Yo yo! First of all, I just wanna say thank you for all the support you guys have been giving me. I'm genuinely thrilled that you guys are enjoying reading this fic as much as I enjoy writing it.
Jerrend: Lol don't worry, she'll get a new ninja outfit pretty soon, I'm gonna create an arc before the chunin exams arc and before that begins, she'll have the new outfit! Oh, and as for you question from chapter 1; yea the Jinton is also the Dust release. I really don't know why they have the same romanization but don't worry about it, not gonna affect the fic very much.
djsmall565: Yea I agree with you, it was also a bit 'meh' in my opinion but for my fic, we'll see what she thinks when Hiruzen finally tells her. ;)
Thanks for you reviews! That's all for now, let me not keep y'all back. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Konoha's Orange Comet!
Chapter 3: And So…It Begins!
"Ughhhhh!"
Namiko let out a loud sigh of exasperation as she slumped to the floor. She, along with her teammates, were currently waiting – at the bridge they usually met up at – on their sensei to show up, but in true Kakashi fashion. He was two and a half hours late…so far. Whoopty-doo.
"That's not gonna make him get here any sooner Namiko." Namiko turned towards Sakura and rolled her eyes, knowing her pink-haired teammate was right.
Sasuke, who had been as quiet as a mouse since his arrival, turned to his teammates and voiced his thoughts.
"You'd think that after he told us we were going to be trained into the ground he'd have the decency to show up on time."
"Pfft, please," Namiko said waving her arms around. "Kakashi-sensei and decency don't go together. Don't you see him walking around reading smut in public?!" She exclaimed and her teammates had to admit, she was right.
Namiko grumbled and stuffed her hands in her pockets. The genin sat in silence for another twenty minutes or so when Kakashi showed up…finally. As soon as he was in talking distance both Namiko and Sakura give him a piece of their minds.
"YOU'RE LATE!" They both yelled and though he said nothing, Sasuke agreed with his rather loud teammates. Sometimes he wondered, ninja prowess aside, how was this guy a jonin?
"My bad…there were some black cats on my front porch, and in order to not attract bad luck I had to call a sage who lives on the other side of the village." Kakashi said, smiling at them. Namiko, Sakura and Sasuke looked at each other before they all deadpanned in unison.
After recovering from their deadpans, Team Seven followed Kakashi to the training ground where they had done their real genin test. As they reached the three tree stumps in the center, Sakura chose to sit on the floor in front one of the stumps, Sasuke decided to simply lean against one of them and Namiko opted to sit on the top of the stomp.
Kakashi cleared his throat as he prepared to speak. "Alright then, today's going to be pretty straight forward. We'll be moving on to a more advanced form of chakra control to start off, then we'll be breaking off and discussing your weaknesses and coming up with individual training plans for the three of you, questions?"
Sakura raised her hand and Kakashi gestured for her to go on. "How are you going to train us individually if there's three of us and one of you?"
Kakashi smiled through his mask. "That's easy, shadow clones."
At the mention of her signature technique, Namiko grinned at her sensei. "You know the Kage Bunshin too, sensei?!" She asked excitedly and Kakashi simply responded with a nod.
"Now that that's out of the way, follow me," Kakashi turned and began walking towards the shallow river that occupied the training ground's real estate. "Like I said, today's not going to be anything over the top but starting tomorrow we'll be following a strict schedule. From here on out, we'll meet up at nine as usual and do a few missions around the village, nothing too strenuous because once the missions are out of the way we'll be coming back here where we'll do both individual training; focusing on your weakness and team training; so that you three will be able to fight and complement each other in battle." Kakashi explained.
As the genin all walked behind Kakashi they turned and looked at each other. Kakashi said they'd meet up at nine, but they all knew that mean noon…for the earliest.
"Oh, and we'll have one off day a week so you guys can recuperate and be prepared for the weak, got it?" Two 'hai sensei's' and an unenthusiastic 'hn' followed Kakashi's question. "Great, now this is what we'll be starting with today." As those words left Kakashi's mouth the genin watched as he stepped onto – yes, onto – the river that ran through the training ground.
"Wow." Surprisingly, the 'wow' did not come from Namiko but from Sakura, who looked awe stricken as her sensei literally walked on water.
"This is the water walking technique, and it will help greatly with your chakra control. However, keep in mind that it is much harder than the tree walking because with this, you need to constantly send the right amount of chakra to your feet, and due to the fluidity of water, you have to adjust the amount of chakra going to your feet constantly…go on, give it a try."
All three genin stepped onto the water at the same time. And not to Kakashi's surprise, Sakura almost made it halfway across the river on her first go. Sasuke had made it about a third of the way before he began to sink while Namiko only made about a quarter.
"Sakura, as expected you're the best at this considering your chakra reserves are small compared to Sasuke's and Namiko's, so once you complete it, I want you to the same as you did with tree walking, go back and forth so that it can help build your reserves." Sakura gave Kakashi a firm nod.
All three genin restarted the exercise, determined to complete it.
Kakashi stood off the side as his student's attempted the water walking technique. The three genin had been at it for about three hours so far. Of course, Sakura had almost gotten it down, while Sasuke was close, getting to about three-fifths the way before he sunk but it was Namiko who had impressed him the most.
The orange wearing kunoichi was soaked at this point and had only been able to make it about half the way there but considering that her chakra reserves were already twice as large as Kakashi's – not to mention the Kyubi had to be accounted for as well – she had done great to get as far as she did so far.
"Okay," Kakashi called out to his students. "That's enough of the water walking, come over here for a sec." One by one the genin made their way over to Kakashi who then dug his hands into one of the pockets on his vest and withdrew four slips of paper. "This is chakra induction paper, and we're going to use it to test your nature affinities and start a jonin level training exercise." He eye-smiled.
"Chakra induction paper?"
"Nature affinities?"
Came the voices of Sakura and Namiko respectively. Sasuke simply smirked at the fact they were moving onto a jonin level activity.
Their sensei placed one of the papers between his forefinger and middle finger. "Yes, chakra induction paper. It's made out a special paper and when chakra is channeled into it like so," Kakashi pushed some of his chakra into the paper and demonstrated. The genin watched as his piece of paper wrinkled. "It indicates your nature affinity."
"Huh…" Namiko scratched her head. "But what is a nature affinity and what does the wrinkle mean?" She asked sheepishly.
"You didn't pay much attention in the academy did you, Namiko?" At the blonde's sweat drop Kakashi sighed. "While it is possible to learn how to use any of the five elements; Fire, Wind, Earth, Lightning and Water, everyone has an element their chakra is more in tune with. That element with will not only be more powerful, but easier for you to use and control; that is what a nature affinity is." Kakashi then handed each genin a slip of paper. "If the paper turns to ash, it indicated a fire affinity, for water, it'll get wet or damp, wind splits it in half, earth turns it to dust and finally, if it's lightning, the paper will wrinkle, just like mine did."
Team Seven nodded in understanding, then Kakashi gestured for Sakura to go first. They watched as Sakura channeled her chakra and the paper turned to dust.
"Ah Doton, it's extremely versatile on both the offensive and the defensive. Doton is naturally strong against Water Style, but weak against the Lightning Style."
Next was Sasuke.
No surprise to Kakashi, Sasuke's paper burst into flames. While it wasn't given that Fire would be an Uchiha's element it was very common amongst the clan, and they were extremely apt in using Fire Release. "Ah yes, Fire Release is the most common element in our part of the Elemental Nations, roughly sixty-nine percent of Konoha shinobi have Fire as their nature affinity. It's extremely powerful and can cause long lasting damage to enemies if used correctly." Sasuke smirked, of course an element of this caliber was associated with the Uchiha clan.
Last, and certainly not least, was Namiko.
You could see that Kakashi's lone eye visible widened once Namiko pushed her chakra into the paper and it split perfectly down the middle, then the two strips that remained wrinkled.
Namiko looked at Kakashi quizzically. "Well…which is it?"
"Um…both." Though the genin didn't realize it, Kakashi was suddenly struck with realization.
Namiko turned to Sasuke with a smirk. "Soooooo…what I'm hearing is that I'm better than the teme?"
"Tch, as if loser."
Kakashi chuckled at their antics before explaining. "I'd say I was surprised, but I've learned to expect the unexpected with you," Kakashi said as he crossed his fingers in an all too familiar sign for Namiko and in a cloud of smoke, two more Kakashi's appeared. "Just so you know Namiko, having two affinities is extremely rare and you're going to have to work twice as hard to master them both."
Namiko grinned excitedly, as always, she was ready for the challenge.
"Bring it on sensei!"
Kakashi eye smiled at his genin. "Since we'll be training six days of week, twice a week each of you will get the real me for individual training, and the other days you'll get a shadow clone, sound fair?"
"Hai." Was there collective response and Kakashi nodded in affirmation.
"Alright then, Namiko; with me." Kakashi started walking off and Namiko began following her sensei, offering Sasuke and Sakura a peace sign as she left. Then, one of the shadow clones took Sasuke off in the opposite direction leaving a Kakashi clone with Sakura at the river.
Once her teammates were out of sight the Kakashi clone looked at Sakura.
The Kakashi cloned looked to the sky, just as the original would then spoke. "I'll get straight to the point and I'll be honest with you, you are by far the furthers behind on this team," Harsh he knew, and the girl's flinch only proved that. "I know that's harsh, but you are…and as your sensei it's my job to help you get stronger, but that's only possible if you want to be stronger yourself."
Sakura was looking at the floor. Her sensei was right, her feelings for Sasuke had not only hindered her ninja progress with the dieting, and with her ignoring training to try and woo Sasuke, but it had also messed up an important friendship with Ino.
"I believe that given your near perfect chakra control, you'll have a strong aptitude for Medical Ninjutsu as well as Genjutsu, and while I have no skill in the former, I know a decent number of Genjutsu that you can add to your arsenal, I also want to look into starting off your Doton training, which involves turning a leaf into dirt, and at the end of the day the original me is going to give you a scroll pertaining information and research on Medical Jutsu…think of it as homework."
Sakura looked up at her sensei this time and gave him a firm nod.
"First, I want to work on your Taijutsu, and helping you build muscle so that your attacks can be powerful enough to be effective. As a ninja you're active enough to the point you don't have to diet, so that needs to stop," Sensing her oncoming rebuttal, Kakashi held up a hand. "You can't be helpful to this team if Namiko and Sasuke are worrying about you every time you're in the field, you have to be able to hold your own."
"Hai, sensei."
The clone smiled underneath the mask. "Good, now come at me with all you got." While it was only a shadow clone, Kakashi had supplied it with enough chakra to take a few hits and keep going, not that it was worried about getting hit anyway, I mean, its opponent was Sakura.
Sakura nodded at her sensei and dashed at him, ready for the training.
"I don't think this needs to be said, but you're the strongest out of you three," the Kakashi clone said once him and Sasuke had walked to a different part of the training ground. "Meaning you're going to require less work than the others…that being said, is there anything in particular you'd like my help with?"
The Uchiha started at his sensei for a while. "Up until the mission away from the village I thought I'd have to master the Sharingan on my own, but clearly you were assigned as my sensei for a reason." Sasuke deduced, to which Kakashi responded with a nod, confirming his suspicion.
The clone walked over to a tree and picked a few leaves, bringing them over to Sasuke. "Your Taijutsu is extremely effective for someone your age, and not to mention your Ninjutsu is remarkable. The plan I have for you includes helping you become faster and stronger, refining your Taijutsu, mastering the Fire Release and developing your Sharingan, any complaints?"
After no response from the Uchiha, Kakashi took one of the leaves and offered it to Sasuke.
"The first step to mastering the Fire Release is turning a leaf into ash between your palms with chakra, have a go..." Sasuke closed his palms on the leaf for about five seconds. He then opened his palm and saw that only a little piece of the leaf had actually burned, to which he grew a visible tick mark.
Kakashi smiled as Sasuke grit his teeth in determination and attempted the exercise again, to which he got the same result.
"In order to turn the leaf to ash, try to picture sending a steady stream of fire throughout the leaf, that's the best way to accomplish this exercise."
The Uchiha grunted in acknowledgement of Kakashi's tip and once again attempted to turn the leaf to ash. Keeping what his sensei said in his mind he closed his palms over the leaf and reopened them to see a little less than quarter of the leaf was burned.
He smirked in accomplishment.
"What do you mean I have HOMEWORK?!" The original Kakashi winced as Namiko applied more emphasis and volume on the last word of her question.
"Look Namiko, it's no secret that you aren't the sharpest tool in the shed," At this statement the blonde face faulted at her sensei's bluntness. "You claim that you want to be the Hokage, but you fail to realize its more than just being the strongest ninja in the village." The blonde looked at her sensei in though, he did make a valid point.
"I mean, I just figured that I'd cross that bridge when I got to it." The blonde admitted, rather sheepishly.
"You do realize that there are written portions in both the chunin exams and the jonin exam, right?"
She sweat dropped. "There's…what?"
"Like I said, there's more to being Hokage than your skill as a shinobi. While that is one of the more important factors, a Hokage needs to be diplomatic, a people's person and has to be as selfless as can be. You've been on the Hokage office a number of times…surely you've seen Lord Third covered from head to toe in paperwork."
The Kyubi Jinchuriki crossed her arms and looked away from her sensei. He kept making good points and though she was hard pressed to admit it, Kakashi was right.
"Fine," She grumbled and Kakashi gave her a signature eye smile. "But…how am I gonna have time to train with the team, train on my own, study and do missions, there's only one of me!" She exclaimed and this time, Kakashi looked at her with curiosity.
He came to the conclusion that she probably didn't know the secret to the shadow clone, so he simply smiled and created another shadow clone, then instructed her to do the same. Namiko watched as Kakashi's clone took her clone over to some bushes and out of sight.
Namiko turned her attention to her sensei who started at her in silence. Under his mask the jonin smiled. "Now…"
The original Namiko clutched the top of her head in a phantom pain of sort. "Hey! Why'd you hit me?!" Kakashi didn't answer her, but instead kept quiet hoping she'd come to some sort of conclusion on her own, to which she did. "Wait…huh…what happened?" She had been watching Kakashi the entire time, and he hadn't moved a muscle…so why did she have a memory of her sensei whacking her on the head.
"The shadow clone jutsu was originally created by Lord Second for reconnaissance. They serve a lot of purposes in combat, but their main purpose is to report information to their original. So, when a shadow clone is dispelled – no matter the means, everything it learned is then transferred to the mind of the original."
At Kakashi explanation, Namiko nodded in understand then voiced a question. "So how come I never noticed it before?"
Kakashi placed his hand on his chin in thought. "I figure it's because you always use them in abundance and not to mention that you fight with your shadow clones, so you wouldn't have noticed the memories, because they were your memories at the time as well."
She nodded in understanding.
"So, I can use my shadow clones to do the studying?" She asked with a rather devious smirk to which Kakashi nodded but held up a finger in caution.
"While the shadow clones can help with anything theoretical, all the physical training is going to be left up to you…and you need to use the shadow clones very warily, as the backlash from all the knowledge and memories coming back to you can overload your brain and be harmful, understood?"
"Hai, sensei."
"Now, time to go over your weakness," Kakashi started and Namiko didn't know why but she felt as if she was about to get chewed out…oh boy was she right. "You Taijutsu shouldn't even be called Taijutsu; you fight as if you're an underground street fighter, your tactical awareness? Nonexistent. You look like a traffic cone and you throw kunai first and ask questions later…" He had only mentioned a few things and she was clutching her heart to be dramatic. "All in all, you need a lot of work, but that's what I'm here for." He offered the blonde a smile.
She grinned. "Alright! Let's get down to business!" She exclaimed while pumping her fist in the air excitedly.
"Hold on Namiko, there's something we need to discuss beforehand," Her fist fell to her side and she looked up at Kakashi, giving him her undivided attention as he sounded serious. "Do you know about the First Hokage's Kekkai Genkai?"
Namiko had never really paid attention in her academic classes, but the one thing she knew everything about were the Four Hokage's, she had made it her mission to know everything about every Hokage – especially their jutsu repertoire – when she had first decided to be Hokage.
"Yea, the Wood Release, right?"
Kakashi nodded. "From what I understand about the Mokuton, it is created by combining the chakra of the Water Release, and the chakra of the Earth Release." Kakashi explained and Namiko did admit it made sense. When you added water to the earth, plants and vegetation tend to grow and that was basically what the Mokuton was…but she didn't understand why he was explaining this to her, but before she could ask, he continued. "Look at Zabuza's accomplice as well," The mention of the dead hunter nin resurfaced memories she had been trying to keep down, but Kakashi went on. "That Ice Release of theirs was the combination of Wind Release and Water Release, using the Wind to get the water cold and create snow and ice."
Another explanation that made perfect sense.
"What are you getting at Kaka-sensei?"
"Ever since I saw the Swift Release I've had lingering thoughts about its origin, because while the Kyubi's deduction of it being your chakra, your lifeforce and its chakra, makes sense…it might be more than that," Kakashi explained. "After seeing your nature affinities…I think the Swift Release might be a combination of your Wind Release and Lightning Release affinities." Kakashi said with an eye smile, making Namiko's eyes widen at the declaration.
"Huh?" She asked, dumbfoundedly.
"Think about it, lightning is literally the fastest thing there is, and wind is known to reach great speeds and cause great destruction every time they're fast enough, look at hurricanes and cyclones for example. Think about what the Nine Tails said, maybe the Kyubi's chakra and the Uzumaki lifeforce was all it took to give your nature affinities the spark they needed and created a new Kekkai Genkai."
Of course, she trusted her sensei and his reasoning did make perfect sense, but she'd have to ask the Kyubi if what he was saying was valid. Considering the Kyubi had probably been around longer than anything else, the fox would probably know if what Kakashi was saying was possible. But something didn't make sense to her.
"If it's the combination of two elements, how come any ninja that can use more than one element doesn't have a Kekkai Genkai?"
"It doesn't work like that, Namiko. Bloodline Limits, such as the Wood and Ice Releases and now your Swift Release aren't able by just combining the elements necessary, it has to be passed down through blood." The former Anbu explained. "To my knowledge, neither your mother nor your father had a Kekkai Genkai, therefore I think the Kyubi did play a part in creating your Swift Release."
Namiko nodded slightly with a frown on her face at the mention of her father.
While she understood why they refused to tell her about her father, it pained her knowing that her sensei, standing in front of her right now knew who he was and spoke about him – on what seemed like a personal level – but would not…or rather could not, tell her about him.
Deducing that the frown might have been caused from what him mentioning the father she was not allowed to know about yet, Kakashi tried quickly to change the subject with something he knew would perk her up.
"Since we don't know much about your ability or how it came about, let's not dwell on it and instead focus on your training." Kakashi then walked over to a nearby shrub and picked a few leaves. Making his way back to Namiko, the jonin took a leaf and placed in between his hands again. He reopened his hands to reveal a wrinkled leaf. "The first step to mastering Lightning Release is to wrinkle the leaf." He explained, offering Namiko a leaf, beckoning for her to give it a shot.
She did, but she failed miserably. Nothing had happened to the leaf. She furrowed her brows in annoyance to which Kakashi lightly chuckled at.
"Since Lightning is also my affinity, I'll be able to help you with that one. The exercise for the Wind Release is to cut the leaf cleanly down the middle…but I don't know much about Wind Release. I know someone who might be able to help you though," Kakashi explained to which she responded with a smile of gratitude. "To get the leaf to wrinkle, try to picture removing the flow of current throughout the leaf."
She looked at Kakashi with a deadpan…how did he expect her to know what that meant?
Seeing her reaction, he chuckled before explaining further. "Electricity comes from electrons, so if you can picture stopping those electrons from flowing, your leaf will wrinkle because it will cease to have any form of electricity or current moving within it, and once you can control the direction the electrons are going you will be able to manipulate the Lightning Release, got it?"
She nodded. While it still wasn't one hundred percent clear to her, she did have a good enough idea to get started. She attempted to wrinkle the leaf again and was surprised when the very tip of it seemed to be wrinkled, to which she exclaimed in joy.
Kakashi smiled at his student. "Good, however, now I want you to create shadow clones to work on that exercise…about twelve clones would be perfect," She obliged and created the necessary clones, who nodded at their boss and sensei before heading into the shrubbery to practice the leaf wrinkling exercises. The original turned to Kakashi. "You and I are going to be focusing on your Taijutsu."
She grinned. Even though she didn't admit it, she knew what Kakashi had said about her Taijutsu earlier was right. It wasn't all her fault though, the way she fought was exactly how they had taught her at the academy, and she suspected that was the problem in itself.
"If I had a Taijutsu style of my own I would've considered teaching you but since I don't, we're going to have to focus on tidying up the Academy Taijutsu style," Kakashi said with a hand on his chin. "Also, even though it's nature is still unknown to us at the moment, I want you to be able to activate the Jinton without a dead giveaway that you're using a special technique," He said, gesturing to her hair and the fact that it glowed and floated when she used it. "Hopefully more chakra control will be able to help that, if not you might have to hide it or cut it." He said jokingly.
Namiko instantly activated the puppy dog eye jutsu and was looking at Kakashi, making the jonin began to sweat. It was just so…so cute. He couldn't take his eyes off her.
"You wouldn't make me cut my hair would you, sensei?"
Kakashi began shaking his hands and head quickly. "Of course not!" Was his exclamation and Namiko frown turned to a triumphant grin. Kakashi also broke into a grin. Namiko, like her parents, had that ability to spread joy and make people laugh.
"Good." She said all too sweetly.
As his chuckled died down, he cleared his throat. "You ready for this training Namiko? I'm not going to go easy on you."
"Oh, I'm ready. Believe it!"
Kakashi looked on to his genin with a proud smile as they ate. After their training session, he had offered to take them for some food, and the place in question they were eating at was Ichiraku Ramen. He'd give a cookie to anyone that could tell whose choice that was. He was currently watching Sakura scold Namiko on her eating habits, trying to explain to her that she had to 'eat like a lady'.
Sasuke on the other than was simply eating his ramen. He'd of course look up and say a few words every now and then, and he would reply when spoken to. Kakashi was happy at how far each of his genin had come in such a short time.
The mission to wave really changed each of them for the better. The training sessions today had proven as much. He turned his gaze to Sakura.
By far she had grown the most since they had become a team. He speculated that she had probably realized that during the wave mission, her skills as a ninja weren't going to cut it and that she couldn't rely on Namiko and Sasuke to save her, his harshness earlier most likely played a part as well. She had shocked Kakashi today by how much she was willing to put into their training session, and he had to admit that even though it had been one day, the results were fruitful.
She had of course, come close to mastering the water walking, had done some physical training to start building some muscle, made exceptional progress with the first stage in mastering the Earth Release and they worked on her Taijutsu and refined it, despite it only being the Academy's Taijutsu stance.
He looked next at Sasuke.
While he was still somewhat pompous and arrogant, the Uchiha had grown. He now tolerated his teammates more and since the mission to wave and Kakashi figured he now respected his teammates – especially Namiko – much more than he did when the genin team had been formed.
Sasuke's training had gone great as well, no surprise there. He figured that in their age group Sasuke was probably the strongest, third only to maybe the Hyuga kid and the Taijutsu user that were under the tutelage of his 'rival' Might Guy. Sasuke's training today had mainly focused on mastering the first step to the Fire Release – which he had made decent progress in – as well as some Taijutsu training to help take his Sharingan to the next level.
And lastly there was Namiko. His sensei's daughter had changed a lot in the past week alone. She had taken a life for the first time no more than a week ago and while she tried not to show it on the outside, he could see the deed still plagued her mind. He knew he'd have to try and find a way for her to open up about it. One thing he knew was that killing and experiencing death wasn't good for the mind nor the soul.
As for her training, it had been splendid. They had made substantial progress on fixing her Taijutsu stance and the necessary katas, and her training with wrinkling the leaf had gone well, managing to wrinkle most of it. He deduced she'd have it mastered within a couple of days, at most. It seemed as though her Lightning affinity was extremely strong, just as her father's had been. She had also attempted the leaf cutting but had no luck, so he'd have to give her Asuma's address.
There were two things he knew for sure she inherited, Kushina's determination and Minato's uncanny ability to surprise everyone.
Kakashi was brought of his musings by the clearing of throats, he blinked then looked at his genin who were all looking at him with raised eyebrows.
"You okay there Kakashi-sensei?"
"Ah yes, I'm fine Namiko…just lost in thought thinking about the way of life."
His students deadpanned. "Uh huh, okay Kakashi-sensei," Namiko responded dryly. "Well, if you weren't focusing on the 'way of life', maybe you'd hear us say we were done." She said, using air quotations for emphasis where she needed it.
Kakashi shook his head at his student with a chuckle before placing some money onto the table and walking passed the flaps for the restaurant, the genin following him. Once they were outside of the stand, he turned to the genin with a smile.
"You guys did good today, I'm proud of you."
While Sasuke smirked at his words, Sakura gave a small smile and Namiko broke into a grin.
He then proceeded to give Sakura and Namiko the necessary scrolls for them to do their 'homework' and bid them all goodbye, but not before giving Namiko directions and soon enough he stood in the middle of the street alone.
As he started to make his way to his next destination, his mind went back to all the times the Third had tried to give him genin teams to command, and every team he was given was failed, apart from Team Seven. He always struggled with whether being a jonin sensei was for him or not.
He sighed as his mind ran across his teammates and sensei who had perished, then back to his current team who seemed to be filling him with what he could only describe as joy.
Maybe it wasn't so bad after all.
"124…128…132…Ah! Here we are. House 136!" Namiko ran up the stairs in front of her and began knocking on the door to the house she had been looking for. She heard footsteps on the other side and her face twisted into one of confusion when the door opened. "Shikamaru?"
The boy in question, a genin about two or three inches taller than Namiko stood on the other side of the doorway. He wore blue shinobi sandals with brown pants, and a mesh armor shirt under a grey jacket that sported green-edged trimmings. His hair was about shoulder length but tied in a spiky ponytail and he had small, hooped earrings in each ear.
"Namiko? What are you doing here?" The blonde was about to answer when he cut her off. "Actually, don't answer that. It'd be troublesome to know." He said with a sigh, making Namiko grow a visible tick mark at his attitude.
"I'm looking for Asuma Sarutobi…" She said through grit teeth.
Shikamaru sighed…again. "Didn't I tell you not to tell me?" As soon as the words left his mouth, he regretted it because it looked like she was about to blow a fuse. "Asuma-sensei!" He called in the house, slightly terrified off the blonde in front of him who was breathing rather heavily through her nose.
"What's up Shika…who is it?" Came a voice, and a tall man wearing standard Konoha jonin attire – bar the white sash on his waist that had the kanji for fire – with black hair and a beard appeared. His student just gestured to Namiko. "Oh, you're one of Kakashi's students, right?" To which she responded with a nod. "What can I help you with?"
"Well, today Kakashi-sensei tested our affinities, and it turns out I have Futon and Raiton. Kakashi-sensei said he can help with the Raiton but sent me to ask you for help with the Futon…so…could you please help me?" She asked, looking sweetly and the jonin.
Asuma whistled, Kakashi had already started elemental manipulation with his genin? Most shinobi didn't start that training exercise until maybe the middle of their chunin career. However, that wasn't the most surprising thing about what he had just heard.
"You have two affinities…and one of them is wind?" She nodded in return. Having the wind affinity in a part of the world it was rare was one thing, but to have two already at her age? He was shocked to say the least. "Well, I'll be damned. What do you need help with?"
"The leaf cutting exercise, I've been trying it since earlier this afternoon, and I can't even get a little cut on the leaf."
He nodded in understanding. "When you're trying to cut the leaf, picture your hands are two sources that are pushing out air, and try to picture them grinding against each other to make a smooth, yet sharp, cut against the leaf." He explained.
Without hesitation she grabbed a nearby leaf from one of his shrubs and clapped her hands over it, focusing her chakra. After a few seconds she opened her hands and gasped, then started jumping for joy.
On the base of the leaf, there was a cut about one-fifth the way up. "Thank you, Asuma-sensei!"
He chuckled at the way the blonde reacted. "Anytime kid," He then turned to his student. "Alright Shika, I'll see you tomorrow." He practically kicked Shikamaru out the house and said boy now stood on the street with Namiko.
"What's his problem?" She asked, looking at the Nara clan heir.
"Troublesome," He muttered. "He's probably got a date with Kurenai-sensei or something."
"Huh…" She said and it was only at this moment did she realize that Shikamaru was holding something. "What's that?"
"What this? It's a Shogi board."
"What's a shogi board?"
"Troublesome…" He sighed out in his head. "It's a board…for shogi…"
"Okay then…what's shogi?"
It was Shikamaru's turn to grow a tick mark, he had a feeling she was acting dumb on purpose just because she figured it was funny…but then he saw the genuine curiosity in her eyes. She really didn't know what shogi was.
"It's a board game that focuses on strategy."
The Uzumaki placed her hands on her chin and tilted her head towards Shikamaru. Something that caused the Nara to sweat a little, and despite his high IQ, he didn't know why.
"Could you teach me?" She asked sweetly, with a little blush on her face and even she didn't know what brought the blush on. She chalked it up to embarrassment.
Shikamaru looked up. There was still quite some daylight left and he really didn't mind teaching her how to play. Of course, it would be troublesome but Namiko had been something of a friend since before their academy days…so he really didn't mind.
He turned to the hyperactive ninja and smiled.
"Sure."
The ShikaNami seed has been planted! I repeat! The ShikaNami seed has been planted.
Lol. I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter, I know it's a pretty slow chapter but bear with me, that's gonna change soon. I don't plan on dragging things out too long. Once I get the explanation of the Jinton out there, we'll be going full speed ahead, no stops!
Before anyone says something about me saying Minato's affinity was Lightning just go with it because we really don't know what his affinity is, but according to Narutopedia, he can use Lightning, therefore for the sake of the fic I made it his affinity. And I know there probably aren't any traffic cones in the Narutoverse, or not any that I remember seeing in the anime but just go with it. Lol.
Oh, and thanks so much for passing the 100 follows mark. You have no idea how happy that made me!
Anyway, that's it from me now. Lemme know what you think in the reviews and as always, have a good one and see ya next time!
- AlphaZulu99