10 Chapter 10: Ninja missions

The next day, we all met up for our first official day of ninja team 42. Shira was there first, shortly followed by Yugao and myself. We were standing around doing small talk, and waiting for our new teacher.

After about 30 minutes, of doing nothing, Ibiki finally arrived.

"Today is the first day, of our newly formed team 42" Ibiki said, after greeting us all. He then continued: "But first, let me make sure you all know what a ninja team is."

Ibiki pause here, to see if we had any objections. None of us did, so he continued to talk: "A ninja team from Konoha is always composed of 4 ninja. One teacher and 3 students. The teacher is usually a jonin, but as is the case with our team, the teacher of a ninja team can also be a chunin or special jonin. The students are mostly composed of 3 genin, but there can be cases where the student are chunin or higher. However in general when you reach the rank of chunin, you will be expected to lead your own team."

After taking a drink from his flask, Ibiki was waiting for any questions. When none came, he continued further: "A ninja team, will have a few duties, but is generally hired out to do plenty of different tasks. These tasks are what we call missions. The missions are divided into different levels of difficulty. D rank missions are the lowest level of difficulty, and can be anything ranging from patrolling to moving the lawn. These missions will always be safe, and generally conducted inside of Konoha. C rank missions are the next level, that can involve some danger, but the likelihood of engaging with hostile ninja, are very low. These missions are often hunting bandits or escorting merchants. Next we have B rank missions. Now these missions are the middle of the group, and there is a high chance of engaging hostile ninja during the mission. These missions could be hunting down missing nin, or taking a mission to spy on enemy ninja. Then we have the A rank missions. These mission are dangerous, and there is almost a certainty of engaging hostile ninja, during such a mission. Until such a time where we become jonin, A rank missions are the highest we can do. Higher missions are only available for ninja who have proven themselves capable." Ibiki said.

"What are the higher missions?" Shira asked

"While I have never been part of them, I know there is a category higher than A rank missions. These missions are S rank missions. While I can only speculate to their nature, I believe that these missions put the participants into extreme danger. So these missions should be undertaken, with the expectation to fight for ones life." Ibiki answered.

After looking at our faces, deep in thought Ibiki continued: "We have a tradition in Konoha. Each team will receive their first ninja mission directly from the Hokage. Thus follow me to the Hokage tower, and we can get our first mission started."

We all nodded and followed Ibiki to Hokage tower.

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*Hokage Tower*

*POV Hiruzen*

This is one of my least favorite times of year. Why did we ever introduce that stupid tradition in Konoha. Yesterday 6 new ninja teams was formed, and today I have to personally hand out a mission to each team. On top of all my normal paperwork, I have to revive each team, and pick a suiting mission for each team today. I also have to get the end of mission report, which will also be today, as all the teams are getting D rank missions. The D rank mission, compared to all other, are quick to finish, even for newly formed teams.

With a sigh, I motioned to my ANBU and my secretary to allow the first team to enter.

After so many years of doing this, most of the teams just kind of flow together. The only way for me to remember a team, they must be exceptional of some kind. Like this first team, they are all from a civilian family, and have shown no real talent in anything. I try to be as nice and grandfatherly as I can, but I don't remember their names. Maybe if the prove themselves in the future, I will remember them better. For now I give them a mission, a small speech about the will of fire, and send them of.

This is repeated 4 more times. Until we get to one team, where I do remember them. Team 42, with 3 genin that graduated from the academy ahead of time. Not only that, they have also shown promise and excelled in different areas each. I took a gamble with assigning these 3 together, under a non conventional teacher, Ibiki Morino.

Ever since Ibiki graduated to chunin, with the way he graduated to, I have had him earmarked to become part of the TI department (Konoha torture and interrogation force). However I was surprised when he came to me, wanting to get more experience before joining the TI force, and training a team. I thought that it was a good idea, as that extra experience would make him even better in the TI force.

Team 42 entered and greeted me all with a:

"Good morning Hokage" while the 3 genin bowed their body down in a 90º angle, before the stood up again.

"Good morning all" I said. As they didn't say or do anything, I continued: "Taking you teams composition and talents into account, I have found the best mission for your team. A rich merchant family has problem with their garden, as some pests are destroying their flowers. Your mission is to go to the merchant family, and help them out. Investigate what their problem is, and figure out how to help them. Any questions?" I threw a folder of files to Ibiki, containing all the detail they would need for the mission.

"No Hokage" They all said.

"Ok then, dismissed" I said, and got back to my paperwork. All 6 teams would be back again later today.

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*Garden of a rich merchant family*

*POV Anya*

After we had been to the Hokage office, I was a bit exited about the mission. I had expected a boring mission, like go catch a cat that has run away from home. Or feed a merchant family's pets. But they way the Hokage presented this mission, sounded like we would have to do some investigation, to figure out what we had to do. Oh how wrong I was. Turns out that the merchant family had not provided all the details to the Hokage, but already knew what had to be done.

The merchant family had a mole problem. So we had to hunt down about 5 moles in the garden. And their garden was pretty big. To ensure that there would be no more moles, we also had to dig a metal fence down around their garden. Catching the moles was the easy part. All we had to do was using Shira's bugs, to swarm through the underground tunnels, and catch the moles when they came to the surface, to avoid the swarm. Ibiki had a strange look on his face when Shira used her bugs, and he stayed as far away from the swarm as he could.

The metal fence part, was the worst. It was about one meter deep fence, and we had to dig the earth with a shovel. No one on our team knew any earth jutsu, so this was the biggest challenge for us. I took us a few hours, with even Ibiki helping out. In his words "I don't want to be here all day".

While working, I asked Ibiki something that had been bugging me since leaving the Hokage office:

"What did the Hokage mean, when he mentioned about team composition? Are there different teams who specialize in different areas? I thought the ninja teams were composed to be balanced in all area's. Also what specialization would our team be?" I asked, giving Ibiki no chance to answer before asking all my question at once.

Ibiki just waited for me to finish, then started to answer my question:

"The ninja teams are composed from candidates available, but also from what is needed for the village. In general the teams can be categorized into these groups: Tracking, combat, support and pursuit. While there are teams that further specialize, they are all within these groups." Ibiki said.

I nodded, and could see that Shira and Yugao was also paying attention to what Ibiki was saying.

"These ninja group categories are mostly used when moving many ninja in large scale battle. Tracking teams, are used in general for information gathering. Sensory groups would be included in this category. Combat teams speak for themselves, but they can be both close or range combat groups. Support teams, work best together with the other teams, they also focus on controlling and planning the battlefield. You would have teams focusing on strategy in this group. Pursuit teams, are what we call teams that can move quickly, they can be used to reinforce different areas, or hunt down moving targets. Logistics are also in this grouping.

Our team, as it is currently, have the potential to be categorized into two of these categories. The tracking or combat group. While Shira and myself have abilities and talents that lean more towards the tracking group. You and Yugao are clearly more in the combat category." Ibiki said.

"Would that mean that we have to change what we focus on, to fit into any of these categories?" I asked.

Ibiki shook his head from side to side: "No, you misunderstand the categories. It is not something you should think about, to fit into. It is only really used by the Hokage, to make his life easier. We should just focus on developing into what we want, and if we fit into both tracking and combat, that just mean that the Hokage will allow us to accept missions from both." Ibiki said.

"Oh, I understand" I said.

The rest of the work was done in silence.

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We just finished our first mission, and reported back to the Hokage. We got a voucher from the Hokage, for a completed D rank mission, that we can turn in at the reception. A D rank mission is rewarded with about 10.000 ryo. How much that is in any currency used in my previous world is anyone's guess, but to cover my living costs I would need to do about 5 D-rank mission each month. However I would need to do more than that, if I wanted to afford other things, like weapons or scrolls for my fuinjutsu.

As we were leaving the hokage tower, with our first mission bounty, Ibiki stopped us and invited us to get something to eat.

He said that he wanted to discuss a plan for our team going forward. While it was not really time for dinner yet, we all accepted to go with him.

We got some skewed meat from a vender, and went on a walk around time to discuss.

"Here is my plan for how we should proceed as a team" Ibiki started out. We all had just taken a bit, so couldn't answer him, and he continued: "We should expect to have to do D rank mission for some time, before the Hokage will accept harder missions for us."

"Why is that?" Shira asked, as she was the fastest of us to chew.

"As I am only a newly appointed chunin, and you 3, although talented, are also newly appointed genin, we need to develop before more dangerous mission are available. So to that end, I suggest we do one D rank mission each day, for 5 days, then use 2 days to pursue other goals. Then we repeat this cycles each 7 days." Ibiki said, before continuing: "Most D rank mission will only take a few hours, and the remaining time, we can do training."

We all agreed. This would cover our living expenses, and give us enough income to buy other essentials for training as well.

"To that end, I already have some suggestions for what training each of you can do" Ibiki said.

"Shira and Anya, I think you should both choose a weapon to use. While hand to hand combat is good, there are cases where you are unable to touch you opponent. Some ninja, like the legendary Hanzo, have poisons implemented in their body. A weapon would be helpful in that case, so at least as a backup you need that.

Yugao the same for you, being to reliant of a weapon is not good. Some ninja, like the third Kazekage, can control metal through magnetism. Thus I recommend you to also have at least a level of hand to hand combat, to survive in those situations." Ibiki had a small pause here.

"Lets go to the weapon merchant, and on the way we will discuss more" Ibiki said, and changed direction. We followed after him, listening intently.

"Shira you need to work further on your chakra control. You need to be able to do the tree walking perfectly. That will be your goal for chakra control. It will also be easier for learning more advanced jutsu.

Anya and Yugao, your chakra control is good enough for learning advanced jutsu. You need to find out what you want to focus on, then come to me for help if you need it." Ibiki said

"Yes, teacher" We all said at the same time.

"What would you recommend for me, to improve my kenjutsu teacher?" Yugao asked.

After a moment of thinking Ibiki answered: "I think you should continue mastering your sword arts, becoming one with the weapon. As you are almost there, I think you can soon start to learn infusing your chakra into you sword. When we get to merchant, we can try to look for a new sword for you, made from chakra metal. It will make the infusion easier."

Yugao seemed satisfied with this answer, and Ibiki looked at me, expecting me to ask him something.

"I don't have a question, right now. I am already working on something, that I got from my family" I said.

Ibiki nodded, and didn't ask anymore about this.

At this point we arrived at the ninja weapon merchant. We walked around the store, looking at different weapons, while asking Ibiki about how they would fit us. Yugao ended up finding a new sword, that was similar to her old one, but made of chakra metal, for easy infusion.

Shira was undecided between using dual daggers, or dual sai's. In the end she ended up with daggers, as they were easier to hide and use.

Because I already had a plan for my signature jutsu, I wanted a weapon that would help me towards that goal. I choose a metal chain. I got some strange looks from my teammates, and especially Ibiki about my choice. I was trying to explain to them that I wanted a weapon to disable the enemy, not to kill. I don't know if they bought it, they eventually let up, when I kept insisting on the chain.

After getting our weapons, and agreeing to a schedule, we started on the hell known as D rank mission marathon.

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*Time Skip 1 year and 3 months*

Since we started on team 42, it has been a little over a year. We have been doing D rank missions for the first 6 months straight. And we still continue to do mostly D rank missions still to this day. However after 6 months we finally was allowed to do the occasional C-rank missions.

Most of the C-rank missions have been uneventful. Mostly escorting merchants from one city to another. No combat with hostile ninja, and only twice did we have bandits trying to rob the merchant. They were just regular bandits, and we took them down without much effort. When we turned in the bandits, we got a pretty nice reward as well.

After these incidents, the Hokage started to believe more and more in our abilities, and were allowed to participate in more C rank missions. He has also indicated that we might be ready for a joint B rank mission, if a suitable one were to present itself.

Some important events have taken place over the last year as well. While I didn't hear about it when it happened, and found out a few months later, Orochimaru has left the village and been branded a missing nin. I know this because when you get your first mission outside of Konoha, they give you a book, with information about notable ninja. Especially all of the ninja with "run on sight" warnings on. Orochimaru has a "run on sight" warning, he is after all a legendary Sanin.

Also important, Itachi has graduated from the academy at age 7. Must have happened at the same year I graduated, but he was not in the exam with us. He must have graduated at a different time of year. I know about this, because Itachi was all over the ninja news. The youngest uchiha ever to unlock his sharingan at age 8. While I don't know if that is true, the uchiha wont shut up about it. Claiming the uchiha are superior and Itachi is the prime example of it. It is all they talk about at this moment, and it is pretty tiering.

Why is this important information you ask? Well the next big event in this world is the uchiha massacre, and I don't remember when this happens. However what I remember Itachi was a teenager at the time, and his age now is 8, so there should be about 4 or 5 years until this event. I would have to keep my ears to the ground about Itachi, to figure out the timeline better. I know he has to become chunin and then ANBU first before the event happen.

Maybe this time, I would have the power to actually do something about the suffering and pain these big event cause. I will have to see at the time, but I can start to train for the event.

Speaking of training. This last year has been fantastic. Yugao and Shira have both been progressing faster than before.

Yugao's kenjutsu is fearsome. She can infuse her chakra with ease into the sword, and while she is not a master of it yet, she can use it for some powerful effect. The most eye-catching one, is that she can infuse the chakra into the blade, and then fire a "sword beam" from the sword, for a ranged sword attack. I almost suspected her to shout "getsuga tenshou" when she did it for the first time. But instead she named it "Moon beam".

Yugao has also started to develop some sensory ability. I don't remember if she had this in the anime, or if her training so much with Shira had awoken this talent in her. She doesn't use the sensory much, but it is something that can become useful for her in the future.

Shira on the other hand, has become pretty good with her daggers. Not to the level of a master, but that because she has been focusing in other areas. After her chakra control goal was achieved, she started on some of her clans secret techniques. Most of the jutsu from her clan focus on using her insects to make effects. Like her insect clone jutsu, where she makes a physical double from insects. Very useful in close combat. When it is dispelled there are a bunch of insects close to the enemy, and they eat chakra very fast.

Shira's sensory is also improving. If she has felt a chakra signature once, she will be able to find it again within 1 kilometer of herself. And when she spreads out her insects around her, it is almost impossible to sneak up on her, from any range.

For myself, I tried a few months to learn the shadow clone jutsu. I saw Ibiki perform it a few times, but no luck. So after failing a lot, I finally just asked Ibiki to teach me. He agreed with no problem, maybe because it is the only thing I have ever asked him for. So I learned the best know jutsu from the anime, and have been using it to some success. What they never show in the anime is just how much chakra is used when making a clone. And unlike another Uzumaki, I don't have access to unlimited chakra, from a grumpy old fox. So for now, the most I can do is 2 clones. However the loss of chakra is just so much, that the clones are not usable for very long each day.

Each time I make a clone, I use 100 % of my chakra, to divide into new bodies. However if I make one clone, I split the chakra between me and the clone 50% to each. But from the initial 100%, the clone and I will get 40%. So making the jutsu itself in that case cost 20% of my initial chakra. Then the clone will immediately start losing chakra, and within a few hours, they will run out of chakra and dispel. I hope the cost of chakra and the loss of chakra will become less when I get better at using it.

Knowing the shadow clone jutsu, have however improved my overall training speed. And other the the shadow clone, I have been focusing on my fuinjutsu, weapon use and my adamantine sealing chains. As I am in my growth phase, my chakra limit is expanding on it's own, so I don't train that now.

Finally about 3 months ago, I finally had some success. I was finally able to use my future signature move: "Fuinjutsu: Adamantine sealing chains". However I was only able to conjure one chain, and only about 3 meters long. The drain of chakra when using this chain is enormous, I hope with use and training, I can bring this drain down. It is at the level now, where I can only use the one chain for about 5 minutes. For now I train with the chain, to prolong this time, and to learn to move the chain as I want. The next step, after this, will be to add additional chains, and lengthen the chains.

For now however I note my stats down in my notebook:

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Notebook performance

F = Academy student, E = Academy graduate, D = Genin, C = Chunin, B = Tokubetsu Jonin, A = Jonin, S = Kage

Taijutsu:

- Hand to hand combat: C-

- Throwing weapon: E

- Weapon chain: D

Ninjutsu:

- Shadow clone jutsu: D-

- Clone jutsu: D

- Substitute jutsu: C

- Transformation jutsu: D

Fuinjutsu:

- Storage scroll: D

- Explosive note: D+

- Adamantine sealing chains (1 chain): D+

Stamina: A

Stealth: D

Chakra control: B

Chakra level: A++

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As I look over my stats, I can see that when I focus on some things, I don't progress in other areas. While the basic jutsu are easy to learn, I won't be focusing on them anymore, so this is probably as good as I get with them.

While sitting in my own thoughts, I hear my front door open. I go out to look, and see Shira and Yugao is here. Before I can even greet them, they both talk at the same time, as if they rehearsed it:

"The Hokage has finally approved us for a B-rank mission!" The both almost scream it.