They were surrounded.

Everywhere he looked, the situation was hopeless. He'd already abandoned his forehead protector to uncover Obito's eye, but even that hadn't been enough to turn it in their favor. He was only one jounin, and Rin was only a chunin, surrounded by Kirigakure ANBU on all sides. Their only chance was to run, but to do that, they needed to fight.

His hands flashed through increasingly familiar seals as his eye fell on the ANBU between them and escape. Chidori flared to life and he dashed forward, his hand plunging through the chest of-

Rin.

Kakashi woke up with a gasp, both eyes shooting open instinctively.

Fortunately, his left eye was covered by his forehead protector, otherwise he was sure the act would have only increased the exhaustion he could feel throughout his body. Through his uncovered right eye, he could see the ceiling of his room at the inn, but his body wouldn't budge a muscle when he tried to sit up. The sensation of chakra exhaustion was uncomfortably and intimately familiar, even if it had been a few years since he'd last pushed himself far enough to receive it.

"Ohh, look who's up!" The cheerful voice came from his right, and before long Mangetsu's grinning face leaned into his view of the ceiling. "Nice to see you in the land of the living, Kakashi. You've been sleeping like a baby since last night. Chakra exhaustion sure kicked your ass, huh?"

Kakashi stared at him blandly, unable to do much of anything else. "Yo." From what he could see, the lightning that'd been bothering Mangetsu throughout the fight was gone. "You seem to be doing better."

"You have no idea." Mangetsu disappeared from his view, and Kakashi forced himself to turn his neck to the right to see Mangetsu sit on the other bed. "I'm sure you're wondering why I haven't returned to Kiri yet to report on Konoha's upcoming prodigies," he continued. "Before you say anything, I do have to tell Lady Mei what I know, but after all the help your team has given me, I'm sure I can convince her not to spread the information."

Kakashi certainly wasn't in a position where he could try to force Mangetsu into complete silence, so he nodded as best he could in response. "They plan to reveal themselves during the upcoming exams in Konoha, so the new Mizukage won't have to sit on it for long," he admitted. "The genin are all fine?"

Mangetsu nodded. "Whiskers had mild chakra exhaustion, but he slept it off along with the rest of the damage he took in that fight." He looked over at the wall the genin were on the other side of. "The other two were both uninjured, but you're gonna wanna talk to the little Uchiha sooner than later about that eye of yours. "

Kakashi let out a heavy sigh. "Yeah, I know."

As if on cue, someone knocked loudly on the door. "Bakashi-sensei!" Naruto called through it. "I can sense you're awake!" A second later, the doorknob turned, and the door was pushed open. "Oh, it's not locked." Without waiting for permission, he headed into the room, followed shortly by Sasuke and Sakura. When he saw Kakashi's open eye, he grinned and waved. "Hey, Sensei!"

The three genin walked over to stand between the two beds, blocking Mangetsu from his view. Naruto and Sakura both looked relieved to see him awake, but Sasuke's face was a perfect mask of Uchiha impassiveness.

"How're you feeling, Sensei?" Sakura spoke up first. "Sasuke told us you got really bad chakra exhaustion because of your, um," her eyes flickered to his forehead protector, "implanted Sharingan."

"Tired, but I'll be back to normal in about a week," Kakashi said. "We'll be able to return to the village then."

"In that case," Mangetsu stood up, more than tall enough to be seen over the twelve-year-olds, "I'll stick around until you leave as thanks, just in case anyone else shows up." He reached out and ruffled Naruto's hair. "Plus, I told Whiskers I'd teach him to make a water dragon."

Naruto's face instantly lit up and he spun around to look up at Mangetsu. "Wait, really?!"

"If you can learn it in a week." Mangetsu shrugged. "I'll be honest though, two-thirds of my team is constantly complaining that I'm awful at teaching Suiton jutsu, so you only have about a one-in-three chance of actually understanding any of my lessons."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow at Mangetsu's willingness to teach a genin of another village, but when he thought about it, it made sense. Like Konoha, Kiri wasn't in a very strong position, and he'd just witnessed a preview of the spectacle Konoha would show at the Chunin Exams. Teaching Naruto was a very easy way to ingratiate himself to an obvious future powerhouse, especially a jutsu he already knew Kakashi could teach Naruto himself. Or maybe Mangetsu had just genuinely grown to like Naruto.

"Alright." Mangetsu picked up a wooden bottle Naruto must've created for him off the bedside table and took a drink of it, attached it to his belt, and grabbed his sword off the bed. "I'll leave you Konoha nin to talk, I'm a few weeks overdue for an update to Lady Mei." He gave a two-finger salute and walked out of the room, letting the door swing shut behind him.

As soon as he was gone, everyone's focus shifted to Sasuke.

"How did you get that eye?" he asked Kakashi bluntly.

"I would've liked to have this conversation when I could at least sit up…" Kakashi trailed off when it was clear Sasuke wouldn't budge, sighing and turning his neck to stare at the ceiling. "It's my best friend's."

Naruto inhaled sharply. "The one you… lost on a mission?"

Kakashi nodded slowly. "His name was Obito." He turned his head back to the side, meeting Sasuke's gaze again. "On the mission where he lost his life, our other teammate was captured. He… we went after her, and along the way, I lost my left eye and he awakened his Sharingan." He closed his right eye, turning back to the ceiling. "When we saved her, the ninja who captured her caused a cave-in, and I nearly got myself crushed by a boulder I didn't notice. Obito sacrificed himself to save me, trapping himself under it in the process, and gifted me his eye so that my teammate and I would be able to escape."

With his eye closed, he couldn't see the genin, but he could sense them shifting to his right. The soft hum of the air conditioning unit by the window to his left filled the room, the only noise following the short story.

"Woah…" Naruto muttered eventually, his voice uncharacteristically quiet in the relative silence.

"… What happened to your other teammate, Sensei?" Sakura asked softly. Kakashi just shook his head, and she let out a quiet, "Oh."

"He must've cared for you a lot." Sasuke's voice was hesitant, and when Kakashi blinked open his right eye, Sasuke's Sharingan had spun into existence. Two tomoe, just like Obito's had been when his first awakened. "It's… good you've made such skilled use of his eye."

Kakashi eye-smiled. "Now that you know about it, I suppose I'll have to teach you to use those eyes of yours," he mused aloud. "I may not be an Uchiha, but I have earned some notoriety for my skill with the Sharingan."

Even Sasuke couldn't hide the excitement that flashed across his face, his Sharingan glinting. "Really?"

Naruto excitedly nudged Sasuke in the side. "Lucky bastard." He leaned to the side so that his face was level with Kakashi's and grinned. "Any chance you also secretly have Mokuton that you can teach me?"

Kakashi squinted at him consideringly for a few seconds and hummed. "No… I may have copied one or two somewhere down the line, but I can't exactly use them."

All three genin blinked at him.

"Wait, what?!" Naruto exclaimed. "How could you have copied Mokuton?! That's impossible!"

Sasuke let his Sharingan fade, dark eyes narrowing suspiciously. "The only person known to have Mokuton aside from Naruto was the Shodai Hokage, and it's impossible for you to have copied from him."

"You… can't be as old as that Kakuzu guy, right?" Sakura asked.

At that, Kakashi laughed. "Believe what you want," he said, shrugging as best he could. "Now, I'm still feeling tired, so is there anything else you need to ask?"

"You didn't answer my last question…"

"If there's nothing, I'd really like to rest both my eyes and not just one." It would only be a matter of time before he had to tell Naruto about Tenzo, but that was a conversation for another time. He just enjoyed messing with the genin. "If you let me get rest, I might teach you each a jutsu once I'm able to move."

That was more than enough to excite all of them. He could see the curiosity still burning in their gazes, especially Naruto's, but the prospect of a new jutsu was enough to sway even the most advanced genin.

"Well, I'm gonna go look for Mangetsu and see if we can get started on that Water Dragon Jutsu," Naruto declared, spinning around on his feet and heading for the door. "And then I'll find a Doton version to have all three!"

Sakura looked after him as he left, her excitement visibly sobering, before she said, "Um, I'm going to go train!"

When it was just the two of them left in the room, Sasuke put his hands in his pockets and made to silently leave, but Kakashi called out, "Wait."

Sasuke gave him a questioning look over his shoulder.

"Chidori." A little bit of feeling had returned to Kakashi's body, and he used it to push himself up slightly, though it was barely more than his shoulders against the pillow. "I'd already intended on teaching it to you one day, but the fight forced my hand." The fact that Sasuke pulled it off successfully under the circumstances was… frankly astounding. "That jutsu… I created it to protect my friends and loved ones. It's a very dangerous weapon. Don't try to train with it until I'm able to train you."

Sasuke's eyes darkened, and he turned his head forward. "Thank you for teaching it to me, Sensei." He held his left hand up, patches of peeled skin visible on his arm and hand. "I'll make good use of it."

Kakashi considered saying more, but in the end he decided to let Sasuke go, leaving him alone in the inn room.

Outside of the inn, Sakura ran to catch up to Naruto as she saw him leaving into the woods to train, and eventually just called out, "Naruto!"

He came to a stop, turning around to look at her and giving her a chance to catch up. "Hey, Sakura!" he greeted brightly, ever-present grin on his face. "What's up? Mangetsu said he'd start teaching me that jutsu later, so I was gonna head out and practice Mokuton where no one can see me."

Sakura stopped in front of him, proud she didn't even feel a little winded, but that small bit of pride was quickly dulled when her mind went back to the fight against Kakuzu. Throughout the entire battle, she'd been unable to do anything. Naruto and Sasuke both freed Mangetsu and Kakashi when they were held by Kakuzu's threads, and had been the ones to drive Kakuzu off in the end, and what had she done? Cut a few threads? She thought she'd been working to fight alongside her teammates, but…

"Sakura?" Naruto's grin faded, replaced by a concerned frown. "Everything okay? Did something happened?"

Sakura shook her head. "No, it's, um…" She found herself mimicking one of his habits and rubbing the back of her head. He'd been the one to originally offer, but it still felt awkward to ask her own teammate for lessons. "Back before we went to join the fight, you mentioned you could tell I had a Doton affinity and-"

"Oh, yeah!" Naruto beamed even brighter than before. "Hey, do you wanna go train that right now?"

Sakura blinked at the easy agreement. "Oh, if you're planning to train Mokuton-"

"I can just train with it while you work on mastering the jutsu I teach you." Naruto waved her words off, turning around to head into the trees. "Come on! I sensed a hidden clearing perfect for training on the other side of the mountain, so follow me and we can train there!"

He took off into the trees without giving her a chance to respond, but it only took her a moment of thought to leap into the trees after him.

Like usual, though most of her attention was focused on jumping from tree to tree, she couldn't help but watch the almost casual way that Naruto traveled through the forest. It wasn't obvious, and the thinned trees compared to the Land of Fire still threw them both off, but he had the uncanny ability to leap from branch to branch without a conscious thought. Rather than the grace and precision Sasuke traveled with when his Sharingan was active, Naruto moved like he just instinctively knew where each and every branch would be, like he was in tune with the forest itself.

He probably was.

It always made it easy to follow him. As long as he didn't move too fast or make a leap that she couldn't follow, all she needed to do was follow the path he took through the forest and she never needed to worry about whether a branch could support weight.

Before long, they came across the clearing on the other side of the mountain he'd mentioned. It was by the foot, a dip in the steep mountainside where it curved inwards and formed a natural wall, lit by the midday sun overhead and protected from the elements. Only a few trees dotted the grass, with plenty of room between, the perfect training ground for Doton jutsu.

She assumed. It wasn't exactly something she'd done before, but that seemed like a given.

Naruto landed in the clearing first, looking around as Sakura landed. "Looks even better than I thought!" He beamed proudly, turning to face her and grandly gesturing around. "Pretty awesome, right?"

Sakura nodded. "Yeah, it looks like a really good place," she agreed. "Nice find. What're you planning to do for training?"

Naruto opened his mouth to talk, but no sound came out, and a look of confusion spread across his face. "Uh…" He started to look around again, gears visibly turning. "I've never really taught anyone else before," he admitted after a few seconds, scratching the back of his head. "I mean, the old man's grandson keeps bugging me for ninja lessons, but I haven't actually taught him anything yet."

"Oh, um, that's alright," Sakura said. "How'd you start learning Doton?"

"Sasuke just gave me a jutsu scroll to work with and I practiced until I got it." Naruto shrugged. "I guess I could show you a few Doton jutsu and you can try them until they work like I did?"

That… didn't sound like the most effective training method to Sakura, but it had very obviously worked for Naruto and Sasuke. Their skills with their chakra natures were well beyond genin, probably even beyond chunin, to the point where it even interfered with the non-elemental jutsu they used. Maybe Sakura only had one affinity, unlike Sasuke's two and Naruto's three, but if she could master it like they had theirs, she wouldn't be as helpless in the future.

"Alright, well…" Naruto turned away from Sakura, towards the foot of the cliff, and raised his hands in the Monkey seal. "Probably makes the most sense to start with the first Doton jutsu I learned." He switched to the Ram seal, and then the Snake seal, before slapping his hands against the ground. "Doton: Dust Storm!"

Where Naruto's hands slapped against the ground, dirt erupted with enough force to make Sakura stumble, creating a huge cloud of dust large enough to cover a house that shot towards the foot of the cliff with surprising speed. It collided with a CRASH that shook the ground beneath their feet, creating an even larger cloud of dust, one that only grew as rocks tumbled from the top of the cliff and crashed to the ground. As the dust slowly cleared, it revealed a crater left in the side of the cliff as wide as a house and deep enough to offer shelter from the sun, with a widening path of torn up earth stretching from Naruto to the cliff.

Naruto dusted his hands off, turning back to Sakura with an easy grin on his face. "Pretty sure Sasuke got me the scroll for that one 'cause the name made him think it would be more about making dust than being destructive," he said. "First bunch of times I tried it, I packed it full of way more chakra than I could control, which made a huge mess." He grimaced. "I had to clean up the clearing so many times… and that was before I could really control Mokuton at all."

As many times as Sakura had seen Naruto use jutsu, like during the ninjutsu exams from the academy or during training since Team Seven formed, it was always amazing to watch. For a few seconds, she just stared in wonder at the crater he'd so casually formed in the wall, but eventually she had to refocus.

"Monkey, Ram, Snake, and I slam my hands against the ground?" she verified.

"Yep!" Naruto nodded, looking down at the path of destruction he'd caused through the grass and the crater he'd formed in the cliff. "One sec, I'm gonna fix it so it doesn't get worse and worse until I forget how it originally looked." For just a second, he put his hands back into the Snake seal, before pressing them against the ground.

Earth quickly rose to fill the torn ground leading from Naruto to the foot of the cliff, forming into a smooth layer of dirt in its place. A layer of grass identical to the grass surrounding it quickly grew over the dirt, and then the crater in the side of the cliff filled itself in, as though nothing was ever destroyed in the first place.

As soon as he finished, he turned back to her like he'd done nothing at all. "Okay, your turn Sakura!"

Suddenly, Sakura's nerves at being taught by her teammate returned. "Right…" Turning from Naruto towards the cliff, she raised her hands in the Monkey seal. "Monkey, Ram, Snake," she recited, going through the sequence without activating the jutsu. As always, the chakra was easy to mold, but she found herself questioning how much chakra she'd need to use. That definitely wasn't something she could ask Naruto.

Naruto didn't say anything as she went through the hand sequence a few more times, just feeling for the chakra. That was one thing that'd always come easily to her: chakra control. In the past month, Kakashi-sensei had her focus on improving her control even further, so it wasn't long before she felt comfortable attempting the jutsu.

"Alright." With intent this time, Sakura held her hands in the Monkey, Ram, and Snake seals, and then slapped them against the ground, channeling as much chakra as she dared use on a first attempt. "Doton: Dust Storm!"

As chakra tugged at her gut, dirt erupted from where her hands made contact.

Unlike when Naruto had used the jutsu, the force of the dirt wasn't enough to make Sakura stumble, and the cloud of dust that fired towards the cliff side was a fraction of the size. Still, it tore up a path of dirt from Sakura to the cliff side, hitting the wall with a much quieter crash than Naruto's.

"Woah, nice job!" Naruto cheered, somehow sounding genuinely excited despite the small size. "First time I tried it, the ground exploded in every direction and sent me flying into Sasuke mid-jutsu. He was not happy. Said I made him choke on a fireball."

Sakura laughed, a smile tugging on her face. "Thank you, Naruto." Compared to the wreckage Naruto's dust storm had left behind, hers was practically nonexistent, and she knew she wouldn't be able to match Naruto's firepower even if she used all of her chakra. What she could do was fine control, or so she hoped. "I'm going to practice this for a while, so you can work on Mokuton, if you want."

"Oh, want some targets?" Naruto didn't wait for her to respond, forming the Snake seal. "Mokuton: Wooden Bastard Targets!"

In front of them, wood sprung up from the ground in a dozen different spots, forming into perfect, grinning wooden replicas of Sasuke in seconds. It was far from the first time she'd seen the jutsu, but Sakura still found the wide, Naruto-like grin on his wooden faces uncanny. Especially because of just how accurate the wooden replicas otherwise were. She felt bad for Sasuke when the Chunin Exams were over and Naruto was free to leave them all over the world.

"There ya go." Naruto dusted his hands off again, grinning proudly at the dozen targets. "Second Mokuton jutsu I ever made, y'know. After my first tree."

"It's, um, definitely impressive," Sakura said. "Can you shape them into other people?"

Naruto made a so-so gesture with his hand. "I can, but it takes more focus to make anyone else," he admitted a bit sheepishly. "Guess it's because of habit? I can make wood targets of me, but there's no reason to use my own face as a target, so I use Sasuke's."

"It could be useful to trick someone by copying one of their allies if you're fighting multiple people," Sakura pointed out. "In a fast-paced enough situation, they might not realize it's made of wood and try to pull their attack and make a mistake."

Naruto's face lit up. "Woah, good idea!"

With a smile that she'd been able to offer one of her teammates any fighting advice, Sakura focused on the targets, recalling the sensation of Dust Storm while she formed the Monkey seal again. Naruto took that as his cue to step away, and while she was tempted to watch him practice Mokuton, she knew she needed to train more than anything. She followed the Monkey seal with Ram and Snake, using a little less chakra than the first time as she slapped her hands against the ground towards one of the wooden Sasukes.

Again, dirt erupted from the ground, forming into a cloud of dust large enough to knock an adult off their feet that shot at the wooden Sasuke. It hit with another crash, forming a dust cloud around the targeted Sasuke, but when it cleared, the Sasuke still stood. In a few areas, bits of wood had been blown off, making it look like Sasuke after a spar with Naruto, but it still stood.

"Right… Mokuton is crazy sturdy," Sakura murmured. On the one hand, that just made it a better tool for training, but on the other, she couldn't help but be disappointed by the poor damage.

Well, she had to start somewhere.

Resolving herself to practice the jutsu as many times as it took, Sakura ran her hands through the three hand seals again, the sensation of channeling chakra into Doton growing a little more familiar. "Doton: Dust Storm!"

"Weren't kidding when you said you found the perfect place for training, huh?" Mangetsu looked around the clearing at the foot of the mountain, from the few trees scattered around to the steep mountain slope that stretched up dozens of meters into the sky in all but one direction. The sun had just started to set, so the tall cliffs shaded the clearing. It was almost perfect. "It's missing one thing if you plan on learning the Water Dragon Jutsu, though."

Naruto blinked at him uncomprehendingly. "What's missing?"

Mangetsu chuckled. "Whiskers, I may be able to flawlessly make a water dragon in any environment, but you're going to want a water source nearby while you're learning this," he explained. "It's a chakra heavy jutsu already. Trying to create all the water for it in your stomach is only going to give you chakra exhaustion."

"Ohhh." Naruto nodded in understanding, then said, "Nah, I'll be fine! I have a ton of chakra. Plus, I can just drain it from the plants if I need to."

It was Mangetsu's turn to blink uncomprehendingly at Naruto. "You can draw water for jutsu from plants?" Well, that actually wasn't too large of a surprise considering the massive wooden dragon he'd witnessed the day before. Still, "Huh, that's convenient."

"Yep!" Naruto grinned, making a fist with his right hand and laying his left hand over it in the Dog seal. "Watch this!"

It wasn't really a jutsu, but Mangetsu was still impressed as he watched water drain out of the grass at Naruto's feet, leaving it dry and lifeless. With surprisingly advanced nature and shape transformation for someone so young, he pushed the water into a ball that floated before him, his control easy with just the Dog seal.

"See?" Naruto asked proudly.

"Not bad." With a sharky grin, Mangetsu held out a hand in front of him, forming a ball of water the same size as Naruto's without a gesture. "Konoha doesn't tend to have many Suiton prodigies, other than your first two Hokage." He paused, tilting his head to the side. "Oh, wait, you'd be related to them, wouldn't you?"

Naruto had been just staring at the ball of water Mangetsu formed in obvious amazement, but at the mention of the first two Hokage, his eyes snapped up to Mangetsu's. "Yeah!" He grinned brightly, moving his water ball away before letting it splash against the ground. "Well, I'm not really supposed to say, but since you already know about Mokuton," he shrugged, "it's pretty obvious I'm related to the Senju, y'know."

Mangetsu nodded along, absorbing his ball of water back into his hand, earning him a confused blink from Naruto. "You a secret grandchild or child of Tsunade the Sannin, or another surviving Senju who happened to inherit the kekkei genkai?" He'd expect the kid to be related to the Shodai Hokage, but kekkei genkai were far from predictable. His own clan's was so unique they'd convinced the village it wasn't one.

"Actually, I'm related to the Nidaime!" Naruto held up his left arm, pulling back the sleeve to reveal a wrist wrap with seals engraved on it. For a second, the seals glowed orange, and a sheathed katana popped out of it. "The old man- I mean, the Hokage even gave me his old sword!"

"Tobirama Senju's sword?" At a glance, the sheathed katana didn't look particularly interesting. It was a katana obviously meant for an adult, making it a bit large on Naruto, with a solid black sheathe, solid blue tsuka, and gray handle, well-made and well-kept but otherwise unnoteworthy.

A sword wielded by Tobirama Senju, though… Based on the stories surrounding the Nidaime Hokage, Mangetsu would be surprised if it was just a nondescript katana.

His week was looking more and more interesting by the minute. Training a Mokuton-wielding descendant of the Nidaime Hokage, one who wielded his sword? Mangetsu had been unsure himself of Konoha's power in recent years, not that he had any ground to stand on as a ninja of Kiri, but it didn't take a jounin to see it had a path back to the top. And that wasn't even mentioning Itachi Uchiha's little brother.

"Well, maybe I can give you a few kenjutsu lessons while we're here too," Mangetsu offered. Naruto's eyes lit up, so he added, "If you'll let me try a few swings of that sword."

"Yeah!" Naruto agreed instantly. "Oo, oo, can I try your sword too?"

Mangetsu hummed. "Maybe." An idea crossed his mind and he gave Naruto a challenging grin. "How about this? I'll teach you whatever you want while I'm around, but only if you master the Water Dragon Missile to my satisfaction first."

Predictably, Naruto grinned widely at the challenge. "Alright! I'm gonna master that jutsu today, believe it!"

"Oh, yeah?" Mangetsu looked at him consideringly for a few seconds before turning to face the cliff wall. "I should warn you, the original jutsu has forty-four hand seals, but I've never used more than seven, even when I was your age." With a grin, he raised his hands in the Tiger seal. "Suiton: Water Dragon Missile!"

Letting go of the Tiger seal, he held his hands with his palms facing the cliff.

From his hands, he unleashed a huge torrent of water and seamlessly formed it into a dragon as large as the wooden one Naruto had used the day before. Unlike Naruto's wooden dragon, the Water Dragon Missile didn't form a solid dragon controlled by chakra but a liquid projectile without limbs held together by chakra, but Mangetsu had enough control over it that it may as well have been a solid dragon. With just a raised hand, he flew it around himself and Naruto until its entire body circled them, and then sent it shooting towards the cliff wall with a flick.

It hit hard enough to shake the ground beneath their feet and form a massive crater in the side of the cliff. Water, dust, and shattered stone exploded outwards, but Naruto and Mangetsu were far enough away that only the very end of the splash reached them, and Mangetsu absorbed what little water touched him back into his body.

"Woah…" Naruto stared at the crater in the cliff with a look of awe, his sword sealed back into his wrist wrap. "Awesome! And you did that with only one seal!"

"Even back in Kiri, I'm known for Suiton jutsu." Mangetsu linked his hands behind his neck and looked up at the top of the cliff, where rocks were crumbling down from. "Honestly, I'm a little embarrassed by that poor performance you and your team saw against Kakuzu. I'll have to show off when I get the chance so you don't have the wrong impression."

"Well, I could tell that you were really weakened by that lightning, but you and Bakashi-sensei were both still crazy strong." Naruto had his hands clasped in the Snake seal when Mangetsu looked back down, his focus on the crater in the cliff wall. "And I can sense your Suiton affinity is, like, crazy crazy strong now that that lightning isn't bothering you." As he spoke, the cliffside rumbled and the crater steadily filled itself in, until it looked like the water dragon never struck in the first place. "I can only imagine how powerful you'd be in a fight now!"

Another sharky grin spread across Mangetsu's face, and he reached over to ruffle Naruto's hair. "If it wouldn't cause an international incident and probably the Fourth Shinobi War, I'd totally try to nab you for Kiri." It was only partially a joke. That much control over all three of his natures at such a young age? "Anyways, I'll show you the Water Dragon Missile one more time with seven hand seals, then you can give it a shot."

Naruto grinned. "Alright!"

To Naruto's disappointment, he didn't succeed in mastering the Water Dragon Missile by the time Mangetsu decided to stop training for the night. It wasn't as easy as just turning the wood dragon to water, apparently, and even he was feeling a drain on his chakra after all the attempts. His only comfort was that he'd gotten further than Mangetsu apparently expected, but he still stuck around for a little while after Mangetsu left, to no more success.

By the time he made it back to the inn, night had fallen completely. With a brush of his chakra senses, he could sense the still-weak static of Kakashi's chakra, the watery essence of Mangetsu's, and the hazy dust of Sakura's in their rooms, but Sasuke stuck out as a fiery storm on the roof of the in.

Without a second thought, Naruto diverted from his path to the inn's front door and leapt to the roof, landing quietly behind a meditating Sasuke. "Yo," he said, sitting down next to Sasuke without bothering to try sneaking up on him. "Didja spend all day practicing that new Raiton jutsu Bakashi-sensei showed ya?"

Sasuke sighed. "No." His eyes opened, blood red Sharingan shifting over to Naruto. "Kakashi warned me not to. I pulled Chidori off against Kakuzu, but I used more chakra than I should've in the process, so it's best to wait and see what other advice he can give me."

"So you can't practice it until Bakashi-sensei's up and running?" Naruto grimaced sympathetically. "If I were you, I'd be dying to use that. It gave you a speed boost and everything!"

Sasuke grunted. When Naruto looked back at him, he'd pulled his left hand out of his lap and started to stare at his palm. "I am," he admitted. "But, considering how volatile Raiton chakra is, I'm willing to wait a week to avoid potentially maiming my hand." He turned his hand around, showing the areas where his skin has peeled. "And it's probably best to avoid upsetting Kakashi."

"Probably," Naruto agreed. "You brought your sword, right?"

Dropping his hand back into his lap, Sasuke turned his head fully to Sasuke with a raised eyebrow. "Of course. You saw me use it against the bandits."

Naruto held up a thumbs up. "Well, Mangetsu told me he'd give me kenjutsu lessons when I master the Water Dragon Missile jutsu!"

"And you mastered it?"

"Well, not yet." Naruto admitted, looking away sheepishly. "It's sorta similar to the Wood Dragon Jutsu, but takes a lot less chakra and a lot more chakra control, so," he shrugged. "Plus, I'm still not entirely sure how I learned Wood Dragon Jutsu in the first place!" He threw his hands up and flopped onto his back, staring up at the stars. "Did I, like, invent a jutsu in my sleep or something?"

"Doubtful, but I'm honestly not sure what makes more…" Sasuke trailed off before suddenly standing up.

"Huh? What's up?" Naruto jumped up to his feet from his back. Sasuke's eyes were searching the ground at the bottom of the inn, but Naruto wasn't about to try and look for what a Sharingan was looking for. "Whaddya see?"

"A summon, I think." Sasuke jumped down to the ground, and Naruto quickly followed. "Looked like a small tortoise, but it had an abnormal amount of chakra. I only got a glimpse out of the corner of my eye."

"A small tortoise?" Naruto frowned and scratched the side of his head. "Are you sure?" Despite his words, he stretched out his chakra senses around them, searching for anything small. To his surprise, he quickly felt something small but with more chakra than an average animal or civilian. "Huh, you were right."

Following his senses, Naruto walked around to the side of the inn that their rooms were on, Sasuke following after him. When he reached Kakashi's window, he didn't need Sasuke's Sharingan to see the small, green tortoise sitting on the windowsill, a scroll attached to its back.

"A messenger tortoise." Sasuke walked up to the tortoise and picked it up, removing the scroll and handing the tortoise to Naruto, for some reason. "Says it's from someone named Might Guy, for Kakashi."

"Um, this tortoise's shell says SOS." The tortoise was small enough to fit in Naruto's hand, with a yellow-lined green shell and a green body. Across its back, the letters SOS flashed every few seconds. "Just a guess, but I think this Might Guy guy needs help."

Sasuke grunted. He knocked on Kakashi's window a few times then, without waiting for a response, opened the window and pushed past the drawn curtains to disappear inside.

Following his lead, Naruto climbed in after him with the tortoise in hand, pushing the curtain aside to see Kakashi sitting up in his bed with a book in hand. At their entrance, he looked up from it and raised an eyebrow. "You know, as much as I appreciate a good window entrance, I do have a door." Before either of them could respond, his eye fell on the tortoise in Naruto's hand, and his voice was serious when he asked, "Did you just find that?"

"Yep," Naruto confirmed. "It was outside your window!"

"There was a scroll attached," Sasuke said, walking up to the right side of the bed and handing the scroll to Kakashi. "From-"

"Might Guy." Kakashi nodded at the tortoise in Naruto's hand as he grabbed the scroll. "That's one of his summons."

Naruto held up the tortoise to his face, meeting its dizzy-looking eyes. "So this tortoise came all the way here on its own?" He narrowed his eyes, but the tortoise just held itself still in the air, doing nothing. It wasn't long until he got bored and sat it down on Kakashi's bed, focusing on Kakashi. "What's the scroll say?"

Kakashi's one visible eye scanned the document like it was just another book, revealing nothing. After a few seconds, he rolled the scroll back up and let out a sigh, eye flickering up to meet Naruto's. "Go get Mangetsu."

"Hah?" Naruto asked. "What's the scroll say?"

"It's a request for backup from another Konoha team." Kakashi set the scroll down on the table next to the bed and closed his book, setting it down next to him. "I'm not in any position to help, but I think Mangetsu's going to want to see this."

A/N:

Not quite over yet lol.

Combat-wise, Sakura's still in a difficult position. Both of her teammates started way ahead of where they were even in canon, so the catch-up game is rough. It's not her fault she couldn't really help against Kakuzu, but that feeling's got to suck. Doton's the start of her path to getting stronger, even if she'll have to use it differently than Naruto

I enjoy writing Mangetsu a lot tbh. All things considered, I actually consider him stronger than Kakuzu, but he does have lightning as a weakness he can be caught off guard by and put him at a disadvantage in the right/wrong circumstances. What little we really know of him in canon is that he seemed young, in the anime I believe he lasted the longest of the reincarnated swordsmen without even using a sword, he must've been a prodigy, he could use all the swords, and since he can use Samehada, he has to have a lot of chakra. And the Hydrification technique is just insane already lol

Also, I know the Hydrification technique is officially listed as a hiden of the Hozuki Clan, but respectfully I call bull on that

First of all, Kabuto had to use Suigetsu's DNA to replicate the technique (and he didn't even manage it fully), just like he needed Jugo, Kimimaro, those two twins, and Karin's DNA for their respective genetic gifts (granted, Karin doesn't specifically have a kekkei genkai either, but the chains are at least kekkei genkai-adjacent if they can only be used by specific Uzumaki). That doesn't make sense unless it's a kekkei genkai in some way. Second, the most similar ability in Naruto is the Iburi Clan's kekkei genkai from Tenzo's backstory, which is basically the same thing but with smoke. Third, there is just literally no way an ability that makes someone borderline unkillable and allows them to turn their organs to water without facing any problems isn't a kekkei genkai.

I'll be explaining the specifics of the Hozuki Clan's kekkei genkai in this as the story progresses, including reasoning for why it's referred to as just a hiden, but I wanted to get that explanation out of the way.