his exhausted son, to think, he was able to complete the first and second stages of the rasengan within the spam of a few hours. A deep warm feeling rose from the pits of his stomach, a feeling he had only felt a few time in his life, like the time his wife had given birth to their children made him the proud father of three.
"If you continue any further, you will cause more damage to your hand. You wouldn't want your Kaa-san and Baa-san to look after you in the hospital again would you?" Naruto stiffened, the last time he had gotten injured and spent the night at the hospital, his mother and grandmother had taken it upon themselves to make sure he would receive only the best medic treatment provided only by them.
He still had nightmares about that particular night, the cooing he had received, the baby talk, the excessive attention, the spoon feeding...he had never felt so, so unmanlied in his life.
"Y-Yeah...you're right, I think it would be better to continue tomorrow. No need to cause any further injuries to my pri-injuries" Naruto said with small shiver.
Minato chuckled at his son's reaction at him mentioning THAT particular embarrassing moment. He bent down to his knees and indicated for Naruto to get on his back.
"Tou-san? What are you doing?" Naruto asked, dumbfounded at what his father was indicating for him to do.
"You are in no shape to walk home. Get on my back and I will carry you home"
"I-I think I can walk on my own" Naruto stuttered, feeling very awkward about the whole situation.
Minato pouted, not so long ago his son would've jumped at the opportunity to get piggy back ridding from him. What happened to the 'awesome Hokage-Tou-chan?' that his children used to call him? Not so long ago Naruto would've been jumping to get a piggy ride from him, oh how times chance.
"Alright then! Grab on and I'll teleport us home" Minato said snapping his fingers, giving Naruto a wide grin.
Naruto gave his father a deadpan stare.
"Why didn't you suggest that from the beginning?". Minato coughed into his hand, suddenly feeling embarrassed about his initial offer.
"Hehehehe, I forgot?" Minato said, rubbing the back of his head in embarrassment.
Naruto could only sigh. 'And people call him a genius'
Wanting to get out of the rather awkward situation he was in, Minato placed his hand on Naruto's shoulder and the two instantly disappeared into thin air.
-3 Days later-
Naruto stared at the clone standing a few feet from him, his arms were covered in bandages, and the training ground they were in was covered in multiple craters with a spiralling design in them.
"Are you ready?" the clone asked him, holding a several kunai in preparation.
Naruto closed his eyes and when he opened them again, there was a wired pattern in them. He gave a small nod, and the clone threw the kunai in its hands.
"Kumui"
A spiralling vortex appeared in front of him, right in the path of the incoming kunai. The kunai were all caught in the vortex and disappeared into it. A different set of kunai appeared in mid air, attacking him from all directions.
With his new sharingan active, Naruto could clearly see all the kunai headed for him travelling in slow motion. All the kunai hit Naruto, but instead of digging into his flash and fatally wounding him, they all passed right through his body like he was a ghost.
Naruto looked at his clone, who didn't look all that surprised at what he had just done, and wondered if there was another way for him to use his kumui in an offensive way, instead of sucking the enemy/objects away. As though commended by some unseen force, a small vortex opened up in front of him, and faster than even his eyes could follow. Something came out from the vortex and impelled his clone in the chest –killing it instantly- and went through several trees.
Naruto looked on in surprise as his clone burst into wooden spikes, never realising it had been hit until the very last moment.
'That...was interesting' He thought with a small frown. It seemed like many of his a abilities all appeared all in the form of an accident.
He wondered if he could recreate whatever that was he had just done, he activated kumui again. This time thinking about attacking instead of being in the defensive, the swirling vortex appeared again and from it, a silver object come flying out.
Unlike the first time, this time he managed to see whatever it was that came out and saw that it hit a tree brunch. He walked towards the tree and raised his hand to pluck the weapon from the brunch it had struck, effortlessly removing it. Examining the weapon in his hand, he was surprised to see that it was one of the kunai his clone had attacked him with earlier.
'So kumui does not only allow me to become intangible and absorb things into it, but whatever weapons or things caught in it are stored in it and can also be brought out, and it seems at any speeds and force. The more I use this jutsu the more secrets I unravel, I wonder what else it can do...'
"You know, you're really not supposed to be training after getting such an injury" A voice said behind Naruto, who almost jumped in surprise as he was so focused in his thoughts that he had not been paying attention to his surroundings.
"I heal fast" Naruto responded coolly. He turned around and found the Kumo kinoichi, Yugito, leaning casually against a tree with her arms crossed.
"What do you want?"
"My, you don't beat around the bush do you?"
"What do you want?" Naruto asked again, this time sounding annoyed and irritated.
Yugito gave him a small pout, a pout that soon turned into an amused smirk. "What, a girl can't visit you even for a little chat?"
"I have better things to do than to entertain you" Honestly he did, like training for one.
Yugito straitened herself and slowly walked towards Naruto, adding an extra sway to her rather well developed hips as she did so. She stopped just a few inches from Naruto. The two stared right into each other's eyes; the distance between their faces was so close that they could feel each other's breath tickling against their faces.
Yugito leaned forward until their lips were mere inches from touching. "I look forward to our match...Naruto" she whispered huskily as she leaned in further.
Just as their lips were about to touch, Yugito took a step back, instantly cutting off what would've most likely have been a kiss.
"Don't disappoint me" She said she walked away from him. Naruto made to respond but found he could not, his throat feeling like it was being swizzed. As Yugito walked away, Naruto's eyes were glued to her swaying rare, he licked his now very dry lips.
As soon as Yugito was out of his sight, Naruto breathed out a breath he didn't even know he was holding. He could feel his heart pounding restlessly against his chest. He took a deep breath to calm his nerves
"What was that?" he asked no one but himself.
A few minutes later, Naruto sat down to resume his training but was forced to stop when he felt something, or rather someone approaching.
He looked to up, sensing someone, and saw a boy standing on a branch with his arms crossed. The boy had short red hair and sea green eye' There were three very noticeable traits about the boy that drew his attention, first was the taniki-like black eye rings. Secondly the boy had a tattoo of 'love' written in kanji, on the left side of his forehead and lastly, he was carrying a giant gourd that from what Naruto had seen, the gourd contained his sand.
The boy, whom he remembered as Gaara, was giving off a large amount of KI and the murderous look in his eyes told him that whatever he here for, it was not beneficial to his health.
Sand started coming out from the giant gourd on his back, putting Naruto on edge. He had seen what Gaara could do with that sand.
"Namikaze Naruto..." Gaara muttered, a sinister grin plastered on his face.
"..."
"Your blood is mine!" The sand rushed at Naruto, covering the distance between Gaara and Naruto within seconds. Just as the sand was about to reach Naruto, a yellow and green blur appeared in front of Naruto, who was about to dodge the sand.
The sand hit the person and dispersed, as thought it had hit a large impenetrable object.
"Good to see you're making friends...Naru-chan" The person who had jumped in front of the attack said, from the sound of their voice it was obviously a female.
Naruto looked at the person and was surprised to see...his grandmother
"Baa-chan?" Naruto asked.
Tsunade embraced the surprised Naruto, burying his face in her large cleavage. After a few seconds, she let her grandson go and looked at Gaara.
"I think it would be best if you waited till the finals to face my grandson, don't you think so?" She tapped the hilt of her shoes on the ground slightly and a small crater appeared on the ground she had tapped.
Gaara scowled and turned around to face the opposite direction "Very well then...but know this Namikaze, your blood will be mine" With that the sociopath Gaara disappeared in a Sand Shunshin.
"So how is my favourite grandson doing?" Tsunade asked, completely disregarding what had just transpired not a minute ago.
Naruto looked at her for a second, wondering how she could switch from scary-killer mode to sweet loving all in the fraction of a second. Just like his mother.
"I'm fine, but what are you doing here?" Naruto asked, getting a smirk from Tsunade in response.
"Your father had an important meeting to attend to and will most likely be very busy these next upcoming weeks, so he asked me to help you with your training".
Two messenger birds had arrived in the village earlier today bearing very important and startling news. The first message was from Kumo, it was a letter from the Raikage informing the Hokage that he would be visiting the Hidden Leaf Village for the final exams. The second message was from Iwa bearing the same message as the one from Kumo, but it was also saying that the Tsukikage, Onoki, was requesting an audience with the Hokage.
Since then, Minato had been having meeting after meeting with the village council and his advisers. Organising security in and out of the village, planning for the exams, safe to say Minato had no time to train his son. Something that saddened him greatly. He would've sent a Shadow clone to train Naruto, but with all the stress and headaches he was already getting from the council alone, he didn't think he could handle receiving all the memories of his clone after it had spent hours with his son.
After seeing all the workload, stress and pressure that Minato constantly had, Tsunade was sure glad that she wasn't asked to be the Hokage, not like she would've agreed if they had asked her. Sure her job as Head of the Medic Department often demanded that she look after a lot of things, sign many documents and heal hundreds of patients every month, but at least she still got the chance to spent some time with her family, unlike a curtain blond haired leader. And besides, she had an assistant manager, Shizune, who took care of most of her work, so she really had not that much work to do.
"Oh" Naruto said with small frown. He was disappointed that his father wouldn't help him after all. He knew that his grandmother was probably the strongest woman in the world, hailed throughout the elemental nations for her super strength and medical prowess.
But doubted that she would teach him how to use her super strength, considering how much precise chakra control it required, it would take him months to even reach that level of chakra control. And learning more medical jutsu would not help him all that much against his opponent.
"Cheer up brat, I might not well versed in fire Ninjutsu or know how to use wood release but there is something I can teach you and you first lesson is...how to dodge!" Tsunade said, holding a large rock that was nearly twice her size, kami knows where she had gotten the large rock from.
'Kami must hate me' Naruto thought, gulping nervously when he saw Tsunade casually throw the rock in the air and catching it with one hand like it was completely weightless.
"AHHHHH!" Naruto screamed on top his lungs when Tsunade threw the rock at him. The rock hit him, and continued in its path with Naruto firmly plastered on it, screaming so loudly that his voice could be heard throughout the village.
-Time skip-
-Chunin Exam Finals-
Naruto slowly opened his eyes and looked at the clock that was resting on the wall in his room. He looked at it for a few seconds, his mind slowly registering what time it was.
'12 o'clock' he thought still dazed from his sleep, and closed his eyes to sleep again. A second later his eyes flew open, and he jumped out of his bed, and ran to his wardrobe. He quickly grabbed his new attire, which was hung neatly inside, putting it on quickly, he ran out of the room, not at all stopping to grab his weapons pouch and headband.
He had over slept! The final exams had started at 9, and he had woken up 3 hours later, which probably meant he had already missed his fight! Naruto frantically thought. He jumped down the stairs and landed on the floor below with a loud 'thud', the moment his feat touched the ground, he sprung for the door and froze just when he was about to exist the house.
He walked back inside the house and saw a sight that made him both want to kill someone and sigh in relief. There sitting on the kitchen table, laughing their stomachs out, was his mother, his grandmother, his grandfather, his older sister figure, his sisters and finally his father.
"Y-You s-should see t-the l-look on your f-face!" Hitomi said between laughs, rubbing a stray tear that was falling off her face from laughing.
Naruto closed his eyes and briefly thought about the situation he was in, he had been pranked plain and simple, and to make matters even worse, he had completely fallen for it. He should have noticed that it was too cold to be mid-afternoon, and after years of living with his sisters and mother, he should've expected them to do something like this.
He sighed, feeling more ashamed and embarrassed than angry for falling for such a childish, simple, prank like this.
"Very funny" he said with a small glare to all of them, as he tried to hide his embarrassment. Unfortunately this only seemed to make them laugh louder at his plight.
'I'm surrounded by idiots' he thought to himself and made his way back upstairs to his room to get properly prepared, And to also hide himself, until they had at least calmed down from their laughing.
Sometime later Naruto come into the living room-thankfully everyone seemed to have gotten over the prank by then-and sat down to eat with the rest of his family.
Breakfast was not as bad as Naruto had thought it would be for him, everyone was happily talking together. Sharing jokes, talking about the upcoming exams and the matches and the adults were giving them some slight pointers and advises on their matches. It was a nice family breakfast that Naruto and everyone enjoyed greatly, it was very rare that they came together like this and talked as a family. In the end it had ended like it usually did when they met like this, with Jiraya making a comment about his grandmother's and mother's breast. Then the two of them proceeded to beat him within an inch of his life.
The time came when it was almost time for the exams to start and the three genins had to leave the house, with the adults' staying behind and following some time after they had left.
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Naruto and his sisters arrived at the Chunin exams stadium and stood at the front gate, looking at the entrance with excitement, hesitation, and determination on their faces.
"This is it" Hikari said, turning around to look at her two siblings.
"I hope to see you two at the finals" Naruto said with a small smile on his face.
"What? Are you that eager to get your ass whooped by one of us?" Hikari injected mockingly
The three shared a laugh, just then they heard people screaming and shouting in excitement. They looked at each other and gave each other a confident nod and walked towards the stadium. As they were walking, Hikari and Hitomi slowed their pace down until Naruto was a little ahead of them. The two shared a mischievous look and sprinted towards their oblivious brother.
Naruto felt his sisters suddenly run and jump at him, he felt them, he heard them, but instead of avoiding them, he allowed them to tackle him into the ground.
"Aren't you two a bit too old to still be doing this? We are not five anymore ya know" Naruto reprimanded his sisters from the ground he was lying on. His sisters, who were sitting on top of him, started giggling just like they always did when they were still kids. Unnoticed by the two girls, a small smile made its way across Naruto's face as he tried and failed to get them off him.
"We are going to be late" That line seemed to get their attention because as soon as he said that, they got off him. They helped him stand up, and after quickly petting any dust of him, the trio made their way into the stadium.
Unknown to the three red haired siblings, this would the last time they would ever share moment like this again. For tragedy was soon to fall upon the Namikaze household.
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When they made it into the arena, they were assaulted by the screams and roars of a thousand people gathered to watch the exams.
"It seems we are famous" Naruto commented to his sisters. The two giggled and then Hikari gave him a mock glare.
"They are screaming more for you than us...You look way too much like Tou-san in those clothes". Hikari commented.
Naruto looked down at his new attire which consisted of ...
The three made their way towards the genin contestants, who were all standing in the middle of the arena.
A bored looking jonin wearing a nervy blue bandana tied to his forehead and chewing senbon in his mouth approached the genins.
"My name is Genma and I will be your proctor for the duration of the final stages of the chunin exam" The jonin said out loud.
"Hey, what happened to the previous proctor, the sick looking one?" Hitomi asked, waving her hand at the senbon-chewing jonin.
Genma glanced at her for a brief second and after breathing out a small silent-to him- sigh, he ignored her and continued with his introduction
"I will announce the end of a battle when one of the opponents is unable to continue any further or have forfeited" he paused for a second then continued "Now everyone but Namikaze Hitomi and Hyuga Neji please leave the arena"
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"First round match is between Neji and Hitomi...begin!" Genma announced, living the arena afterwards.
The two genins stared at each other, neither making the first move.
"You should give up" Neji suddenly said, getting a raised eyebrow from Hitomi
"And why would I do that?"
"It is obvious that you are not a match for me, give up now and save yourself the embarrass-" Neji's speech was stopped when he suddenly found himself souring through the air.
'Fast' was his only thoughts. He skidded to a stop, and used his sleeve to rub the trail of blood from his mouth.
"Very well then...Byakugan!" Neji exclaimed, activating his family's bloodline limit.
"Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Hitomi shouted, there was two puffs of smoke, and when the smoke cleared two exact clones of her could be seen.
"Clones? You think you can hide yourself amongst illusions? My eyes can easily tell them apart!" Much to his surprise, the clones had a chakra system just like a normal person did. Even with his Byakugan he couldn't tell them apart.
"Oh yeah, take this!" The clones declared at once.
The clones ran towards him and immediately engaged him. As skilled as the clones were, Neji proved to be more of a challenge for them to handle as they were dispelled after a few seconds of instance close combat.
"Is that all you've got?"Neji asked with a small smirk on his usually stoic face.
Two more clones appeared besides Hitomi but unlike the last two clones, they did not attack Neji. Instead, Hitomi ran through a few hand seals, with her clones doing the same.
'Not by a long short'
"Fire Style: Fire Ball Jutsu" Hitomi shouted.
"Wind Style: Gail Palm!" Her clones shouted after her.
The wind jutsu hit the fire ball, greatly amplifying its size and power.
Neji's eyes widened at the attack, but instead of panicking, he closed his eyes and waited for the jutsu to approach
"ROTATION!" He shouted on top of his lungs, a dark blue dome of chakra surrounded him, offering him protection against the raging inferno.
Neji slowly stopped spinning when the fire jutsu let off, panting from exhaustion. He had used a very large amount of his chakra in his jutsu to make it strong enough to withstand Hitomi's jutsu. He was forced to dodge when he saw several kunai and shuriken attack him.
Curiously, he looked at the weapons on the ground, the ones he had just dodged, and could see a small shin of chakra around the kunai. He was about to jump away from the kunai, knowing that something about them was not right, but was caught by surprised when some of weapons exploded into smoke. From the smoke, four figures rushed out, grabbing hold of a surprised Neji.
Neji tried freeing himself from the tight grip that the clones had on him but could not. Something very sharp pressed against his neck, making him freeze in his struggles.
"Surrender" Hitomi threatened, pressing the kunai even harder against his neck.
Neji glared at Hitomi with so much anger and resentment in his eyes that she almost flinched. Almost. He knew he had lost, after all he had not even managed to land a single hit on his opponent, whist she, she had inflicted more damage on him than he would admit, both physically and mentally.
"Procter...I concede" Neji said through gritted teeth.
The proctor walked into the arena and declared Hitomi the winner. The crowd cheered loudly in approval and excitement.
Match 2
(Shikamaru vs Tamari...same as cannon)
"Third match is Naruto vs Yugito, will the two fighters please make your way into the arena"
Naruto appeared in the arena floor in a leaf shunshin, Yugito followed soon after by jumping into the arena.
-Kage booth-
"The prodigy Namikaze vs Kumo's own prodigy...this is match that many came here to see" Onoki commented. "Who do you suppose will win?" He asked the other two Kage seating besides him.
"I have faith my son will not disappoint" Minato responded
"Unless your son can pull a miracle, there is no way he will win against Yugito" the Raikage, A, boasted.
'Still arrogant as ever A' Minato thought with a small frown.
Unnoticed by all the Kages, the ANBU guarding the Raikage looked at the arena floor, specifically at Naruto. And for a very split second, his eyes glowed yellowed.
'Show me Naruto-kun, show me the true power of your eyes'
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Naruto and Yugito stood in the centre of the arena, the once screaming crowd now dead silent, watching in anticipation. Konoha's strongest genin, a prodigy, facing off against Kumo's own hailed prodigy, this was the match that many had come to see, prodigy vs prodigy, a match that was bound to be the show stopper of the exams.
"Fight!" The proctor yelled, living the arena. Neither combatant moved, they stood there, staring at each other, as though waiting for some divine intervention to tell them to start. A leaf, from a tree nearby, gently fell from its brunch, gliding in the air as it descended to the ground. The moment the leaf touched the ground, they moved.
"Fire Style: Fire Ball Jutsu!" they both shouted at the same time. They both breathed out two large balls of fire that rushed at each other and collided in the middle of the arena. Upon impact, the fire balls exploded in a giant fiery explosion that lit the entire stadium in orange, red, flames.
Not wasting any time, Naruto disappeared in a burst of speed and appeared in front of Yugito with a fist headed straight for her face. She sidestepped the attack, and retaliated by kicking him. Seeing this, Naruto raised his hands and blocked the kick, which sent him skidding a good distance away.
"I know you are far stronger than this...continue holding back and this battle will be over before it even begins" Yugito threatened.
Naruto looked at her curiously as he felt a spike in her chakra levels and with his sharingan, he could see her channelling chakra into her fingers? To his surprise, her finger nails started to lengthen until they were easily the size of
Naruto barley managed to bring out a kunai fast enough to block a hit from the claw-like nails, which would have shaved his head clean off his shoulders. A small cut opened up on his cheek, and a small amount blood licked down his face.
The two of them stood in front of each other, Yugito was pressing her deadly sharp nails against Naruto, who was blocking them with the kunai in his hands.
Thinking quickly, Naruto looked right into Yugito's eyes and noticed that both her eyes had a clit in their eyries, like a cat. His sharingan started to hypnotically spin. Yugito smirked, showing off her now sharper than normal canines, she knew exactly what he was trying to do.
"That won't work on me" Yugito said, her voice sounded deeper that it had been at first.
Naruto narrowed his eyes at her; somehow she was blocking all his attempts to cast a genjutsu on her. His eyes widened slightly, as he recalled particular information about his opponent. Naruto added some chakra into his hands, and pushed her away, creating some distance between the two of them.
"My 'friend' can easily tell when a genjutsu is being cast and will dispel it before it can affect me"
'This might be harder than I thought it would be'
"Water Style: Water Cannon". Naruto spat out a large powerful beam of water at Yugito, who made no move to dodge it.
"Fire Style: Fire Ball Jutsu". Yugito breathed out a large ball of fire at Naruto, or rather the beam of water that Naruto had spat out.
The two Jutsu's collided and upon collision, the water instantly evaporated extinguishing the fire ball and created a large amount of white blinding steam that covered the entire stadium. After a few seconds the steam cleared, showing behind it Naruto and Yugito standing a few feet from each other.
"You are far better than I had expected you to be...but as interesting as this battle is, I belief it's time we finished it" Naruto's voice was low as he said this.
"Let's e-" Whatever Yugito was going to say, was cut off when two hands suddenly burst out from the ground below her, grabbing hold of her legs. Instead of being dragged into the ground like she expected, a second Naruto appeared in front of her, kicking her in her stomach, hard.
She doubled over gasping for breath at the surprisingly hard blow. The two hands holding her legs, let go and a third Naruto burst out from the ground, punching her right on her chin. She was sent flying into the air, and before she had any time to recuperate, the two Naruto's that had hit her, jumped into the air after her. One of the clones used the other as pivot to jump higher, past Yugito.
Disorientated from the first two hits, Yugito could not avoid the chakra enhanced kick that the clone Naruto gave her in mid air, sending her rocketing into the hard ground. When she hit, a small crater appeared where she had hit the ground.
The entire stadium was dead silent as everyone watched with rapt eyes and attention, after what seemed like an eternity, Yugito moved. She stood up from the small crater she was with ought any injuries on her form, the small bruise on her face instantly healed right before everyone's eyes.
"Yes...don't hold back..." A small hue of red chakra started seeping from Yugito's skin.
The wind suddenly picked up, a she started releasing more and more of the strange, yet powerful chakra. Naruto, and many of the spectators, were forced to cover their eyes from the blast of dust and wind that was created when Yugito let out a loud roar.
When the dust cleared and wind calmed down, Yugito could be seen standing on all fours with a red bubbling chakra cloak covering her entire body with a tail swaying behind her. She looked right into Naruto's eyes, showing him her now different eyes. One being green and the other brown with small black slit in it.
Chapter End
Sorry for the long update guys, I was busy with exams and honestly couldn't make time to do this. Anyways I hope you enjoy this chapter.
I tried, really I did, to get rid of all the mistakes in this chapter so if there are any I apologise. My beta is unfortunately very busy right now so...
till next time