Hours had passed already and Kakamei had barely made any progress up the tree. His body had become slightly heavier as he was getting tired. He was breathing slightly heavier.
All of Team 7 was still in the forest as they were trying to get up this tree well, at least everyone but Sakura, who had already made it up the tree.
When they had their first run up the tree Sakura had made it up the first time. If Kakamei was being honest he felt slightly jealous of her chakra control. Even though she was able to make it up the tree instantly Kakashi had still ordered her to continue to walk up the tree.
'I need to hurry up and get to the top of the tree. At this rate Sasuke's going to make it to the top of the tree before I do. Also, if I don't watch out Naruto might catch up.' Kakamei thought to himself as he stood up and looked at his tree then looked over to Naruto's tree and sweat dripped from his forehead.
Naruto was sitting on the ground rubbing his head as he was rubbing the top of his head as it was throbbing as he had fallen on it so many time.
'Maybe not.' Kakamei thought as he turned to Sasuke's tree. Sasuke had made it a little more than halfway up his tree. Kakamei looked back at his tree to notice how far he had gone. The Daichiki had barely even made it halfway up the tree. He sighed before gathering chakra in his feet and running up the tree. He was running upwards. This time he kept going up higher, and higher. He came close to his highest point before noticing that his chakra was becoming unstable. He tried to keep running before he made it up to his highest point and sliced the tree as he jumped backwards and landed on the ground. He landed on his feet before taking a seat and looking at the tree.
Now that he was looking at his tree he noticed how he saw a plethora of footprints up the tree.
'Almost every time I run up the tree that happens. I guess I'm putting too much chakra in my feet. I'll try to put less chakra into my feet this time.' Kakamei thought to himself as stood up and readied himself to run up the tree again. As he was getting ready to run he stopped himself as he noticed Naruto bent over and talking to Sakura.
'I guess Naruto's asking Sakura for help. I would ask Naruto when he's done but I doubt he'll give me any information. To be honest I don't really want any help. If I want to get stronger I have to do it by myself. I could ask Kakashi but he's just going to tell me to try harder and go back to reading that book he's already carrying around.' Kakamei thought as he shook his head and looked at the tree.
'Looks like it's just you and me.' Kakamei mentally stated as he gathered chakra in his feet and ran to the tree.
Hours Later
Team 7 was still doing the tree walking exercise as the sky was starting to darken and all of the genin were lying on the ground, breathing heavily as a result of using their chakra all day for the tree climbing training.
Kakashi sighed and closed his Make Out Paradise book looked at his students.
'It's getting darker outside and making it harder to read my book. Besides, it looks like the kiddies are tired.
"Alright guys, it time to go home. Grab your kunai and let's go." Kakashi said as his student stood up and went to Tazuna's home so they could ready themselves for another day of training.
The Next Day
The Team had been slight trimmed as Sakura had been allowed to stop training as she had already mastered it. This is time she had gone to the bridge with Tazuna as his bodyguard.
The male genin were standing in front of their trees and looking at their marks. They had gained a lot from yesterday, especially Naruto, who had seemed to go up an almost unbelievable amount since getting help from Sakura.
Kakamei was looking up at his tree as he looked at how much he had gone. He had gone a good ways up as he had passed his markings from yesterday by a fair amount. As he went farther up the tree he saw less and less holes in the tree.
'Alright, slowly but surely I'm getting there. I still have a problem with getting up the tree as it hard to maintain miniscule amount of chakra in my feet. That's the hardest thing to do. But…' Kakamei said as he looked over to his fellow teammates as he saw they were all relatively close to each other.
'They're really close to me. I'd look pretty lame if I let them get to the top now wouldn't I?' Kakamei silently thought to himself as he readied himself for another run. He ran up the tree and kept going until he was a little after what he had come to last run before cutting the tree and jumping downwards and landed on his feet.
This time he wasted no time in thinking as he jumped right back into the action and raced up the tree. He made it slightly higher up this time before jumping down. This time he wasn't paying attention to his feet and landed on his back.
Both Naruto and Sasuke looked over as Kakamei stood up off the ground and slapped the dirt off of his body. He looked over to see his teammates staring at him. He scratched the back of his head.
"What?" Kakamei said as he laughed sheepishly. Sasuke scoffed.
"Loser." Sasuke said as he turned back to his tree. Kakamei became annoyed as clenched his fist before regained his composure and turned.
"I'm higher up the tree than you and you're not that far away from Naruto." Kakamei said as both Sasuke and Naruto became visibly angry.
"Hey! What's that supposed to mean?!" Naruto yelled.
"You're not ahead of me and Naruto couldn't catch up to me in a million years. Even if you're a couple of centimeters now I'll make it up there before you two losers do." Sasuke said as he readied his kunai for the tree.
"Whatever." Kakamei said as Naruto readied his kunai.
"Don't count me out! I'm going to make it up there first! Believe it!" Naruto yelled as all three of them raced to their respective trees.
All of them raced up the tree and kept going. They reached their previous height and kept going until they their chakra wavered, marked the tree, and they fell down to the ground. Naruto was the first to fall, next was Kakamei, then Sasuke came falling down. One coming not too long after the other. They all land and look at each other's marks and looked at each other. And as expected they all turned and run back up to the trees.
Hours Later
About three or fours hours pass and all three of the genin are breathing heavily and standing on the ground. They hear leaves rustling as they all quickly turn to see Kakashi walking through the bushes. Kakashi raises his hand and does a little eye smile.
"Calm down, it's just me." Kakashi said as the boys let down their guards.
"Hey, Kakashi-sensei." Kakamei said as he wiped some sweat off of his forehead. Kakashi completely walked, or wobbled, out of the bushes with a picnic basket. He walked into the middle of the tree opening and sat down the picnic basket.
"Kakashi-sensei, what are you doing out here? I thought you were supposed to be resting while we trained." Naruto said as Kakashi just waved him off.
"Well, you've been out here training all day and it's lunch time already so take a quick break from climbing up the trees and get something to eat." Kakashi said as all three of the genin walked over and opened the picnic basket as they opened it to see a basket of uncooked fish and precooked rice.
"What is this?" Sasuke asked as Kakashi smiled.
"I said you were taking break from climbing trees I didn't say you were taking a break from training. Use your chakra to make a fire. A fire big enough to cook the fish but not too strong enough to char the fish." Kakashi explained as his Naruto whined.
"But Kakashi-sensei! I can't even use fire jutsu!" Naruto yelled as Kakashi sighed.
"I can use fire jutsu." Kakamei intervened.
"So can I." Sasuke said as sweat dripped from Naruto's head.
"I knew that." Naruto said as Kakashi slowly sat down.
"Alright, I'll gather some firewood for the fire." Kakamei said as he turned around and started walking through the forest. Naruto and Sasuke were standing there in silence.
"So, how has your training been going?" Kakashi said as Naruto perked up.
"I've gotten way better at this tree thing. I'm pretty high in the tree!" Naruto said as he pointed at his tree. Kakashi looked at the trees.
'They've come pretty far in just a couple of hours, especially Naruto. I would say that they'll be finished with this training not too long from now.' Kakashi said to himself.
BOOM!
The three males turned as they heard a huge boom of noise. Debris started to rise up through the sky and trees started to fall everywhere.
"Hey! That's the direction that Kakamei went into." Naruto yelled as they all watched as the bushes started to move. Since Kakashi was still out of commision Sasuke and Naruto pulled out their kunai and readied themselves for a fight. Just as they were about to jump into the bushes, and kill what was going to come out, but Kakamei walked out of the bushes with his back turned.
"What's up guys. Sorry for the wait but I found something better than fish." Kakamei said as he pulled out a relatively large wildebeest.
"This thing was just standing around and I was walking and it kicked me so I smacked it in the head. We can eat this for lunch." Kakamei said as his two teammates were surprised to see what Kakamei had done.
'It's amazing how much chakra this kid has. He probably has the most chakra as that I've ever met.' Kakashi thought to himself watched his student pull in the catch.
"You're looking at me like I'm some kind of monster. Help me cook this thing." Kakamei said as his teammates walked towards Kakamei. They talked for a while before all of them walking in opposite directions to go looking for wood.
Twenty minutes later the boys had come back together to the training ground with hand fulls of wood, ready to be used to cook the beast.
They piled all of the wood into the middle of the hunting ground as Kakamei and Sasuke let off Fire Ball Jutsu. The fire was set and the beast started to cook.
The wildebeest finished cooking and all four ninja ate the beast before the boys getting back up to restart their training. Kakashi stood up and turned.
"I'll be taking my leave now. Train hard." Kakashi said as walked away. His students turned around as they prepared for another round of training. As Kakashi walked away Kakamei looked up the tree.
'I have to make it up this tree first or they're going to make me look bad.' Kakamei thought as he cracked a slight smile. Sasuke saw and picked up his kunai.
"What are you laughing at?" Sasuke asked as Kakamei lost his smile.
"Nothing, just smiling at the chances of you getting up the tree before I do." Kakamei said as Sasuke frowned in annoyance. He was going to say something but he was stopped before he could say something.
"Hey! Never count me out! I'll be Hokage someday! I'll make it up this tree before you can even blink, BELIEVE IT!" Naruto yelled as Kakamei chuckled.
"You making it up there before I do makes me the grin. It actually makes me laugh." Kakamei teased as steam came from Naruto's ears from anger.
"Whatever! I'll just show you!" Naruto yelled as he rushed towards the tree. He raced up the tree. He made it to his previous marking and kept going before falling before he could get a full step ahead of that one, then fell downwards and landed on his head.
"Hahaha! You're surely going to get to the top at this rate." Kakamei laughed as Naruto stood up.
"Keep laughing but I'll end up making it up there first." Naruto said as he stood up. Kakamei watched as Naruto run up the tree again.
'Time to get back to the grindstone.' Kakamei thought as all three of genin went back to their training with trees.
Hours Later
Time seemed to pass faster than ever as hours had passed already and they sky had grown dark. The three genin boys were standing in front of their trees breathing heavily. They had made good progress up the trees as it seemed like it wouldn't be that much longer until they made it up their trees completely.
'We've come a long way since the beginning. Even though we have been doing this for two days it still feels weird that we haven't gotten to the top since Naruto talked to Sakura he's been able to catch up with me and Sasuke. That's a crazy jump. Maybe I should ask him about it.' Kakamei thinks as he hears a thud and Naruto lying on the ground.
"Ahhhhh what do you want?!" Naruto yelled. Sasuke looked embarrassed about what he was going to say next.
"Uh… well… the thing is…" Sasuke said trying to get out a sentence but was stuttering.
'Why is he so nervous?' Kakamei thought as he looked at his teammates.
"Well… earlier, Sakura gave you some advice. What was it?" Sasuke asked a both Kakamei and Naruto were surprised by Sasuke's asking for help.
'Maybe he'll actually give up something…' Kakamei thought as he listened in. Naruto, on the other hand, lost his look of confusion with a huge, sly smile.
"I'm not telling you!" Naruto screamed as Kakamei almost fell over.
'I can't believe I thought Naruto would tell Sasuke anything.' Kakamei thought.
A few more hours passed was the three students once again fell to the ground. Kakamei went to stand up but before he got the chance he heard, and felt, his stomach making the dreaded rumbling noise of hunger.
He quickly looked over as he heard two other grumbles. Sasuke and Naruto looked at each other.
"Seems like we're all hungry. I guess it's time to go in and eat dinner." Kakamei said as he grabbed his kunai and threw it to the tree. Sasuke turned and started walking towards the house as Naruto looked up at his tree.
"I'm not going anywhere." Naruto said defiantly yet calm. Kakamei looked annoyed by Naruto's disagreement.
"Why not?" Kakamei asked as Naruto looked at him huffing.
"Because I'm going to beat you and Sasuke!" Naruto said as Kakamei shook his head.
Naruto's stomach made another attempt to make him eat. Naruto gripped his stomach and turned.
"You can't train on an empty song but stay here if you want to." Kakamei said as he walked to Tazuna's house. Naruto stayed back as another sound of hunger seeped out of his stomach as he started to scratch the back of his head.
"Hahaha, you know what? I think I'll go get some rest. I don't want you two to miss it when I make it up the tree first." Naruto said as he giggled and Kakamei just shook his head.
Minutes Later
After a walk through the woods and washing their hands the three boys sat down at the table. Kakamei was sitting beside Naruto who was locked in an eating competition with Sasuke. Naruto and Sasuke were scaring down food as they both simultaneously stood up and screamed, "MORE PLEASE!"
Kakamei was sitting down eating his food silently as his teammates both bent over and threw up the food onto the floor.
"Hey! Don't eat so much if you're just going to puke it out!" Sakura yelled as Naruto wiped his face and looked up.
"… I have to eat more than him." Sasuke said as Naruto looked at him.
"And I have to eat more than him. It's the only way to get stronger than him." Naruto said as Kakamei looked onto the confrontation in silence.
'You can't do it without yelling. Don't forget that I'm part of this climb to the top too but whatever.' Kakamei thought as he looked on. He had finished eating his rice and wanted more but thought it would be too much
"Yes, that is true, but it won't help you any if you just throw it all up." Kakashi explained as Kakamei nodded. The Daichiki then stood up and walked to the rice and fixed another bowl of rice. He sat back down and started eating.
"Kakamei, how are you still eating?" Sakura asked as Kakamei swallowed the rice in his mouth and looked at his female teammate.
"What do you mean?" Kakamei asked as he was clueless to what she was asking.
"I mean, yeah, Naruto and Sasuke have been scarfing down food and asking for more but you've eaten more than they have." Sakura asked as he thought for a second.
"I don't know. I guess I'm just hungry from training all day." Kakamei said as he waited a second before he went back to casually eating. Sasuke and Naruto looked down on Kakamei with sweat dripping from their foreheads.
"You know Kakamei, you're weird." Naruto said as Kakamei finished up his bowl of rice and shrugged.
"I don't know why but I have always eaten a lot of food. The only food that ever seems to fill me up is dango. It's just so good but they didn't have any." Kakamei answered as Naruto and Sasuke just sat down.
Minutes Later
After the dishes had been cleaned off of the table. All of the residents were sitting around said table drinking water or tea. Sakura was standing as she stared at a picture That's was sitting on the shelf. It was a picture of Tazuna, Tsunami, and Inari. They were all standing happily but there was a slight problem. There was another figure that was standing over Inari. It seemed to be a man but his face had been ripped off of the picture.
Sakura looked at the picture as she wondered what had happened to the man in the photo.
"Tazuna, what's wrong with this? Why was the man's face torn off? Inari, you kept glancing at it all dinner." Sakura said as the room became dead silent as Inari lowered his head. All of the clients stopped what they were doing. Tazuna looked down at the table and Tsunami stopped cleaning.
"It was my husband." Tsunami said lowly as Tazuna looked up.
"They used to call him a hero in these lands." Tazuna said. Inari immediately jumped up.
"Inari, where are you going?" His mother asked but the kid didn't give an answer. He continued to walk out. Kakamei took a sip of his tea
"Father! You know you can't talk to him when Inari is around!" Tsunami said as she raced after her son.
"Now that was rude." Kakamei said as everyone in the room fell silent.
"I take it there's a story behind all of this." Kakashi said, urging Tazuna to spill the history of this mystery.
"He wasn't his real father…" Tazuna said as Kakamei sipped the rest of his tea and stood up. He started to walk out of the room.
"Kakamei, where are you going? Tazuna's about to tell us about the man in the picture." Naruto said as Kakamei shook his head.
"Nahh, these type of stories aren't for me. I'm gonna take a walk. Sorry Tazuna. I don't mean to be rude." Kakamei said as Tazuna just waved his hand.
"I don't mind." Tazuna said as Kakamei walked out of the room. The room was quiet before Tazuna spoke up.
"Now that I' thinking about it that kid doesn't really seem to be a real people person." Tazuna said as Kakashi sighed.
"He's really not the type of person who likes to listen to sentimental things. Don't worry about it. Now, back to your story." Kakashi insisted for Tazuna to go back to his story.
"Alright…" Tazuna said as he continued with his story.
Kakamei was walking through the village as he looked onto the ocean. He was about to continue walking as he heard crying in the distance. He looked to his right to see a distant figure sitting on the dock. He walked closer until he noticed the figure turn into a person, that person turning into a kid, and the kid turning out to be Inari.
'Why is this kid out here crying by himself? I know he seemed sad by Sakura asking that question about the picture but crying? I'll go talk to him.' Kakamei thought to himself as he walked up to Inari.
"What are you crying for?" Kakamei asked as Inari was surprised as he jumped.
"What do you want?" Inari asked as Kakakmei looked down.
"Well, I was just wondering why you're crying." Kakamei stated as Inari turned.
"It's none of your business! Leave me alone!" Inari screamed as Kakamei started to get slightly annoyed.
'This kid… is rude AND annoying. We better make progress soon." Kakamei thought as he looked up.
"Before I walked out Tazuna said something about your dad. Is that why you're crying because you're father left or something?" Kakamei thought as Inari seemed to get even more sad.
"SHUT UP! LEAVE ME ALONE!" Inari yelled as Kakamei finally sat down on the side of the dock.
"So… he's not around anymore, what happened to him?" Kakamei asked as Inari didn't answer as tears ran down his face.
"Oh, so now you're silent. Well, if it makes you feel any better neither of my parents are around any more. Both died a long time ago." Kakamei said out loud as Inari paused his crying as he looked at Kakamei, who ignored the kid's staring and looked out onto the water.
"You surprised that you aren't the only person who has lost parents?" Kakamei asked he stood up and dusted off his pants. He turned back to land.
"Well, I'll be taking my leave. Your mom will be here soon. Now that you know that someone similar to you is out in the world it shows you that you can't be a dick to everyone because you're angry about something that's already happened." Kakamei said as he walked away. Inari looked at Kakamei as he eventually disappeared into the darkness.
Not too long after Kakamei left Inari's mother came running to Inari.
"So that's where you've been! Tsunami said as she hugged Inari from behind.
"I'm sorry." Inari said very lightly as Tsunami let out tears as she held Inari closely. In the distance Kakamei was standing on a tree branch.
"You can't be serious. I have a talk with the kid and he's still crying! Why is his mother crying?! Now you can't say I didn't try to cheer him, now I don't care about what happens." Kakamei said as he jumped down from the tree and walked back to Tazuna's house.
'Why was he crying anyways? Yeah, his father's not around anymore so why was he crying. It already happened so there's nothing he can do to change it. So why was he so sad? I guess I can't understand someone like him.' Kakamei thought to himself as he continued to walk.
Minutes Later
Kakamei walked through the door as everyone, except Naruto, was still sitting down around the table.
"Hey, where did you go?" Sakura asked as Kakamei just sat down.
"I was just walking around and walking off some of those calories. So, where's Naruto?" Kakamei answered.
"He went off to train some more." Sakura said as Kakamei nodded.
"Oh, I don't think he was in the best of states to go training but I guess it's too late now." Kakamei said as he leaned back onto the floor.
"He wants to show Inari what it means to be a real hero." Sakura said as Kakamei scoffed.
"I already talked to Inari and he just continued to cry so I guess he's still a crybaby." Kakamei said as Tazuna looked up.
"It's not his fault. His only father figure was killed by Gatou's men." Tazuna said. Kakamei sighed and stood up.
"You can't make progress if you keep making excuses as to why you can't move forward. He has to get over it because it already happened. I'm going to take a guess and say that Inari can't manipulate time so he can't go back in time and change it and, he doesn't have the strength to get back at Gatou. His only chance to not go insane is to let go of his emotions about his father." Kakamei said as he walked past everyone.
"That's just my two cents. I'm going to bed. See you guys in the morning." Kakamei said as he walked out of the room.
The room had become silent as they let Kakamei's words sit in their heads. Sasuke was the one who felt them the most as he stood up and walked out of the room.
"Sasuke…" Sakura said as Sasuke kept walking.
"I'm going to bed." Sasuke said as he left the room. Tazuna's eyes were closed and Kakashi sighed.
"What's with those kids? They seem to have weight on their shoulders that kids just shouldn't have on their shoulders." Tazuna said as Kakashi looked at the bridge builder.
"They're shinobi, they have to live with the weight that comes with becoming ninja. But those three, Naruto, Sasuke, and Kakamei, have weight on their shoulders because of the way they grew up. All three of them had to grow up with no parents, no family. That is why they have that weight on their shoulders." Kakashi said as the room was once again in silence.
"Well, it's getting late. I need to rest so I can continue to build the bridge. Tazuna said as everyone cleared the room for the night.
