Chapter 8

Time skip : Six years

A lone figure was standing on top of the gates of Konoha. He was tall for his age, standing at five feet. He was wearing a white and black, half sleeves jacket with two orange stripes on the sleeves, connected to the ones going along his zip which stopped at his chest, his high collar standing up. There was a blue lightning symbol on his back, in the black stripe. He wore a full sleeves black shirt underneath the jacket with two bands, one on his wrists and the other just beneath his elbows. He wore dark blue ANBU pants with orange stripes on the side, going all the way to the ankle. He wore simple blue shoes with white soles. [ Think of the pants like Sasuke's in Road to Ninja, but instead of sandals it's shoes]. On his right thigh he wore a holster held with white tape, and a standard shinobi pouch tucked in at the back of his pants, on the left side. His bright, spiky blonde hair was tied in a messy ponytail.

He was Naruto Uzumaki, and today was the day of his graduation exam. As he stood on top of the gate, he reflected on what he had gone through in the six years of academy.

Just a few days into the academy told him that he was going to receive the short end of every stick. Even though he had no need to learn the academy Taijutsu style, he could tell that the stances taught to him were all wrong. But he gave no indication that he knew this.

Theory lessons were roughly the same. The teachers taught the different concepts in the class, but never answered any of his doubts. Instead, they tried to sabotage his answers as much as they could. Not that they could do that. Being a genius had its perks.

On the bright side, he made a lot of new friends. Friends that he could actually count on.

Hinata Hyuga of the Hyuga clan was the first friend she made. He could tell she was an incredibly shy girl who had confidence issues, but a very warm person to befriend. She spoke in the language of stutters, which for some reason, seemed to intensify around him. Her face also turned very red whenever he spoke to her and she fainted most of the times, which is why he let her do most of the talking. She became his friend after he saved her from bullies.

Chouji Akimichi of the Akimichi clan was a chubby boy who always seemed to have some snack in his hand. Chouji had a very big heart once he got to know him through a shared lunch. He was a very caring person, very kind and strong. But he also suffered from lack of self-confidence. He was also very sensitive about his weight, angered very quickly if someone called him fat. Nonetheless, Naruto considered him a dear friend.

Shikamaru Nara of the Nara clan was Chouji's best friend, because he was the first one to look past his weight and find who Chouji truly was. He was also incredibly lazy, his catchphrase being "Troublesome". Along with that, he was probably the most intelligent person Naruto had met. He didn't know Shikamaru's exact IQ, but he knew his lazy friend was high up in that department, even more so than Naruto. Shikamaru was a true genius at Shogi, which is where his weakness also lied. He spent most of his time cloud gazing, or playing shogi to sharpen something which was already sharp. He was the epitome of lazy.

But Shikamaru and Chouji were Naruto's closest friends. They even took part in the occasional prank that Naruto played. They even enjoyed the punishments they got together after testing their teacher's, Iruka Umino's patience. Every moment he spent with them, a strong desire to protect them pulsed in his heart.

Kiba Inuzuka of the Inuzuka clan was more of an annoyance that grated on his nerves. He was short tempered and impulsive, which did not help him at all. He was also headstrong, which was probably the reason he got very easily angered in his spars and made mistakes. He always carried his ninken, Akamaru with him at all times. Akamaru was a small puppy who fit in Kiba's jacket. He always responded to Kiba's nonsense and was always on his side. He held a one sided rivalry with Naruto and Sasuke.

Shino Aburame of the Aburame clan was a calm, collected and a mysterious person, a stark contrast to Kiba's personality. He rarely smiled and gave almost no emotion away while speaking. He was always on the side of logic, always having some sort of explanation to his answers. It always drove Kiba nuts when Shino started to preach logic to him. Naruto made friends with him because Shino was also treated like an outcast because of his ability to control insects. Naruto could empathize with him. He sometimes sat with Shino just so he could enjoy the silence.

Ino Yamanaka from the Yamanaka clan was a very loud, outspoken girl, and a very devoted fangirl of Sasuke Uchiha. She was also very proud of her appearance, eating less so she could appear more attractive for her 'Sasuke-kun'. She was a very kind-hearted person at heart, but that side of her was rarely seen by Naruto. She also loved gossip and had made her goal to ensure that nothing stayed secret from her. Not someone he trusted right now, but was sure he would later.

Sakura Haruno was a civilian girl who was a rival of Ino's for Sasuke's attention. She was highly self-conscious about her large forehead, which she hid behind her pink bangs. She only had eyes for Sasuke, and often tried to ask him out on dates. Of course, she was always denied. But she tried to immediately hit Naruto after every denial, believing it was his fault. Of course, Naruto never allowed her to hit him, but simply avoided her. There were times though, when he suspected she had split personality disorder. He didn't trust her at all.

These people were the only ones who were worth acknowledging. The rest of them simply treated him as the rest of the village did. But there was one person who was closest to Naruto's heart out of all of them.

Iruka Umino was his class instructor. He at first thought that Iruka was just like the others. But somewhere down the line, when Iruka scolded him for one of his pranks, he was surprised that he cared for him enough to scold him. He then started treating Naruto for who he was, instead of what he contained. He occasionally took Naruto to Ichiraku Ramen to eat his favorite dish and was very kind to him. Naruto always felt that Iruka was perhaps the only person who he felt a familial relationship with aside from the Sandaime.

Sasuke Uchiha was, in the simplest terms, a class A douchebag. He always acted like he was the god's greatest gift to mankind. In short, Naruto was stupefied how arrogant Sasuke was. He always brooded in class, which somehow his fangirls perceived as "cool". He had perhaps the strangest personalities Naruto had ever seen. A mixture of superiority and inferiority complex. Naruto hated how Sasuke was labeled a genius, when he really wasn't. Genius was what Naruto would call the Yondaime Hokage, the Nidaime Hokage, Kakashi Hatake and Itachi Uchiha. Not Sasuke.

Sasuke always evaluated new people that he met. If they were weaker than him, he would arrogantly disregard them, feeling they would hold him back. If they were stronger, he would relentlessly try to surpass them, believing he should be their equal, if not stronger. This infuriated Naruto the most. He hated how Sasuke believed that he should have no equals.

He knew how Sasuke's clan was massacred in a single night by the prodigy of the Uchiha clan, Itachi. No one knew why he had done it, but it had left Sasuke deeply scarred. Naruto tried to befriend him at first, thinking the lone boy could use a friend. Instead, he was rudely rejected and outright insulted; Sasuke had said that he had no wish to befriend the class clown, who was also the dead last.

Since then, Naruto simply stopped interacting with him outside spars, where he forced himself to lose every time; he did not want to reveal all his cards just yet. But on the inside, he had a desire to be acknowledged by him.

His training had gone very well in the last six years. He had finished his Taijutsu training in one and a half year, with six additional months of self-training. After that, Anko had proudly declared him to be a master of the Snake style Taijutsu after getting stalemated in a spar with him. It was after this he had started creating his own style, using the snake style as foundation. His own imagination was very useful in creating moves, blocks, strikes that were completely unique to his style.

After he had mastered the Snake style, he had started to work on his speed and with the help of shadow clones, had drawn resistance seals on his body. It was a bit weird at first, but he quickly got accustomed to it. Currently, he was on the twelfth level of the resistance seal. He could have already started using the training simulation, but felt that the time was not right, so he held off until he became a Genin, preferring to spar with Anko.

Her help was invaluable in creating his new style, which was very unpredictable; exactly how he wanted it to be. His style had an attack stance, but he preferred to let his opponents attack him first. He had incorporated his danger sense into his style, making it even more efficient. His style was a combination of linear and unpredictability; he would attack whenever he saw the openings and attack however he could.

He had based his style so he did not have any restrictions or limitations. In short, he had successfully created and mastered his own fighting style in five years and just like his father said, it was as aggressive as fire, as sharp as wind, as fast as lightning, as strong as the earth, as fluid as water and as unpredictable as the nature. The perfect fighting style. He decided to name it the Elemental fist. Pretty badass.

His sensory abilities had been perfected over the course of six years. He had help from his jiji, whose sensei, the Nidaime, was said to be the greatest sensor of his time. He had graciously allowed him to study his sensei's scrolls on sensing. The more Naruto read, the more he was convinced that the Nidaime was a genius of his father's caliber. He had developed his own sensing techniques; which Naruto had eagerly learnt. Naruto could now accurately sense chakra to the point that he could identify nature affinities if he concentrated hard enough.

His Ninjutsu had progresses far as well. His chakra control and reserves only increased over time and he made sure he had enough jutsu in his arsenal of all four of his affinities. He had also created a way of copying jutsu from others. Whenever he would watch someone perform a jutsu, he would immediately hone in on the chakra in that person's body, sensing how it was being molded. His photographic memory combined with his now controlled danger sense ensured he could copy hand seals in slower perception. This skill had greatly impressed his jiji. He was also pretty smug about the fact that he had successfully copied the Great fireball jutsu from Sasuke from when he had once watched him train.

Also, he had literally begged the Sandaime to let him study from the Nidaime's library, considering that he had four affinities that could rival Tobirama's water affinity and the former Hokage literally had a huge library that was full of jutsus of all nature transformations. Sarutobi was outraged at his request, but Naruto had reasoned that he had the ability to make use of them. Besides, the Nidaime had no use for them now since he was dead. Sarutobi had very reluctantly allowed him to study from the library, but had made him swear that he won't tell anyone.

The fact that he was a seal master had helped him study and understand the Hiraishin scroll his father had left him. He had to admit that it was incredibly complex.

From what he understood, it was a part of the rarely studied field of space-time. It was a perfect combination of Ninjutsu and Fuinjutsu. His father had left him an astounding amount of chakra theory for him to recreate the jutsu. In summary, it was using fuinjutsu to create a temporary tear in space-time, traveling through it and appearing on the other end near-instantly. It relied on the principle of teleportation; once you enter the tear of space-time, your body is dispersed into millions of particles of chakra that re-assembled just before you exited the space-time.

Naruto's challenge was in recreating the jutsu shiki (seal formula). His father's famous kunai had only five kanji on it that he used very successfully. The scroll was enormous, even with his father's improved notes. He had to shorten it, just like his father did, into five or six kanji.

At first he had made the mistake of using his father's formula, imprinted on a kunai, the difference being that instead of his father's chakra, it was his. It even sort of worked, but he slowly discovered the problem in that method. It was taking him too long to sense the kunai; he was wasting chakra as well. He had then re-read that every Hiraishin formula was unique to its user. He had to painstakingly start from scratch to build his own formula, which would require a lot of time.

Two months of curses and ink marks later, he had proudly created his own Hiraishin formula, with a few interesting modifications of his own.

He had modified his formula so that instead of sensing the kunai and forcing yourself into the space-time, which had become easier with his own formula, he maintained a very weak link with whatever he had put his formula in. Whenever he molded chakra and honed on a particular kunai, the link would instantly teleport him, without him having to force himself through. He now required significantly less chakra to use Hiraishin, and sensing the kunai became easier.

His formula was four kanji symbols forming the phrase, 'Fall down seven times, stand up eight.' It was his proudest creation yet. There was one last modification he had made, but gave credit of it to Kurama.

Kurama had very strategically pointed out that he would not be able to use Hiraishin in places where there is water. For four days straight, he worked on another formula which would allow his kunai to stick on water surface.

When he had finally tried the flying thunder god, he was ecstatic. But he also discovered the jutsu's disadvantages. It took time getting used to. It took him thirty-seven successful teleport attempts to end up on the other side without nauseating.

He still sucked at Genjutsu. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't perform a single one. But thanks to his sensory abilities, he could easily break out of one. But this hadn't been tested as of yet. Kurama had very patiently told him that due to the abundance of yang chakra in him, he could never perform Genjutsu, which required yin chakra.

He had pondered on whether to learn kenjutsu or not, but something inside him (Not Kurama) told him that he was not cut out for it. To compensate for it, he had perfected his fighting with dual kunai held in reverse grip. He also knew that he could coat the kunai with wind chakra to sharpen it and lengthen its reach, but had yet to try it out in a real fight.

An important thing he had discovered in the last six years was that he was alone. He knew that before as well but had no idea how bad it was. Whenever the parents would come pick their children up, they would turn scornful gazes on him. It cut him every time, but he never allowed it to show on his face. He simply covered with a bored, indifferent look.

He had developed a technique of his own after learning the shunshin no jutsu, just for battle purposes. The shunshin simply took too much time for his taste, and he did not want to become too reliant on the Hiraishin. Therefore, he created shunpo, the flash step. He would focus his chakra into his leg and would vanish in a sudden burst of speed. He created this for short distance purposes in a fight. He was probably at low-chunin to mid-chunin speeds, counting with the resistance seals on.

He also had his IQ tested by jiji. With an IQ of 177, he was one of the rare geniuses that came once in a generation. He was in league with the Yondaime, the Nidaime and Itachi Uchiha.

As he stood upon the gates reminiscing, a sudden noise caught his attention. He smirked, 'That's right, all the alarms would be sounding now, waking them up from their precious sleep.' It was his final prank before he became an official ninja.

All the civilian council members had been pranked by him. He had set off a timed-release stink bomb in each of the houses, courtesy of Fuinjutsu. He knew the blame would come onto him, but he had made sure nothing connected him to the crime. He also knew that the ANBU would be searching for him due to his prankster reputation. Normally he would proudly take credit for his work, but since it was the important people this time, he made sure to have an alibi, which was the academy. He had specifically set them off just five minutes before the first bell rang, ten minutes before which he was already in class usually. He easily sensed the jutsu shiki he had imprinted in the tree outside the academy and silently vanished in a tiny, blue flash.

Appearing on the tree, he closed his eyes as if searching for something. The next moment, the air around him shimmered a little. Naruto then puffed into smoke, signifying that he had perfectly substituted with the shadow clone that was sitting inside the class.

The class was as usual, very noisy and chaotic. Thankfully, his shadow clone was sitting on the last bench, which meant he did not draw unnecessary attention. As the memories of the clone came to him, he blinked and then scoffed at the stupidity of the people. 'Did they really think I would keep wearing that orange jumpsuit?' The shadow clone had received stares from people in his change of clothes. Sakura had yelled at him to not act like he was cool, but he had ignored it easily, as was his habit.

The clock struck eight, and Iruka-sensei entered the classroom followed by Mizuki-sensei. Naruto hated him. Mizuki always tried to fail Naruto in all the tests by casting Genjutsu on them, making them appear tougher. But Naruto paid no mind and continued writing the wrong answers to maintain his facade of dead last. He gave no indication that he knew of Mizuki's pathetic ways to fail him.

Finally, the class settled down and Mizuki handed out the papers. As he gave it to Naruto, a very ugly sneer appeared on his face, kind of like a sick smile. Naruto looked at his paper and back to Mizuki, who seemed to be glowing with triumph. Naruto sent an 'Are you kidding me?' look mixed in a deadpan stare. He then promptly dispelled the Genjutsu on the test, making a blank page appear.

'So this is your game?' he thought with amusement.

Raising his hand, he said in a cool tone that perfectly matched his facial expression of bored indifference, "Mizuki-sensei, I believe that you put this blank page here by mistake."

Mizuki's thunderous expression almost made him smirk, but he reigned it in with experience. He came up to Naruto, a smile straining his face. "Thanks for pointing it out, Naruto. Good thing you spotted it, otherwise you would have failed", he said, placing the real test on his desk. Turning back, a furious expression came across his face. 'How did the demon spot the Genjutsu?! He never could do it before!'

Usually when tests were conducted, Naruto would purposely answer so he barely passed or failed. But today, he decided to let his intelligence shine through. He could hold back a little less today.

He finished the paper with twenty minutes to spare, but kept the appearance of writing as to avoid suspicion. He could see that Sakura and Sasuke had also finished roughly at the same time. It was not surprising since Sakura was considered the class bookworm and Sasuke was quite intelligent. Everyone else finished at roughly at same time around.

After collecting their papers, Iruka-sensei called out, "All right everyone, next section will be weapons. Proceed to the practice fields."

Naruto waited in the crowd for his turn. Since it was alphabetical order, he was pretty much in the last. He watched as Sasuke's turn came and observed as Sasuke hit all the ten bullseyes for kunai and shuriken, save for one. 9 bullseyes out of 10 was the highest score yet. Finally, it was his turn.

He went in front of the crowd and to the box where the shuriken were kept. He took five of them out and holding three in his left hand and two in his right, threw them all simultaneously. He watched as they all hit bullseye with boredom, as if he did this every day. He proceeded to do the same with kunai.

The whole class was shocked and gaping at what they saw. Naruto Uzumaki, the class clown and dead last, had beaten Sasuke Uchiha's score very easily. The said Uchiha was frowning heavily, not liking that the dead last of the class had beaten his score, that too looking as if he was barely concentrating.

Iruka was shocked as well. Naruto never displayed such skill before. "G-good job, Naruto. You have the highest score in the class", he complimented, before moving onto the next student, not noticing that Mizuki was barely keeping himself from strangling the blonde. The said blonde turned in his direction and gave a smirk, infuriating him even more.

After the weapons part of the exams was over, Iruka called out, "Everyone, gather around for the Taijutsu portion of this exam."

Naruto frowned minutely at this. Every time they practiced Taijutsu, he was always up against Sasuke, no doubt because Mizuki wanted to see him lose. This time would be no different.

He was right.

"Sasuke Uchiha and Naruto Uzumaki, please enter the ring", Mizuki announced almost gleefully. He was fully prepared to see Naruto beaten down and if he was lucky, he could fail him.

"Beat baka-Naruto, Sasuke-kun!" Sakura screeched, causing many people to cover their ears. Ino supported her by shouting as well, "Show him you're the best, Sasuke-kun!" Naruto could have sworn that he saw blood coming out of Akamaru's ears.

Almost no one cheered for him, but his sensitive ears caught a soft spoken voice saying, "G-good luck, N-Naruto-kun."

He smiled in thanks at Hinata, who fainted at his smile. He then turned his attention towards Sasuke, the same bored look from before back on his face.

Sasuke stepped in with a serious frown, still feeling upset that the dobe of all people beat him. Naruto still had the infuriating look of bored indifference on his face, as if he barely considered Sasuke a challenge. Sasuke almost snarled, 'That dobe is mocking me!'

"Hajime", Mizuki called out and jumped out of the ring. Sasuke slid into his clan's fighting style, the Interceptor fist. Since it mainly relied on the Sharingan, he could not use it to his full potential. 'But I don't need the Sharingan to beat dobe of all people', he thought smugly. But wasn't prepared for what came to him.

Naruto was contemplating whether he should end this quickly or prolong it, just to see how angry he could get Sasuke. 'Nah, I'll end this quick', he thought. He would use every advantage he could get. It was his fighting style after all.

He stood in a semi-ready stance, watching as Sasuke did not bother to enter his until the signal to begin was given. 'Got him', he thought with a mental smirk.

As soon as the signal was given, Naruto didn't waste any time to get into a stance. Sasuke had provided an opening, and he would fully use it.

He used the speed he had built up all over the years to get into Sasuke's guard in an instant. One moment Naruto was standing opposite to him, another moment he was kneeing Sasuke's chin, very painfully. The force of the blow was such that Sasuke was thrown right out of the ring. Even though he recovered mid-air and was able to soften his landing, a furious expression was on his face. Kurama was heartily laughing inside his mind, pleased to see Sasuke getting his ass handed to him.

The class was silent for a moment. Naruto had beaten Sasuke a second time, that too in just one move. Then came the accusations, "Naruto cheated, Iruka-sensei!" "There's no way baka-Naruto can beat Sasuke-kun! He cheated, Iruka sensei!"

Iruka was getting fed up at how the fangirls were shouting ridiculous and useless accusations. He could see what Naruto had used was pure speed, and nothing else. "Shut up! Naruto has not cheated! If anyone knows better speak up!"

Naruto was watching the drama unfold with hands crossed across his chest, amusement dancing in his eyes. He almost laughed when Sakura, the ever devout fangirl, screeched, "Iruka-sensei! There's no way baka-Naruto could beat Sasuke-kun! Therefore he must have cheated!"

'That's a very logical reason, isn't it?' Naruto thought with sarcasm.

Iruka turned a stern glare on her, "And just how did Naruto cheat, care to explain Sakura?"

Sakura opened her mouth, but closed it since nothing came to mind. An embarrassed blush spread across her face and she fell back into the crowd.

Iruka nodded and called out, "Everyone head inside for the Ninjutsu portion."

Mizuki was looking like someone shit in his breakfast and made him eat it. 'Don't you get so smug, demon! I will fail you somehow!' he thought angrily.

They headed into their class and everyone sat down, keeping their distance from Naruto, who had gone to the back of the class and had pulled out a book to read.

"All right, you will all sit here until we call out your name. When we do, come into the next room for your exam", Iruka said before calling the first student.

Sasuke had long since gone back to brooding again, though this time he had a faint aura of anger around him. 'How is the dobe so good? I never saw any signs of skill in him and every time he was the last in class, so why was he able to beat me that easily?! It doesn't make any sense!' he thought furiously.

Soon enough, it was Sasuke's turn. He went out of the door and returned five minutes, a hitai-ate on his head. He smirked in the direction of Naruto, but grit his teeth when he saw that Naruto wasn't even paying attention to his surroundings; he was too engrossed in his little book.

'This book is very interesting', he thought as he read the 'Tips and tricks of Fuinjutsu I' written by his parents. So engrossed he was that he almost missed his name being called out. He snapped his book shut and put it in his pocket. He then proceeded into the next room.

Iruka and Mizuki were sitting on chairs, a desk in front of them. Mizuki watched with barely hidden glee, 'Today you will fail, demon!'

"All right Naruto, perform the Henge no jutsu", Iruka instructed. Naruto nodded and formed the ram seal. A puff of smoke later, the Yondaime Hokage was standing in front of them.

Iruka smiled. Naruto was full of surprises today, "Very good, Naruto. Now perform the kawarimi no jutsu."

Naruto nodded and a second later, Mizuki was sitting on the ground, wondering how he came there. A second later, he turned furious eyes onto Naruto, who was looking a little too innocent, "I'm sorry sensei, are you ok?" he asked, with fake concern in his voice.

Mizuki got up and brushed himself. "I'm ok Naruto, don't worry", he said with gritted teeth.

Iruka nodded approvingly, "Excellent Naruto, you performed it without smoke and without seals too. You get extra points for that."

He looked up from the paper and said, "Lastly, perform the Bunshin no jutsu." There was some fear in his voice. Naruto could never perform it perfectly.

But Naruto surprised them yet again. Holding up a half ram seal, there was a puff of smoke and three Narutos were standing in front of him. Of course, they were actually Kage Bunshin, but they didn't need to know that. He was actually proud that he only needed a half ram to execute Kage Bunshin, instead of the full seal.

Mizuki watched helplessly as Iruka declared Naruto passed and told him to pick between black and blue. Naruto picked the blue hitai-ate and asked if Iruka could tie it just beneath his left jacket sleeve.

Walking out of the room, he saw that the class was giving him the same, gaping look, again. Annoyance passed on his face, "What are you looking at?!"

Kiba pointed an accusing finger at him, a shocked look on his face, "You got a hitai-ate!"

Naruto simply gave him a deadpan stare. Slowly clapping he sarcastically drawled, "Well done Kiba, you now have a firm grasp of the obvious."

Snickers erupted in the classroom as Naruto made Kiba feel stupid with a single statement. Kiba prepared to pounce on Naruto when Iruka entered the classroom, " Everyone settle down!"

After everyone was seated, he said, "Those people who have passed will come tomorrow in the morning for team assignments. You can leave now."

Naruto leisurely walked out of the academy, in no hurry. He had nothing else to do, so he sat down on the swing on the academy's tree. He sat there for a long time, thinking of what he will eat today. He sensed someone coming and hid his scowl. 'What does Mizuki want now?'

Mizuki came up behind Naruto, "Congratulations on passing, Naruto!" he almost threw up in his mouth saying that.

Naruto curtly replied, "Thanks." He said no more than that; he didn't need to. Mizuki approached him, so he will be the one to talk.

"I was impressed on how you performed Naruto. But you still don't have enough points to claim Rookie of the Year. I will offer you a special test, if you're interested in that title", he said.

Naruto just looked at the man. 'What a fucking idiot', Kurama helpfully supplied. But Naruto wanted to see where this was going.

"Really Mizuki-sensei?" he hopefully asked.

Mizuki smiled at how easily he fooled the demon, "Yeah. You just need to take a scroll from the Hokage vault in the Hokage's office and bring it to me beside the old shed in the forest at midnight. You know that right? Bring it to me and consider yourself the Rookie of the Year!" he said as he walked away.

'He really has a very low opinion of you, doesn't he?' Kurama commented. Naruto mentally agreed, 'He just asked me to steal the Forbidden scroll. What a moron!' he thought as he flashed to the Hiraishin shiki in his apartment. He had a seal to make.