Lunch ended and the newly graduated genin all went back inside of the classroom to find that there was a group of adults already there waiting on them. Team 10 decided that now was as good a time as any to start working like a team and sat in the same row next to each other while most of the others were still spread out around the classroom. After everyone entered, Iruka took the front of the class again.

"Alright, everyone." Iruka started. "The men and women standing before you are your jounin sense for your duration as genin. Remember to work hard and remember everything you've learned through your time here in the academy." With that, the jounin started going down the line talking their teams away by the number indicated.

"Team 8," A beautiful raven-haired woman with remarkable red eyes said. She had on a mesh blouse with one long sleeve and a missing other underneath a broad, Bandage Looking Material, that had a pattern of thrones on it. She had bandages wrapped around her upper thighs and her hands up to her elbows, "I'm your jounin instructor, Yuhi Kurenai, come with me and we'll get started."

Kiba, Hinata, and shino all stood up and walked out of the room with the woman when Sakura stood up, "Um, you skipped Team 7. What about our sensei?

All of the remaining jounin shook their heads with amusement etched on their faces as the next man stepped forward, "You guys are going to be waiting a while for him to show up. Anyways Team 10? I'm Sarutobi Asuma and I'm your sensei, so follow me."

Naruto Ino and Shikamaru stood up and followed him out with Shikamaru giving a small wave to choji before they left for luck to him and how he would fare on his team. Shikamaru was still worried about leaving his oldest friend like that all on his own, but he had to worry about himself at the moment and how he was going to do on his team.

Naruto looked at the bearded man they were following oddly as if he were supposed to be familiar or something, "Hey, have we met before?" Naruto asked with his eyes closed in confusion. The man chuckled at the diminutive blonde, "Hey, What's funny?"

"You must not have a very good short-term memory eh kid?" The man said as they started walking outside. When he saw Naruto's face scrunch up in thought, "We met yesterday kid. You were outside of the Hokage tower and ran into me after messing with my nephew."

"Huh?" Naruto was still confused before he started piecing together what asuma had just said along with his last name, "Wait, You're Konohamaru's uncle? Then that means you're the Hokage's son right."

Asuma sighed, "Well that's not what we're talking about but yeah, I am the Hoakge's son." "Wow.' Naruto said with a grin on his face, "So you must be like a younger, more awesome version of Hokage-jiji right? Asuma broke into laughter at hearing that. If nothing else Naruto was going to be entertaining to have around on his team, "Well I don't know about that. I don't even fight anything like the old man to be quite honest with you, but I do in my own humble opinion think I'm quite strong."

Ino gave Naruto a chiding look, "Naruto why would you call Hokage`sama that? That's Disrespectful to his status in the village." Naruto shrugged, "It's just what I've always called him. Ever since I was a little kid I've been calling him Hokage~jiji whenever he came to see me and he never corrected me on it so I guess he liked it or something."

Then they got their way to a training field where they sat down and looked at their sensei reaching into one of his flak jacket's pockets and pulling out a cigarette. Ino watched him distastefully as he stuck the cigarette in his mouth, "Those will kill you, you know." Asuma smirked and pulled out a lighter to spark his cigarette up "Girl I think you'll find after you've been doing this for a while that compared to being a ninja, a little smoke can't even come close to being anywhere near as dangerous." He took a moment to enjoy his cigarette for a moment, talking in the expressions his genin all wore.

Asuma tapped the ashes of the end of his cigarette, "From this day forward I'll be your jounin sensei. You will train under me, take missions under me and I will be responsible for all of your well-being from this point forward." He saw their faces receive that info, and now for the fun part. He thought with a smirk, "That is after you pass your final test to become genin

Ino looked at him with a crooked brown, "What I thought we already did? We just got through with the graduation didn't we?" Asuma chuckled, "Come on. Anyone can reel off a few memorized test answers and crank out the most basic level jutsu that pretty much any ninja can do right?" After he said that, a sweat dropped on his head when Ino's eyes turned to Naruto and Shikamaru who laughed nervously and muttered 'troublesome' respectively. Well regardless that was just to scout out prospective candidates that end up being ninjas. The truth is that there's a 66% average failure rate for kids at your level.

He let silence style over the field before sighing, getting the full attention of the group of kids, "You know I talked about Hokage~sama beforehand and I have to tell you all, just be fair to you I don't want a team." He surprised them, "I have the freedom to make the test to pass you as tough or as easy as I want it to be and I'm going to come up with something you'll never be able to pass. A mission full-fledged jounin would have to take a second though." He exuded the minutest trace of killing intent he could to enforce his threat, and seeing Ino's eyes quiver he had to hold himself back from breaking his straight face.

"Seems like a challenge, this is going to be fun," Naruto said darkly. "You're just a Lazy ass!" Hearing Naruto say something bought something out of Ino "Yeah, even Shikamaru wouldn't be lazy enough to do something like that!" "Tough," Asuma said, shutting them both down, I'm a jounin, an elite. I earned my spot ten times over and I'd much rather not have to spend the next five years wiping noses and powering bottoms." Even Shikamaru was fully attentive by this point."

The normally lazy-pineapple-haired boy sat up and started asuma down., "So you're going to just drop us? You led us out here just to tell us you're falling for us like that? Just getting rid of us ""No."Asuma said to him "I never said I was going to just get rid of you. I said I never wanted a team, not that I never wanted to train anyone. I'm willing to take only one of you as an apprentice. The others are out of luck

All three of them looked at each other before Ino spoke up "Which one of us?" Asuma smirked, "That's up to all of you. I don't know the first thing about either one of you so how would I know? All I know is that I don't want any weak little tag-along. I want the best ." Ino smirked back at him and flipped her ponytail back "Well I can tell you that I am the best. My academy grades were twice as good as both of them were probably combined."

"Yeah.." Asuma said dryly, "That doesn't mean a damn thing to me. You could pass with flying colors and still be shit for a shinobi, just like you could have barely graduated by the skin of your teeth and wind up being the best there ever was. What happened there doesn't do anything to me now."

Ino shirked back at that. Naruto spoke next "So What happens now?" Asuma started walking away "Meet me back here in three hours. In that time I'll come up with a way to determine which out of all of you is worth being a genin." With that, he vanished from the training field in a whirlwind of leaves leaving three bewildered genin on their own.

Meanwhile - Konoha Ninja Academy

The only team remaining in the room was the group of team 7, who were getting agitated by the wait for their sensei. Sasuke and Sakura were absurdly bored and could have been doing stuff with their time, and choji was running out of food to munch on. This guy was taking so long.

The door finally slid open. "Sorry I'm late, a black cat crossed my path and I had to take the long way around to get here." A man with gravity-defying silver hair in regular jounin garb and a face mask with his headband covering one eye stuck his head in the door with an expression that appeared to be him smiling. He opened his one eye and looked at the three with a broad expression on his face, "Hmm my first impression of this group, You all are not quite what I was expecting. Meet me on the roof in five minutes." With that, he disappeared in a puff of smoke.

The faces upon hearing his lame excuse twisted in confusion once they processed his later words. Sakura looked at both of her teammates, "What did he mean we're not what he expected?" Choji simply shrugged before Sasuke stood up. "hm."Sasuke said before putting his hands in his pockets, "Let 's just go." Choji nodded and put up his snacks before following Sasuke out while Sakura sat there, still puzzled at her new sensei's first words to the team.

After a quick training session, Naruto returned to the field to find Ino and Shikamaru already there. The former glared at the latter as he sat against it with his eyes closed, "Naruto." Shikamaru said before yawning, "We've been waiting for you to show up." Naruto gulped before he began walking toward the tree, "Yeah. I'm here." He looked fromShikamaruu to ino and was splitting her time from glaring Shikamaru to glaring at Naruto, 'I thought I'd get here early and get some time to think before everyone else showed up… I guess that plan is good enough for everybody to use too huh?"

Shikamaru shrugged, "Well I never really left. I just waited until you guys all did and then I came back. This is a good spot. Ino stomped back here a few minutes before you did." "So how are we going to do this?" Naruto asked more to himself than to anyone else as he made his way under the other, but unheard and picked up on it. 'There's no way I'm going back to the academy now. Not after all I've done to get out of there. If this is how it's got to be, then I'm not just letting this pass me by."Ino said, voice full of determination, 'So if I have to prove it, I will."

'No you're not." Shikamaru said, his voice having lost the disinterested tone before to take on a more hardened one that showed he was serious. "Neither of you are you actually." he said, directing his gaze to Naruto to make sure he got the message. Ino smirked, So "What are you going to do? Beat both of us and take it for yourself Shikamaru? That seems like too much work from a guy like you."

Naruto tensed up his muscles and spoke seriously, " I'm not going to fail, I can't. Not now, not after all of that. I won't go back Even if I have to fight." Shikamaru stood up from his spot on the tree, "Well you see no one's going to be fighting anyone at all." he made a gesture of antlers on top of his head and let a smile across his face when he saw Naruto and ino mimic his action, 'Shadow possession Jutsu complete." Ino's eyes had a panic in the, "What is this shikamaru?" She said frantically. The parrot struggled but couldn't move an inch. "I can't move."

Shikamaru put his hands down," This is my jutsu, now listen up. We're not going to be fighting. None of us are. Why would they that guy a team if he could just fail us for something stupid like "He didn't want a team.'' Just because he has a tenure or something doesn't mean he can just ruin someone's career before they even start." "But what if he can?" Ino said, "I can't fail." My entire family would be ashamed of me." Naruto's eyes widened, "he never said he would just flat-out fail us though! He said he would give us an exam we couldn't pass, but he didn't say anything about failing anyone just like that."

"Exactly." Shikamaru said smiling at Naruto for pulling that answer out, "So, as troublesome as it is, all we have to do is pass his exam and that should be that." Ino wasn't convinced, "But what if we can't? He said that a jounin would have trouble with what he was going to end up making us do. How can you be so sure we'll get through it?"

Shikamaru let go of his just, 'Because there are three of us. A single jounin might have trouble with whatever he makes us do, but three of us can more than likely handle anything he'll make us do. He kept looking between them in case anyone planned on attacking anyway but calmed down when no one did after a minute.

"Okay." Naruto finally said, "We're Team 10 aren't we?" Naruto said with a slight laugh, 'We're not supposed to be fighting anyway, and Shikamaru Is right, we can take whatever that chain-smoking teme has planned for us.

Ino sighed in resignation, "Alright sure… We'll work together but if we end up all being sent back to the academy for this I'm going to spend the next year making your lives a living. Got that?" Her rough face dropped as she slinked down against the tree that Shikamaru had been sitting against for the longest time."So what are we going to do?"

Shikamaru kneeled in the shadow of the tree in a weird position, his hands forming a circle with his fingers and his eyes closed. Naruto and ino looked at him strangely before looking at each other. Naruto whispered to his fellow blonde loudly, "What is he doing?' Ino shook her head, "I don't have a clue, just wait."

Naruto's whisper grew harsher, "We don't have time to wait! That asuma guy is going to be here in ten minutes, he's jounin and he'sHokage-jiji's son. That has to mean he's strong as hell!" "Well, what do you want me to do?" Ino whispered back just as harshly, still trying to whisper thoughts so as not to disturb whatever he was doing. "I don't know the first thing about the guy! Or any of you for that matter!"

"Oh man!"Naruto continued to whisper as he moved around in place nervously, "We're going to get our asses killed by this guy and then we're going to go back to the academy and I'm going to sit through those boring lectures for another year! I can't do it!" Ino started crying anime tears "I don't either!" I can't be the only one of my friends this year to go back to the academy, that's a popularity killer for sure! I'll be a social untouchable Naruto just like you!... No offense."

"No, I don't blame you!" Naruto said crying just as equally as ino was "I wouldn't want that either and if that happened to you what would happen to me? I don't think I can sink much lower ino and I don't feel like finding out if I can either!" "What are we going to do with Naruto?" Ino grabbed the collar of his jacket tightly. "I Don't know!" Naruto replied just as desperately. Both of them hugged each other and started sobbing loudly.

Shikamaru's eyes open up "Alright, have a plan." He almost had his eyes bug out of his head when he noticed Ino and Naruto holding each other crying inconsolably "Guys." Shikamaru said not getting a single response from them "Guys." He said a bit louder before muttering trouble and trying again "Guys!" Naruto and Ino noticed he was finally back to paying attention and proceeded to let go nonchalantly as if nothing had happened. Shikamaru said "Alright if we're going to do this then we need to know what the others are good at, so I'll go first. I'm not much for fighting. I'd rather sleep or play shogi than do something so troublesome but if I had to I would do that my thing is-."

Then asuma appeared, "Okay, time to break some genin." Asuma thought to himself upon entering the training field. He looked around and saw all three of the kids sitting under the tree he had left them at. He walked over to them and crossed his arms once he got close enough for three to take notice of him" So have you come to a decision on which of you is going to be my apprentice civilly or will have to fail all three of you and be done with?"

Naruto stood up and dusted off his pants 'You're not going to fail any of us at all. We're not going to let a jerk like you just tell us he doesn't feel like a benign sensei and kill our dreams like that. So we're going to give you a choice." Ino said, backing her teammate up as she got up to stand beside Naruto. Shikamaru stood up with a groan, "As troublesome as it is going to be, you either pass us or we'll make you pass us . and you don't want us to do that."

Asuma let out a deceitful snort "And how exactly is a group of green-as-grass genin going to pull that off? You are better off hedging your bets and fighting between yourselves for one guaranteed spot. You know that you all have a snowball's chance in hell of actually beating me right?" Naruto grinned "Just pass us, and you don't have to find out." Asuma smirked, "Well that's fun because I needed a workout anyway. You brats can try, by all means,feel free to." Naruto smirked, "That's just what we wanted to hear. Let's do this." As he said that, Shikamaru placed his hands in the rat seal, "Shadow possession Jutsu!"

Asuma smirked and jumped back away from the shadow the tree was casting over the field. "I know about the Nara clan's signature jutsu. I'm not talking to students I don't know anything about!" He said before finding himself frozen in place "What?" He looked at the ground and there was no shadow stretching from the tree, "what happened?"

Naruto smirked as did all of the others as they transformed into puffs of smoke to all take on the appearance of Naruto," What the matter sensei? I thought you knew about your students?" With that the extra Naruto's disappeared leaving only one original Naruto in place "It worked Shikamaru!"

"Yeah, I can see that Naruto," Shikamaru said as he walked out some brush from behind asuma. Asuma turned his head when Shikamaru allowed him the motion to do so "Ino if you would be so kind as to finish this." Ino sauntered out in front of asuma in a showy fashion, prompting the man to say "You all set this up? What was the plan?" Shikamaru elaborated 'Naruto was to distract you with his shadow clones hinged into us..that was good by the way, you even had our mannerisms down perfectly." Naruto shrugged and rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly, "Basic Skill." Ino smiled over at him "Yeah solid clones Naruto? U don't even know where you would learn something like that." Promoting Naruto to blush more under the praise.

"Anyway." Shikamaru picked up where he left off "After Naruto distracted you and feigned my jutsu I would catch you with the real one from your blind spot. You would be doing what you thought was the real one so you would be on alert just at the wrong one." " A mischievous smirk crossed Shikamaru's face, "And finally we were going to have ino hit you with her just and walk you right to Hokage-Sama's office to pass us so you couldn't screw us over." Ino waved from her place in front of asuma before making the hand seal needed for the jutsu she intended to use.

Naruto chuckled after that, drawing attention back to him "And then for all the crap you put us through today we're going to do something humiliating you'll never live down in your body. Something like that makes you look like an idiot in front of that Kurenai lady. Shikamaru said you were standing close to her for less than just a passing work relationship or something which kind of brought up our second way to beat you.. But somebody didn't want me to use it that way."

Ino glared at Naruto "You're damn right I don't want you using that way You'd better never use that jutsu around me or else, got it?" Ino said to Naruto threateningly before turning back to asuma with a victorious look" Get ready to get used to us sensei. We're not going anywhere." Asuma had a look of terror on his face before he started laughing raucously "What's so funny? Fine, Mind transfer Jut-!" Before Ino could complete her jutsu, asuma disappeared suddenly/The genin all looked around, and Naruto felt familiar seeing asuma just disappear like that, 'No way, he knows that too? How could he have-?"

I'm a high-level skill kid, but I'm a high-level ninja." Asuma said as he walked into the clearing. He looked at all three in a pleased manner "That was good. I like that." his face turned grave "But seriously if you ever try pulling any crap around Kurenai I'm going to make you all pay dearly, don't even think about it. Ever." He then noticed that they all were still ready to fight 'Oh by the way you pass."

All three of them blinked before standing up out of their fighting stances, two of them with confused looks, the other just slouched, owned, and placed his hands in his pockets``Um, what?" Naruto said, conveying the thought he and ino shared at the moment. "Yeah." Asuma said with a laugh, "That was just to see if you would all turn on each other, fight over the single spot or work together. I was you all to fight with Missy Bossy and The Airhead Kid over there, Lazy-ass would have ended up getting dragged into it and I would have failed your miserable asses and sent you back. Didn't expect you all to turn on me though, that was entertaining."

Asuma placed a cigarette in his mouth, 'I was going to scare you all shitless one more time and then give you the option to fight over the apprenticeship and if you turned that down I was going to make you fight the clone anyways seeing how the point of all this was to ensure that you all act as a team as a team, so all you did was rush it all along." he finished and lit his cigarette.

"Knew it." Shikamaru said offhandedly, 'Are we done? We pass so we're done right?" Asuma sighed. Shikamaru straight killed his momentum. Damn kid didn't understand the concept of cool, he was trying to be a role model here, 'yeah... We...we're done. Meet me back here tomorrow at 8 a.m. sharp for your first actual day as Konah Genin. Good work Team 10." With that, he once again disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

Shikamaru heaved a sigh at his day finally being over "Finally. I'm going straight home and taking a nap. See you guys tomorrow." He began to walk away from the field. Ino smiled "Well that worked out better than I thought it would. I'm going to tell Dad I passed. Later guys! Ino ran off in her direction.

Naruto just stood still watching them both walk away before a smile crossed his face and he jumped into the air excitedly, "Yatta! I'm finally an actual ninja now." He landed and looked around for anyone who might have seen that before shrugging and walking away. "That seriously wasn't cool Naruto!" He heard ino say from a distance away. "Dammit!." Naruto said to himself before walking off with a proverbial rain cloud over his head.

It would be a week and Naruto and the rest of Team 10 would be doing a d-rank mission. Asuma~senseiIi thought the mission was supposed to be fun and high action naruto said. Missions are fun and high-action, just not these missions asuma said. These aren't even missions, these are chores and you won't even let me use shadow clones. Naruto tries to think that d-rank missions aren't just chores once you and the rest of team 7 figure out that we might be able to do something "More fun." I wonder what these missions are for Naruto said as he then went over to ino and Shikamaru. Hey guys Asuma~sensei said once we figure out the reason for d-ranks we can do something more fun but I just don't know. Do any of you know? Maybe for us to do lower ranks missions because chunin and jounin are outside the village, ino said. Well yeah, that's right but that is not the total reason asuma said. Then what did Naruto say? I don't know if you guys have to find out until then we are going to be doing d-ranks. Shikamaru then said

I know this mission is a drag so let's get it over with.

Team 7 would do their 3 d-rank missions of the day and then it was about 5 pm and they were going to see 7 so then asuma decided one more d-rank wouldn't hurt. The mission would be

Capture Tora the cat. Naruto and the rest of Team 10 would move out to the woods and then come up with a plan. So what was the plan Shikamaru Ino said? Here asuma gave me these as he gave radios to talk. Radios what are we going to use these for? To talk and communicate I think the point of d-ranks is for Genin to build teamwork with their team so they know how to work together in higher rank missions, Shikamaruu said. Hmm, that makes sense, Naruto said. But I could be wrong. Let's do this d-rank and we will tell asuma. So I want Naruto to be high east of that tree. Shikamaru said I want ino west of Naruto and I will be in the middle down to the south behind y'all. We will talk over the radio and tell me if you see Tora as soon as about

2 minutes later Tora would appear and Naruto would say'' I'm ready, just give the signal." "Now," Shikamaru said. Naruto moved to the east of the cat and ino would be west of the cat Shikamaru came north of the catch blocking it from running as then he would Ninja Art: Shadow possession Justu. As he would catch them in the shadow. Naruto grabs the cat and scratches his face like a door. Asuma then said Great teamwork team 10 I'm proud of you guys Asuma said.

Team 10 would take Tora the owner and she would hug her lovely and Tora would be crying for help. Ino then said under her breath I see why the cat ran away. Yeah, I do, too but I don't feel bad, Naruto whispered. As then asuma said, "Did you guys figure out the meaning of D-ranks? Yeah, Shikamaru spoke up. I think the purpose of the D-rank mission is to help Genin with teamwork for higher missions. Correct shikamaru.

Now I think you guys are ready for A C-rank. Naruto would be excited if it was a change from doing chores and he gets to show his skills in battle to his sensei. Asuma would then ask the Hokage in front of them if they could have a C-rank mission for tomorrow. Hurizern then said are you sure your team is ready asuma. Yeah, I do Hokage~sama.

Alright, you guys are assigned to take the scroll to the land of rivers and give it to leader Nakamura Eiko. She has been waiting for you. Alright team 7 be up at the gate at 7:30 bring all the tools and everything you need for this mission.