77 Chapter no.76

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....

Naruto looked up and saw that everyone in the room had a gobsmacked expression on their face, including the Hokage. He could see Natsuki, Narumi, and Satsuki all staring at him in pure awe and admiration. They were soon brought back to reality as they heard the proctor clear his throat.

"Winner by knock out, Portgas D. Naruto! With the final match over this marks the end of the preliminary rounds. All of those who have one their matches, please make your way down to the arena to decide the matches for the final rounds!"

As Genma made his announcement to the chunin hopefuls, they slowly began to make their way down the stairs until they were standing beside Naruto in a single line.

Minato and Anko had made their way down to the arena floor as well. The Yondaime Hokage stepped forward to start his speech to congratulate everyone, "Congratulations to all of you for winning your matches and making it to the third and final stage of the exam. I am proud of all of the Konoha genin that have made it thus far and I'm sure the Kage of your respective villages feel the same way." Minato let a moment of silence pass before he continued.

"However, the final stage of the chunin exams will not be happening now. Many important people such as the Kage of your villages, Daimyos, and many potential clients will be attending the final tournament. Therefore you have exactly one month to prepare for your matches. Time will allow you to study your opponent's abilities in order to form a strategy to deal with them and it will also give you a chance to improve your own skills." Minato said.

"For now we will decide what the match-ups will be for the tournament. Please take a piece of paper from the box that Anko-san is currently holding. These pieces of paper will determine who you will fight in the first round, so I hope you are all confident in your good luck."

One by one each of the genin walked up to the box and pulled out a small piece of paper with a number on it. They presented their numbers to Ibiki and were drawn onto the tournament grid where there number was.

Match 1: Uzumaki-Namikaze Natsuki vs. Sabaku no Temari

Match 2: Uchiha Satsuki vs. Uzumaki-Namikaze Narumi

Match 3:Portgas D. Naruto vs. Uzumaki-Namikaze Nawaki

Match 4: Inuzuka Hana vs. Chojuro

Match 5: Suigetsu vs. Sabaku no Gaara

Match 6: Yuki Haku vs. Winner of Match 5

Naruto was grinning like a madman at the idea of Nawaki, the brat just annoyed him to no end and this would be a perfect opportunity to show his true strength.

"Are there any questions dealing with the rules of the final tournament?" Minato asked after everyone had seen who they would be fighting.

Shikamaru raised his hand, "Will there only be one person who becomes chunin since this is a tournament?"

"No, there are several different judges for the tournament, Kage included, if someone is determined to have the skill and mindset of a chunin then they will be promoted. However, fighting more matches in the tournament will give you more opportunities to show the judges that you are fit to be a chunin. There is also a chance that none of you will be promoted to chunin, but from what I have seen that scenario is highly unlikely. Are there any more questions?"

None of the genin before him raised their hands or looked uneasy.

"Very well then you are all dissmissed. Oh Naruto! Please meet me at the Hokage Tower as soon as you have spoken with your teammates." Naruto had expected this after showing a bit of what he could do in his match, so he didn't voice his opinion.

Slowly all of the genin left the tower until only Team 11 and Team 7 remained. Obito turned to speak to his team, they needed to deal with the time they had during the period before the third exam. "All of you think about what you plan to do with your thirty day time period overnight okay. Meet me at the usual training ground tomorrow morning at 9:00 AM." He said as he disappeared from sight a moment after seeing them all nod their heads.

Naruto thought a bit about what he needed to work on before making the journey to the Hokage Tower, he would take the long way around so he could prepare himself for his eventual meeting with the Hokage, and most likely the rest of his family.

....

What are secrets really? Are they pieces of information that are not meant to be known by others? Or are they just things that you'd like to keep to yourself and only the people that you truly trust? Everybody had a secret or two.

Secrets were the basis of the shinobi world. Every country kept secrets from each other in order to benefit their own interest, whether it was to keep their hidden village's strength at the top of the elemental nations or to hide their own underground dealings. The world was a dark place. A rotting wasteland where the sun would never shine, at least it would be until someone decided to set the world aflame.

Naruto had many secrets, such as the fact that he knew the truth about the Uchiha massacre or that the Kyuubi was really still being controlled by Uchiha Madara on the night of his birth. Secrets were meant to stay in the dark because should they come to light, the consequences would be greater than any kind of benefit.

If either of these two secrets were to get out, the fallout would be disastrous. If anyone were to find out about the Uchiha massacre then the people of Konoha would lose faith in their village and their Hokage. They would see him as a tyrant who ordered the execution of an entire clan just because they no longer believed in the village's 'will of fire' and were going to speak out against it. Those Uchiha children who were spared would seek revenge for their losses, or betray the village altogether.

The second secret was just as dangerous, if not worse. If what Shisui had said the night of the massacre was true, then the Kyuubi was most likely still under the effects Madara's Kotoamatsukami. Naruto would need to deal with that the first chance he had, only a the same jutsu would be able to remove the effects. Should the people of the village find out that the Kyuubi was under the effects of a sharingan that night, then the Uchiha would be ostracized even more. Some may even call for the complete extermination of the clan because they feared that what happened all those years ago would happen again.

Naruto had no idea that the Kotoamatsukami was so powerful. Should the village find out that he possessed the very same jutsu that cost Konoha all of those lives sixteen years ago, then he would most certainly have to take counter measures to prevent his family from being knew that it was the strongest genjutsu of the mangekyo sharingan, but to be able to control the most powerful of the Bijuu for over half a century with it was an amazing feat. Naruto had yet to reach that level of mastery with the sharingan. He was capable of activating Shisui's mangekyo, but when he did he still felt like there was a higher level to reach. It felt as if there were a power just within his grasp, but he had to take one final leap to reach it. Were his eyes telling him that he was capable of awakening the rinnegan? He would continue that thought later.

People also might interpret that Natsuki and Nawaki are also under Madara's control because they hold the Bijuu within them. Then they would be treated like that of real jinchuriki instead of heroes who saved the village. That brings up another theory that Naruto had. Yin and Yang were never supposed to be separated, it was the law of nature. The only reason that Naruto was able to completely split apart his chakra with his perfect chakra control was because he still contained the other half within his body. The Yin half of the Kyuubi was sealed inside Natsuki and the Yang half was sealed within Nawaki. That being said they would naruraly be drawn back to each other, the pull of the forces would be so powerful that they would even break the seal holding them in the process.

Naruto theorized that if one half of the Kyuubi was broken from Madara's control thenit would instantly draw the other half back too it and merge back into the complete form of the Bijuu. The extraction wouldn't kill the Uzumaki-Namikaze that possessed the half that was still under the Kotoamatsukami because of their Uzumaki genes. The Uzumaki always had incredibly strong life forces, which is why Kushina was able to survive having the Kyuubi escape from her. Though it would be an incredibly painful and exhausting process. If Naruto could help it he would break the Yin half from Madara's control because it would be easier to because it represented the Kyuubi's spirit half, as it was made of Yin chakra.

It would probably be best to deal with this either after the chunin exams, or during the invasion that would occur during the finals where Gaara would transform into his full Bijuu state. Naruto couldn't wait to deal with Shukaku, he had spent far too long in isolation and it had made him even more bloodthirsty and insane. Naruto would have to remind him of what he was like when he was just born. He would remind him of what fear was.

But that would have to wait for another time, as Naruto was currently sitting in front of Namikaze Minato the Yondaime Hokage. He was obviously interested in uncovering all of Naruto's secrets. Though they weren't the only ones in the Hokage's office. Uzumaki-Namikaze Kushina stood behind her husband, staring forlornly at Naruto, while Narumi and Natsuki both sat to the side of the office on the couch. Both of the genin had no idea why they were there, but there Kaa-san had requested that they be there. Nawaki wasn't there as he had been moved to the hospital for the night to recover from the injuries he received during his match. Even Jiraiya was in the room sitting on the windowsill, Naruto had not even glanced at the man since he arrived.

Naruto had not seen Jiraiya in years, nor did he want to. Naruto could only describe the Toad Sage with one word, pathetic. He was strong, that much Naruto was certain of, but it was his beliefs that made his entire existence a joke in Naruto's eyes. He lived his entire life based on a prophecy that the toads gave him decades ago. They told him that he was meant to create peace by finding the child of prophecy. The sharingan user never understood what made the toads so special that they could hand out prophecies like they were pieces of candy.

It was one of these prophecies that drove the Uzumaki-Namikaze family apart even further. Several years ago after he had awoken from his coma, Naruto had thought that he would give his family a chance after seeing how his family life couldn't even compare to how bad Aces was. After all, Naruto's parents didn't actually try to kill him. However, it was not meant to be as they had began to focus even more on his siblings' training after Jiraiya had given yet another prophecy to Minato about the child of prophecy and how they will either bring forward peace or lead the world to ruin. That had been the final chance he gave his former family.