Chapter 43 - Chapter 42

Naruto and Shikamaru worked their way south across the Hi no Kuni countryside with little problems, excluding the 'short' episode they had in the hills with those monkeys that raided their packs and took their storage scrolls with clothes and equipment. That slowed them down by at least half a day.

Stupid monkeys.

The minor occurrence with the primates aside, they made it to their destination with no actual trouble to comment on.

And their arrival to the capital itself… well once the city came into sight Naruto's jaw stayed slacked for fifteen minutes while they walked the rest of the way there until a gnat flew into the back of his throat.

It was amazing. At first there were homes outlying around the crux of the city itself with the regular civilians. Nothing major, just quaint little homes to stay at for the working folk; the backbone of the entire community. Smiling, happy people, and a marketplace where travelling merchants from all over would peddle their wares to the citizens there before heading into the city itself to make the big money.

Both Naruto and Shikamaru took their time walking through this portion of the city as it felt warm, a good atmosphere. It more or less felt like their kind of place.

But when they entered the city itself they started to be a little awe-stricken at the sheer size of the place. It seemed like everywhere they turned they were surrounded by buildings that made the height of the Hokage Tower look absolutely puny in compare. As the two Konoha born and bred boys looked around they felt like ants shuffling along through the neatly paved streets filled with people around the titanic buildings and very ornately constructed buildings.

Yeah, this was definitely the capital. As if there would possibly be anywhere else in the country that looked like this.

Eventually after seemingly forever, the two made it to a large amount of open ground filled with trees, even though the path they walked on seemed to become more well kept and eventually instead of just pavement the road was cobbled.

"How big is this place?" Naruto asked out loud after almost a full hour of being dead silent as they got through gaping at the city, choosing to move along to their future place of employment with little words spoken between them.

"The city or the daimyo's palace?" Shikamaru replied before smirking, "Because I don't know the answer to either yet Naruto. I've never been here before, just like you." He spared a bit of a chuckle at the pout on Naruto's face at that crack. The first thing either of them had said to one another in that long and Shikamaru had to get in the first good snide comment of the two of them.

"Well… the palace now actually." Naruto admitted, rubbing the back of his neck in a bit of exasperation, "I mean, we left the city a while ago. Do you think we should start tree hopping again?" A frown came to Naruto's face as he actually started thinking of the question he had just tried to ask.

That might not have been the best course of action for heading towards the palace of the most influential man in Hi no Kuni. Moving through the woods would have been suspicious. It would be obvious that the daimyo would have some sort of standing force as a guard aside from the Ninja Guardians and two shinobi moving through the branches would not go over very well if either of them were to hazard a guess on the matter.

Eventually after much walking and complaining from Naruto about how he just knew this place wouldn't have ramen, the pair came upon a beautiful manmade stream that arched from the sides of the road to run alongside it, with much gorgeous foliage to be seen alongside it.

A great gate marking the entrance to the massive guard wall around the palace grounds stood in front of them the size of one of the ones in Konoha with the symbol for Hi no Kuni on the front of it.

And they simply stood there aimlessly for minutes, "Knock." Naruto said to Shikamaru, gesturing him forward.

"You knock. I'm not touching that gate. You know how nobles are about people touching anything that doesn't belong to you. It's troublesome business."

"No, I don't know. But you do. And that's why you should be the one to knock."

"Why don't we just wait for someone to open it up?"

That little bit of banter got Naruto to raise an eyebrow at Shikamaru. That wasn't really the smartest thing he'd ever heard his best friend say and he jumped all over it. You had to take the small victories when your friend was a genius, "Who's gonna open this thing? No one comes here regularly. I don't think anyone's touched this thing in three days at least, and I don't feel like standing out here looking stupid until the next time some aide has to go run errands. Now knock on the gate or I'll throw you at it."

Did Naruto just more or less call him out? Shikamaru raised an eyebrow as well at the statement as he looked at Naruto out of the corner of his eye, "Can you grab me before my shadow grabs you?" Both of them seemed to be more or less at a standoff, glancing at each other within arm's reach until Naruto's arm suddenly lunged out only to stop cold halfway there, "Nope."

Naruto didn't have to look down to know that Shikamaru had already caught him, "Okay, new goal. I'm getting fast enough to grab you before your shadow can stop me." Being able to grab and throw Shikamaru at will would be cool with him.

"Finish learning Rasengan first." Shikamaru said calmly, not taking Naruto's threat for the future seriously because even if he did get that fast, he'd still have to finish throwing him before his shadow locked onto him, "Then you can start talking about stupid ideas that you aren't going to make work." Besides, it wasn't like he wouldn't be training either.

Muttering to himself as Shikamaru let go, Naruto adjusted his clothes and marched forward determinedly before taking a deep breath as he turned around and back-kicked the gate, forcing a loud bang that was more audible than either of them had expected.

Naruto jumped back to Shikamaru's side in alarm as the two wondered just what the hell that could have been that magnified the sound of Naruto's kicks, but before they could start speculating the gates began to separate and pull open right in front of them.

What awaited them on the inside seemed like a village of its own, with fine traditional architecture and beautiful sights of both nature and manmade construction seeming to go hand in hand.

Of course, in order to get a better view of that they had to be able to look past the multitude of uniformed men with a multitude of weapons from clubs to well-forged spears, and even a broadsword or two. The uniforms were black pants, black sandals with greaves, and green and tan tunics with red flecks of flames throughout the outfit.

Both Naruto and Shikamaru shared a glance at the same time that more or less said, 'I'm not wearing that.'

The soldiers lined up in two lines, making something of a path for the two visiting shinobi to look down only to see the daimyo's attendant that had gone out to recruit them walking their way. Still dressed in his robes that were as extravagant as ever and seeming way too happy to have the job that he just so happened to be doing, he walked right towards Shikamaru through the lines of soldiers and shook both of their hands.

"I'm so pleased that you two made it here safely after such a long trip." The noble said, even more excited than ever now that he had Shikamaru and Naruto in front of him at the daimyo's palace instead of just relaying messages back and forth to Konoha, "I trust you two didn't have much trouble getting here?"

"Other than the monkeys in the mountains, no." Naruto admitted with a grin, finding the noble's attitude pretty upbeat and infectious, "It's good to be here… uh, I don't know your name." He admitted sheepishly.

"Oh!" The noble started laughing airily, enough so that it actually got Naruto to break out in a few laughs as well, amused at how the man himself was laughing, "I never introduced myself directly to you two. My apologies. My name is Nobuyuki and I am the director of the Guardian Ninja. All of your assignments will come down to you from me and I will be the one you should come to if you have any issues. Now follow along boys."

So he was basically the den mother to the lot of them. That sounded simple and straightforward enough.

With that, Nobuyuki began escorting Naruto and Shikamaru around, giving them a short tour of the massive property. The entire outdoors of the landscape had gorgeous running water and wooden bridges all throughout to go along with the well-made paths. Dozens of lords and ladies were seen walking about as close government workers of the daimyo's court.

He showed them the barracks and the operating grounds of the soldiers where around 3000 of similarly dressed warriors stayed, the quarters of the servants, the small district where the nobles lived, the many gardens and other aesthetic areas of the place meant for the daimyo's family's benefit and entertainment, and finally the main palace where the daimyo himself stayed with his relatives.

Shikamaru had to pull Naruto away from just gawking at the place as it was several stories off of the ground and seemed to have many bronze statues adorning the corners of the building's railings. Even the tile on the awnings looked incredibly expensive. It made him wonder what the inside looked like.

Eventually though, the pair of Konoha ninja were led to a huge four story building that was made in the same traditional manner as the other buildings in the daimyo's property only with dark brown wood making its outside instead of the lighter shades that comprised the others. The tiles on the roof were dark red and the yard around the house looked akin to a garden meant for mental tranquility and spiritual training.

"This is where you will be staying with the other members of the current Guardian Ninja." Nobuyuki said as he opened the two doors at the front for them all to go through, "The place is rather empty compared to the old days when it was twelve, but that was before my time heading up things here. With you two joining them that makes six, and I'm certain we will be up to full prominence once again soon."

As they walked into the front area, a large open room with wooden floors and rails for each floor of the building surrounding a slightly lowered dirt floor with equipment such as targets set off to the side to leave the vast majority of the floor open. More than likely for sparring.

But Nobuyuki's thoughts brought a question forth in Shikamaru's mind, "So you're not a Guardian Ninja yourself, are you Nobuyuki-san?"

"Oh heavens no!" Nobuyuki replied, a bit amused at the thought, "You lot are animals. Why, you would all tear me apart within the blink of an eye. You're all here because you have something special about you that sets you apart. You Nara-san with your intellect that is impressive even for your clan, and Uzumaki-san with his own special 'hidden power'." He said, covering his mouth with his sleeve, "You are both unique, and the daimyo will love the two of you once you get your first audience with him."

"That's if they get that far."

Everyone looked up at the high ceiling and saw a tall, somewhat muscular young man with brown hair that had a white streak in it wearing black monk's clothing and a small pair of sunglasses over his eyes. He was sitting cross-legged on the ceiling with his arms crossed, sticking to it with his chakra before he chose to drop down from the ground. The fall would have injured his legs had he not positioned himself to land towards a pillar. He slid down the length of the pillar and jumped off to land on the bottom floor in the dirt, standing straight up to dust his pants and robes off.

"Sadao-san!" Nobuyuki uttered, seemingly happy to see him, "Well as you can see, these two are to be your new comrades in the Guardian Ninja I hope you take care of them and help them along."

"No problem." Sadao said with a ghost of a smile as he looked over the pair of chunin that he had met not too long ago in Konoha, "But of course, you know they have to pass the test first."

Nobuyuki made an 'ah' noise of realization before stepping back behind the two as he made his way to the wooden floor behind the training ring area, "Of course. I almost forgot. Uzumaki-san, Shikamaru-san, if you do not pass this test of your combat skill you are to become regular soldiers in the daimyo's standing forces for the duration of your contract."

"What?" Naruto said in surprise.

Sadao just chuckled a bit, "Yep." He gestured to the white sash around his waist with the kanji for fire on it, "This means we're the best. The daimyo can't have just anyone protecting him and carrying out his will you know? But don't worry. If you screw it up and have to be a regular soldier you can keep on training to challenge us once every six months to see if you can pass and advance."

In his head, Shikamaru let out a loud groan. He knew it wouldn't be as easy as just showing up and getting the high paying, high ranking job. Of course he'd have to work his ass off again to get a troublesome job like this. The story of his life it seemed…

On the other hand, Naruto was not going to be a regular soldier under any circumstances. He was going to be the Hokage! He didn't leave Konoha and all of his friends behind just to wind up marching in rank in a stupid uniform. He was a ninja, not a commonplace kingdom's warrior.

"You can pick who you fight out of the four of the current members!" Nobuyuki added loudly from his place at the sidelines.

At that, Sadao made a noise of inhaling air sharply through his teeth, "Actually… they can't. The only ones here are me and… her. The other two are out on assignment, remember Nobuyuki-san? You sent them yesterday evening." He then put his fingers into his mouth and whistled loudly for someone else in the building, an echo streaming all throughout the halls, "Kotoko! I know you can hear me! Get your ass down here, it's time to work!"

It took a moment, but the sound of rapidly padding footsteps could be heard from the top floor of the Guardian Ninja building before the girl with the black hair in the ponytail and the dark green kimono with the brown and black floral patterns adorning it peered over the top railing, her eyes still squinted closed as if she were never trying to look at anything, "Work? But Shinya-kun and Akira-chan are already out…" She whined fitfully, "Whyyyy…"

"Kotoko… you forgot what was supposed to be happening this week didn't you? Friggin' airhead." Sadao deadpanned before pointing ahead at Naruto and Shikamaru who both stepped forward to look up towards her level in order to get a better sight of her, "The new kids? The ones we met in Konoha when Nobuyuki-san got their confirmation notices? They were showing up this week and someone had to stay back and test them."

Kotoko's eyes actually opened in surprise to reveal that they were actually colored dark yellow before they quickly shut again just as quickly as they opened and she got a huge grin on her face, "Oh, okay! One sec!" She chirped brightly before running out of sight again, once again with footsteps being heard all over the building.

Sadao sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, "Sorry about her, she's kind of…well I shouldn't say. Just know that she's strong enough to be here even though she acts like that. We can't make her stop so we learn to deal with it."

"The daimyo likes Suzukuro-san's attitude." Nobuyuki said cheerfully, "The soldiers all like her too. She's very friendly and rather popular in the capital city as well, I'm certain you both will get along with her."

At that moment she came rocketing out of one of the halls and over the railings, landing on a bit of a flourishing pose with her fingers in a 'v' over her eyes, "Ha, you two didn't die and you made it here after all! I'm so pleased to see you here!" She got a thoughtful look on her face and took the shamisen from her back and began randomly strumming notes, "I'm certain I can put a song together about this chance meeting between us all once more."

"It's not chance…" Sadao said with a twitching eye, "We knew they were coming. We've known for a month that they were coming. Get it together so we can do this right. Introduction time."

With that request, Kotoko put her instrument back onto her back and smoothed out her kimono and her Guardian's sash before smiling brightly at Naruto and Shikamaru again, bowing to them both before speaking, "Of course. The current no.3 Guardian Ninja, Suzukuro Kotoko, age sixteen. Otherwise known as 'Sangen no Kotoko (Kotoko of the Three Strings).'" She held her head up from her bow, still smiling all the while at the two, "Please take good care of me." Her voice positively sang with the request.

The sheer radiance of the girl's smile got Naruto to gulp a bit uncomfortably. And they'd have to fight this girl to test their battle skills? Naruto wasn't really sexist, but he didn't think he could hurt a girl like this. The women he had fought in the past started at 'tear his head off' and from there only leveled up in scariness. Kotoko wasn't like that at all.

But Shikamaru found her introduction fraught with its own dangers, 'This girl has an epithet? Crap…'

With Kotoko's introduction complete, Sadao stepped forward next for his own, "Current no.1 Guardian Ninja, Sadao. Just Sadao. Age nineteen. You should be well prepared for this, just a bit of a forewarning. This will be a one-on-one battle until enough has been seen of your skills. Uzumaki Naruto and Nara Shikamaru, select your opponent."

So it wouldn't be a team battle, it would be one-on-one. Both Naruto and Shikamaru looked at each other before shrugging and playing rock-paper-scissors which Naruto won. Celebrating with a fist pump before he and Shikamaru dropped their backpacks for the time being, Naruto pointed right at Sadao, "I choose you!"

"Aw…" Kotoko said dejectedly, "I don't get to fight with the miniature cutie… Shika-kun looks kind of boring." She eventually sighed and resigned herself to her fate of fighting Shikamaru, returning to her bright personality "Okay, in that case we're up first Shika-kun."

"Oh joy…" Shikamaru said sarcastically, stretching his shoulders out as Naruto moved back towards the wooden floor on the outside of the training ring area. Why did it have to be a woman? If he got his butt kicked Naruto would probably never let him forget it, but then again he was probably going to have to do all kinds of grunt work as a soldier, and he'd have to follow orders and whatnot… oh he was certainly not going to be a regular soldier if he could help it.

Nobuyuki cleared his throat and lifted his hand into the air within clear view of both combatants before shouting the indication to start fighting for both Shikamaru and Kotoko, "Begin!"

Never one to be the aggressor, Shikamaru watched intently as Kotoko placed a few small metal claws on her fingers. There was no way that they were weapons though. They couldn't have been able to hurt anyone unless they were poisoned, but she didn't look like the type. Still, they were ninja after all.

"Not gonna attack?" Kotoko said, still smiling all the while, "You're one of those kinds of people aren't you? Well that's okay." Her smile then turned very vicious and her eyes opened just enough to see what color they were, "I like guys like you that just stand still. It makes things so much easier."

Sadao just shook his head at hearing the gleeful tone of voice Kotoko was using. It didn't help that her sheer killing intent seemed to force the temperature of the room to feel like it had dropped five degrees, "Oh hell. She'd better not kill him. This is just supposed to be a test."

Kill him? Kotoko could and would kill Shikamaru? She didn't originally seem like the type at all. And then Naruto had to remember the fact that they were all ninja, and she had been a Ninja Guardian for years before this point.

So yes… she had killed people. Duh.

"Let's see how fast you can get yourself into gear dear!" Kotoko exclaimed, pulling her shamisen from her back and holding it as if she were going to play it, "Fuuton: Hasai no Kyouki (Wind Release: Shredding Madness)!" With a few plucks of the strings, Shikamaru had the instinct to duck down to the ground.

It was a good thing he did too, as over his head passed a light breeze, but as it flew towards the back of the ring and made contact with one of the pillars holding the upper floors up it left a slash marking in it at the same height where his neck would have been, the length of Kotoko's shamisen strings.

'Wind!' Shikamaru thought to himself, realizing that the breeze that passed him by could have sliced his head clean off in one move had he not dropped to the dirt, 'Oh man… why does Naruto have to be so lucky in rock-paper-scissors?' He would have the luck to get a long range fighter to have to deal with.

"You can't stay there either!" Kotoko singsonged as she took aim at her reluctant target once more.

Cursing to whatever God just so happened to stick him with this fight, Shikamaru heard the instrument playing again and saw the breeze passing over the ground from Kotoko, pushing dust aside as it moved towards him. With a mighty push he shoved himself up off of the ground and let this wind blade pass underneath him safely, 'Invisible wind blades… I really need a way to slow her attacking down so I can begin using my shadow.'

A pout made its way to Kotoko's face as she saw Shikamaru dodge her second attack and begin moving about the field, "You're really no fun Shika-kun. You've got to try harder than this or I'm gonna kill you, okay?"

The bright and cheery way she said that more or less told him that she probably wasn't kidding about that at all… and that was kind of creepy. Being told by someone with such a lovely voice that they were going to kill him with a smile on their face was a new experience that he didn't really like too much.

'I've got to get closer and keep her from using these attacks.' Shikamaru thought to himself as he drew some weaponry and threw them at Kotoko to draw her attention away from attacking him. Kotoko stopped playing and instead used the body of her instrument to block his shuriken barrage.

She lowered the thick body of the shamisen only to see not just one, but two Shikamarus running at her in a pincer motion after reaching both sides of her with his deceptive short-range speed, "You might be more fun than I first thought." In a flourishing whirling motion that sent her kimono spinning along with her, Kotoko took a seat on the ground seiza-style, "But don't think numbers mean anything to me!"

Her laughter began chiming out melodically as her pace of strumming became frantic and her wind control kicked up a dust storm around her that the two Shikamaru clones stopped outside of and avoided by moving away. Both Shikamarus took up the hand-seals for their signature jutsu and sent their shadows on in to find her, "Kagemane no Jutsu (Shadow Possession Jutsu)!"

"Odori o Tsubusu (Crush Dance)!"

From the cloud of dust Kotoko could be seen dancing her way out with footwork that was mostly concealed by her kimono as the pair of shadows were attempting to give chase, but she was not only keeping herself ahead of the pace of the shadows, she was able to stay out of the trail that the shadows already made.

Reaching one of the two Shikamarus her shamisen was suddenly brandished and smashed directly into his stomach in the middle of one of her spins. It was clearly a debilitating attack, if she had attacked the real Shikamaru of course, because this one vanished in a puff of smoke.

Kotoko stopped spinning suddenly as she slid across the ground, drawing her fingers along the strings of her shamisen again as she took aim at the last remaining Shikamaru on the field, "Your jutsu needs more diversity. It doesn't work when there's nowhere to hide and ambush me from! Kyouki no Eiyou Buyou (Dance of the Madness Hero)!" The small claws on her fingertips were radiating wind chakra as she began rapidly dragging them across the strings wildly.

"Duck." Sadou suggested in a dry tone of voice and both Naruto and Nobuyuki took his word for it as he also hit the deck the moment he realized which attack Kotoko was set on using, "I knew she'd go overboard…" He said as all three of them stayed behind the cover of the pillars that the wooden railings ran through to mark the border of the ring.

Nobuyuki nodded, keeping a hold of his tall hat of status on top of his head as small wind projectiles were whistling all over the place to the soundtrack of Kotoko's random strumming, "Yes. Suzukuro-san is not one for holding back in battle is she?"

"You've got to be kidding me!" Naruto exclaimed as he could see small holes being spiked in the very sturdy walls and wooden railings along with the pillars in multiple places in the room, "This girl is totally crazy! Shika's gonna die out there!"

"You're just now picking up on that kid?" Sadao said with an amused look on his sunglasses-clad face, "Kotoko's pretty bloodthirsty when she fights. You're lucky we were able to get her to tone it down as much as we did when she was outside of battle."

"What?" Naruto replied in the most intelligent manner he could muster.

Sadao nodded sagely and Nobuyuki continued shedding a little light on the situation, picking up where Sadao left off, "Yes, her clan is very sadistic. They take on the guises of people that can easily be inserted as people that don't attract much suspicion. Things like musicians, courtesans, cooks, all sorts of normal occupations. They would act like civilians, trained to be the most pleasant people you would ever want to meet, much like Suzukuro-san's peacetime demeanor, until they finally reached their target and then they would massacre them and anyone that stood in their way."

"They don't belong to any village traditionally." Sadao followed up in turn, "No Kage can trust them and no minor village leader can really keep them in check since they're notorious for taking missions to kill VIPs so they operate on their own as solo freelance workers for the most part once they come of age. Kotoko used to be kind of a sociopath before she was a Guardian Ninja, but she's fine now." Sadao noticed Naruto's skeptical silence and reneged on the matter, "Okay, she's still out of her mind. But at least we got her to keep it to just being during fights because if you were here four years ago... whew."

"How is she not ripping the walls apart with her jutsu?"

Nobuyuki let out a small laugh at Naruto naivety of how the building was constructed, "This entire area of the Guardian's Quarters can withstand the blasts of a chain of explosive tags. How else would training with ninjutsu be allowed indoors otherwise?" He tapped on the extremely durable pillar with one fist, "The small cut in the pillar Suzukuro-san made earlier is nothing more than a notch here, but it would completely cut through the trunk of a normal tree."

Wow. That was kind of cool. A finely honed blade of wind couldn't get any further than half an inch into the five foot thick pillar. Good to know that the place wouldn't be destroyed from training.

It wasn't cool for Shikamaru though. Poor bastard.

But he was hanging in there. The sporadic pattern of the wind projectiles coming from Kotoko's shamisen also came with the price of not being able to all hone in on him directly, probably the only thing saving him. At least until one got him right in the center of the chest with two more following up on him in the shoulder and hip respectively.

"Shikamaru!" Naruto exclaimed as he saw the wind begin to drill a shot into his best friend's chest. A best friend that then disappeared in a puff of smoke much to his surprise.

"Huh?" Kotoko had taken count of two Shikamarus and had already destroyed the clone of the two before nailing the other one with her latest jutsu, "What? But there were only two… or did I miscount?" She turned towards where the others were ducking for cover and called out, "Sadao-kun, there were only two right? Did you see more?" She asked, panting slightly from the amount of effort she had exerted thus far.

"No I didn't." Sadao said, poking his head out from behind the pillar now that the barrage had seemed to cease, "But then again I don't see anything… ever."

Kotoko stomped her foot on the soft dirt floor childishly at her turn of fortune, "Well where is he? I know I didn't miss one. There were two, I got them both, Shika-kun should have been in there somewhere. It's a fact."

Slowly, right in front of her face, an explosive tag was carefully and slowly lowered. Kotoko curiously poked at one of them, forcing it to twirl a bit on the ninja wire it was attached to before she noticed that there were several more attached to the same bit of wire. Without saying a word she casually turned to try and immediately move away from it.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

Kotoko looked up to find Shikamaru hanging from the ceiling, upside down with a hand in his pocket and another hand forming a hand-seal. A calm look was on his face as he peered down at his opponent and motioned for her to look around.

It became clear that there were dozens of lines of explosive tags hung in the same manner from the ceiling like the first one that had almost bumped into her face all over the ring area as if they were special charms of good luck.

"I used a ton of chakra on those two clones of mine and then you didn't even flinch when they came at you." Shikamaru started to say to explain his actions, "When my clones were caught up in the dust cloud I was there with them, but instead of jumping out to the side, I headed up one of the pillars to get out of your range to try and think of a way to handle you."

Kotoko puffed her cheeks out indignantly and shook a fist at the young man that was high above her, "You coward! How dare you deceive a lady, a fair maiden of the battlefield such as myself! Have you no shame Shika-kun?"

"Shame?" Shikamaru repeated, smirking for a moment, "I'm afraid I ran out of that when you almost cut my head off you troublesome woman."

A sigh of relief came over Naruto at seeing that Shikamaru had turned the tables in a major way. Kotoko was in the middle of the ring. She'd never make it out if she tried to make a break for it since all Shikamaru had to do was activate his chakra connection to the tags to remotely blow her straight to hell, "Iruka-sensei said my mind was scary… well Shika's mind is the scariest one I know."

Still on the ceiling, Shikamaru's features turned grave, "I can't beat you straight up and trying to trap you with my shadow leaves me a sitting duck for your wind in this ring we're in. So I just decided to trap the whole field. I'm lucky you're so crazy because while you thought you were killing the real me that gave me all the time I needed to prepare this trap and lower them all at once on you. Now give up or I'll make a total mess out of you. I already heard Nobuyuki-san say this place could take this much damage no problem."

"Hmm…" Kotoko said as if she were pondering her answer. However instead of giving the clear and obvious choice, she brandished her shamisen as she planned to still try and cut Shikamaru to ribbons from the floor even though she was surrounded, "I say no. I like playing with you Shika-kun… you're so hard to get. So let's play another little game called 'who can kill who first'. I still have one jutsu that you can't dodge from up there and I'll bet I can get it off before you take me out."

The two just stared at each other, with Shikamaru narrowing his eyes at the insane girl below him. Was she really testing him like this? Did she really think he wouldn't kill her?

"That's enough." Sadao said, taking the air right out of the tense atmosphere, "I've seen more than I need to see from Shikamaru. You can come down now kid, and Kotoko you're done. Don't try to kill him when he gets down here."

Shikamaru held his position for a moment before letting out a huge sigh and wiping his brow. He cut all of the strands of explosive tags down as he started walking his way down, "Oh thank Kami…" He muttered to himself, "Most of those were fakes. Nobody carries that many explosive tags at once." At least his con wasn't really called, "I can't believe she saw through the bluff."

"Bluff?" Kotoko repeated, tilting her head in a scatterbrained fashion as she continued to do nothing but smile with her eyes squinted closed, "Ara… you were bluffing? Aww, that's no fun. I thought you were serious." She said lightheartedly, "Hm, I kinda wanted to see what it was like to die. It's such a big mystery to me." She giggled before skipping past the explosive tags to take a spot next to Naruto who took a large step away from her.

This was the most dangerous kunoichi he had ever seen fight in his entire life. Not because she was powerful even though it was clear that she was, but because she was certifiably out of her mind. And not even in the good way, not even to say that she had a quirk. She was flat out insane. There wasn't anything quirky about it.

And final test permitting he would wind up working with this girl? He would be sleeping with his trusty machete under his pillow and his bed and body facing his door for the foreseeable future.

"You're next Naruto." Naruto's attention was returned to the current activities when Sadao called out to him from the now cleared sparring ring. His arms were once again crossed over his chest as he stood tall and imposing, seemingly dwarfing Naruto by a foot at his current height, "Get on out here and let's see what you've got."

Not needing to be told twice, Naruto hopped over the railing and stood across from Sadao in his fighting stance, prepared to throw down with his fellow (hopefully soon-to-be) Guardian Ninja, "You're messing with the future Hokage of Konohagakure no Sato here." He bragged with a grin as he adjusted his goggles on his forehead, "Just tell me when to go."

"Begin!" Nobuyuki cried out, marking the start of the fight.

Naruto wasted no time before charging directly at Sadao, however when he got within teen feet of him he felt something strange and immediately averted to the side with a mighty leap that forced him to bounce off of the pillars to charge at him from an unfamiliar angle.

But Sadao didn't even turn his head or even shift his body Naruto's way. Instead he still stood there with his arms crossed, still like a statue.

As Naruto hurtled through the air at him he shifted to a thrusting knee strike that was his flat out fastest and most sudden striking one-hit taijutsu attack, "Kakeyapakto (Flash Mallet)!" Even if Sadao could somehow block the attack, Naruto had been training chaining attacks extensively and it would only be the start of his ever-improving taijutsu barrage.

But Sadao didn't block the speedy attack being aimed at his head. Instead he slid skillfully out of its path and let Naruto fly clean past him. The diminutive blonde flew towards the pillar on the opposite side and shifted in the air to stick to the surface, narrowing his eyes at Sadao. Something was off. He could feel it.

Wordlessly, Naruto let off a pulse of his ever trusty sonar jutsu to see if everything was as it seemed and to assure himself that he hadn't fallen prey to a genjutsu. He indeed had not. And once again Sadao was simply standing there, "You'll have to try harder than that. I love how blunt that move was though. I could feel the sheer power behind it. Nice." He commented, still not looking Naruto's way once.

It was starting to grate on Naruto's nerves, as if he was so much further above him. The Konoha chunin was proud of his rank and his hard-earned strength that had gotten him this far, and yet Sadao sounded so nonchalant and patronizing. He wasn't even offering the courtesy of acknowledging him with a ready stance.

'Who does this guy think he is?' Naruto thought to himself, gritting his teeth angrily, 'I know what my next move's gonna be. And it'll knock him right on his smug ass.' Naruto stared at his open right hand and formed a tight fist of intent.

XxX

(Meanwhile – With Shikamaru)

From the sidelines, Shikamaru was watching until he noticed that Kotoko had made her way directly to his side. He kept a sharp eye on the perpetually smiling kunoichi, but she seemed to only wish for a companion to watch the ongoing fight with, "Oh you shouldn't worry about me anymore Shika-kun." Kotoko said in her normally sweet tone of voice. Kami help him, Shikamaru knew she was wacked out of her gourd but that voice could turn any man to jelly, "I would never attack a comrade with intent to kill. This goes against one of the two most cardinal rules that the Suzukuro Clan stands by… the only concrete rules we live by really. Never betray a contract with an employer under shame of suicide, and never attack one's comrades."

"You just now tried to kill me." Shikamaru pointed out with no little bit of accusation in his voice, "It wasn't even five minutes ago."

"Yes I did." Kotoko admitted shamelessly, "But you weren't my comrade five minutes ago. You more than likely are now."

Wow. Even though her reasoning had no real flaws in it, Shikamaru still didn't feel comfortable around this girl so he decided to change to subject, "So, why is Sadao not even looking at Naruto? I hope he doesn't think Naruto's weak or something." Actually he did, because everyone that had ever underestimated Naruto in battle wound up paying for it in the end.

"Of course not dear. We know that both of you are strong. Otherwise you wouldn't even be here." Kotoko said, shedding her airhead personality for a moment to provide a touch of insight, "This is just how Sadao-kun fights. He's not facing Naruto-kun because he doesn't have to. It wouldn't make a difference. It's just wasted effort to move his body that way as far as he's concerned."

"What are you talking about?" Shikamaru asked, "If he isn't facing Naruto then he can't see anything that Naruto does; if he's making hand-seals, if he's grabbing a weapon. Naruto could be doing anything in his blindspot."

Kotoko just shook her head in response, "It wouldn't make a difference… because Sadao-kun is blind."

XxX

(Naruto vs. Sadao)

Naruto jumped off of the pillar he had been sticking to with chakra and landed back in front of Sadao, taking a deep breath before pointing at the young man in front of him, "What are you doing? Fight already."

"This is your test, not mine." Sadao replied casually, "I've been here for eight years, I earned my spot before any of the current Guardian Ninja. I don't have anything to prove to you, but you've got something you need to prove to me. Now bring it runt, or you can just head for the normal soldiers' barracks now to get yourself outfitted."

"Outfit this!" Naruto said, sticking up his middle finger at Sadao and growling when he again got no response, "Fine!" Naruto shouted before sticking both of his hands into the loose dirt beneath him. It was just as deep as he thought it was. Without the dirt the floor would probably be a pit in the middle of the building. It reminded him almost of sand. That was perfect.

Naruto shoved his hands deep into the dirt floor and grit his teeth as he pumped chakra to his hands with a wind tint to it. He could feel the material around his hands begin to vibrate and he grabbed nothing but dirt as he twisted his hands and yanked up sharply, "Giga Shintou (Giga Impact)!"

With the sound of a low 'whump', the vacuum force of Naruto's jutsu was enough to affect the entire floor as he formed an entire sinkhole in the middle of the ring.

"You've got to be fucking kidding me!" Sadao said in pure disbelief as he could feel himself being drawn towards the center of the sinkhole from where he was standing, "That kind of raw power in someone's use of chakra is absurd! He isn't even using the Ky-!" Before he could finish, Sadao leaned his head out of the way of a trio of shuriken that had been thrown at his head by Naruto who had started standing.

If Sadao had vision, he would have been able to make out the clear as day sight of a full-on smirk on Naruto's lips. He had just shown the ingenuity to alter the form of this specific kind of battlefield with a nonconventional use of a niche ninjutsu.

XxX

(With Shikamaru – On the Sidelines)

"Wait." Shikamaru said with a raised eyebrow, trying to ignore the fact that Naruto had just effectively destroyed the floor of the room for a test, "If Sadao can't see, how did he dodge Naruto's attack like he could? There's no way his hearing could make out the sound of the metal over the sound of the sinkhole and his own yelling."

Kotoko made a thoughtful humming noise before deciding that it was alright to say it out loud to Shikamaru, "Well, it's all because of Sadao-kun's special jutsu. Keimoudama (Sphere of Enlightenment)." She pointed at Sadao and used her fingers to frame him up in a circle, "His self-taught ability to use his chakra to sense his surroundings is incredible. He always projects his chakra from his body and can feel anything that enters the sphere it creates. Depending on how much chakra he chooses to expel at one time he can feel things within fifteen feet of his body, or as far as one-hundred yards in all directions until something gets in its path."

That was kind of unbelievable in Shikamaru's opinion. Naruto could do it in singular bursts, but it took so much chakra to feel out farther and farther Naruto used it every so often in the field unless it was necessary, "That's got to take so much chakra. How does he have any left to fight with at the same time?" Sadao wasn't Naruto, he didn't have the Kyuubi so there was no way he could match Naruto's sheer chakra output.

"It does take a lot of chakra. But Sadao-kun has always been blind. He's been using this jutsu since he was five years old." Kotoko informed Shikamaru, shining some light on the longest tenured Guardian Ninja's background.

Shikamaru started looking at Sadao in a bit of an inspirational light.

Still, Kotoko continued, "He abuses it and had a lot of chakra exhaustion as a kid because he loved being able to feel the things around him, almost as if he could really see. He can't make out specific things like facial features or words that aren't carved into things, but other than that he's aware of everything around him. Even things through walls if he forced enough chakra out to a wall he was close to."

In Shikamaru's opinion, actually Kotoko sounded a bit remorseful at this, 'It sounds like a constant version of what Naruto can do, more like radar in all directions instead of Naruto's which would be like sonar in all directions.'

Noticing the look of understanding that began to surface on Shikamaru's face she kept talking, brightening up all the while, "All of the chakra he constantly expels… it started beefing up his own natural supply. A person's reserves of chakra happens to be like a muscle you know; the harder and more often you work it over time you'll build up more. He's got the most chakra out of anyone in our little group, and his control over it is just below that of a medic-nin. People say it's unnatural to have both to that extent."

'If this guy can feel in every direction for one-hundred yards max then just using enough chakra to feel around in this room for Naruto is nothing to him.' Shikamaru thought to himself, 'Even constantly using chakra like he is, he's got to have more than enough chakra to fight with.'

So these people with their own unique fighting abilities and traits were the Ninja Guardians? And they had only met two of them. Shikamaru could only wonder what the other two were like.

XxX

(Naruto vs. Sadao)

The two combatants faced off while using their chakra to stay attached to the pillars of the sparring ring area.

In his mind, Sadao had already made his decision on Naruto's membership in the Ninja Guardians. He was certain that Kotoko had as well. Even Nobuyuki with his complete lack of knowledge of the ninja arts and the lifestyle of the warrior had to know that they had two very special recruits in Naruto and Shikamaru.

Still, he didn't want to stop just yet. With his long-standing, well-trained sensing ability from this range he could feel the chakra burning in the pit of Naruto's gut like a raging inferno and it was exciting. It was like a flame trying to draw a moth to it. The moth had to know that the fire was dangerous, but its light was so enticing it simply couldn't stop. It had to play around it despite the danger.

And he wanted to see what this kid five years his junior had to offer for himself.

'Let's see how he deals with an attack in a situation like this.' Sadao thought to himself. Both of them were sticking to the pillars instead of standing on the ground due to the sinkhole spinning and sucking sand around and down below them on the floor. This made attacking and dodging all the more perilous now.

Sadao began darting from pillar to pillar to try and reach Naruto's while his opponent did the same brazenly, with the two meeting in a clash of kicks on one pillar, with Naruto having the high ground and Sadao having the low. The two began to battle it out hand-to-hand standing vertically on their support column as if it were flat ground.

Each punch that Naruto threw, when they would hit Sadao's arms past the sleeves of his monk's robes would begin to stick to his arm, only for him to twist the grip around and hold onto Naruto's wrists. Had he himself not been so well-versed in how to escape being grabbed by way of training his own style he would have been in trouble.

Still Sadao's style was strange. He barely moved from where he was standing more often than not, only taking strong steps forward up the pillar to accentuate the fact that Naruto did not hold a strength advantage in this situation.

But it wasn't like Naruto could even get around him because they were standing vertically on a pillar. It was either fight on the ground with the sinkhole or keep fighting on the pillar that didn't have any space to maneuver around.

And Naruto decided to tackle this problem the way he did most things when left to his own devices; he took it head-on. Just not in the conventional way.

Backing off from the melee, Naruto turned tail and headed directly up the pillar to the upper floors of the building and much as he had expected and had been counting on, Sadao did not follow him up, instead choosing to remain in his same position. Once he felt he was high enough, Naruto jumped forward (upward for those not paying attention) and then started falling back down directly towards his enemy.

Sadao didn't know what Naruto was doing at first until he started descending from the air, 'Holy crap, he was just trying to gain momentum to go right through me!' He crossed his arms in front of his head and chest as Naruto dove towards him leading with his knee much like his initial attack.

He wasn't fast enough to dodge and Naruto smashed directly into him, "Kakeyapakto (Flash Mallet)!" The attack sent them both slamming into the soft ground and down into the sinkhole that swallowed them up. Apparently this seemed to satisfy the constantly shifting dirt that seemed to stop once it had taken them both.

"Damn!" Shikamaru witnessed this and was prepared to run out there to try and dig Naruto out, but Kotoko held his shoulder and shook her head, letting him know that it was alright.

It took a moment, but the dirt began to move and Sadao clawed his way out, taking a big breath of air as he got up and shook the dirt out of his robes, "Kami! Who fights like that?"

For Naruto it took a bit longer, but a head of spiky blonde hair popped out and dragged himself out of the ground before reaching back down and pulling out another Naruto, who pulled out another, and another, and another until the original reached the surface again, allowing the others to dispel now that their job was complete. Still in combat mode, Naruto stood up and wiped the dirt from his face as he prepared to charge again.

"Stop." Sadao said, holding a hand up towards Naruto, "That's enough. I've seen all I need to see." He then chuckled at his own little inside joke about seeing. Naruto did not because he was unaware of Sadao's blindness.

Instead, Naruto's jaw dropped in disbelief, "You want to stop now? Come on! I was starting to win that fight! You just don't want to get your ass kicked by a thirteen year old kid!"

A snorting laugh came from Sadao as he emptied dirt from one of the sleeves of his monk's clothing and shook the dirt out of his brown, white-streaked hair, "You can't kick my ass even if we keep going. Just take this for what it was. It's over." He said, waving him off before taking the same stoic emotion he had before the fight had ever started.

Still, Naruto wasn't having any of that. He was still ready to go.

"If you want me to stop you'd better give me a reason." Naruto said, and almost on cue it became clear as to why Naruto was unwilling to stop fighting at that moment. Not only had he made clones to dig himself out of the dirt, he had scattered clones that had dug through the soft material to get within striking range of Sadao and they all sprang from the ground like creatures of the earth directly at him, "Because right now I say I just caught you in checkmate!"

"This isn't even a warning for check. I felt them the entire time." Sadao responded coldly, not amused by this in any way, shape, or manner. His fingers quickly formed the dragon and tiger hand-seals before he exhaled sharply, "Katon: Hikeimoudama (Fire Release: Enlightened Sphere of Flames)!"

From directly around Sadao's body, a sphere of fire erupted, causing Naruto's clones to stop their attack before they wound up getting scorched and destroyed. So it was a defensive jutsu meant to keep people from touching him directly was it?

No, it wasn't.

Sadao noticed that nothing was hitting his field of fire and realized that the clones smartly stopped short and were preparing to pelt him with weaponry instead of charging him. That was smart. But they were too close. Instead of the steady breathing he was doing he exhaled and shouted and a sudden shockwave of heat and fire blasted out in all directions around him.

Every clone was caught in the blast and dispelled. Naruto had a clear view of what was happening and coming for him and he quickly escaped the ring and dove behind a pillar to avoid being burned similarly.

Even Kotoko, Shikamaru, and Nobuyuki had covered themselves with a pillar… though Shikamaru had hidden himself behind the same pillar as Kotoko and found himself in a very compromising situation, with his face right in her breasts. She seemed to be extremely amused by it though, "Fufufufu… my Shika-kun, how forward of you. I knew you were more fun than you looked at first."

Of course she was also insane, so this could have just been a preamble to her decapitating him for all he knew, no matter how charming she sounded.

Shikamaru had never jumped away from anyone so quickly in his entire life, red-faced and all, "S-Shut up… you troublesome woman." Troublesome or not, for seven seconds it was a good time to be Nara Shikamaru and he knew this.

Instead of focusing on the stubborn thoughts of the situation that he would from then onwards dub 'marshmallow heaven' for his own budding libido's safety, he preoccupied himself with noticing that the wood that comprised the pillars, rails, and floors were not on fire and burning them all alive at the moment. It was that fire retardant as well? That must have been some expensive wood. It was superheated from the flames and the scorching heat that had just flown from Sadao though.

Speaking of Sadao, he simply had a scowl on his face that had him glaring at Naruto who was peeking out from behind the pillar he had taken refuge behind, "I said stop. We're done. There might not be any leaders amongst us all, and seniority doesn't mean anything, but when something is over it's over. And don't think just because you've got a biju stuck in you that I won't rip your spine out through your asshole. A jinchuuriki is still a human." Naruto just nodded dumbly and came out from behind the pillar.

Sadao had that jutsu the entire time and didn't use it until right then? That was rather disheartening to think about. And apparently even the thought of the Kyuubi's chakra didn't give him pause? Maybe because he hadn't faced it yet, but even so… it wasn't best to rock the boat, especially when he was in the wrong in the first place.

"So…" Naruto said, looking around aimlessly as he tried to distance himself from the almost severe moment from seconds prior, "Do we pass?"

Kotoko and Sadao looked at each other before the girl with the permanently closed eyes tilted her head, still smiling like always. Sadao simply shrugged in return, getting her to squeal in delight as she seemed to receive that as him accepting them both, "Yes! More comrades! The Guardian Ninja are up to six!" She grabbed Nobuyuki and tried dancing with the man, "Go ahead and order two more sashes to be made Nobuyuki-san!"

A grinning Naruto ran up to Shikamaru and popped him in the shoulder in a celebratory as the two shared a grin and a smirk respectively. Before they could really let the achievement sink in, Sadao walked up to the pair of them and stood over them with a stern look on his face as he cut his hand with a kunai and let it bleed for them to see, "Do you two swear by the blood in your bodies and on pain of death to protect the daimyo of Hi no Kuni and his interests with all of your strength for the duration of your time here, without refusal no matter the mission issued to you?"

Naruto drew his machete and cut the palm of his hand shallowly to draw blood and let it run onto the ground. Shikamaru drew a kunai and did the same, both giving him a stiff nod.

The blind ninja seemed to stare them both down despite his lack of vision before nodding in satisfaction and turning to leave, "Good. Now clean that up and I'll show you where you're staying. Welcome to the Guardian Ninja Nara Shikamaru; Guardian no.5, and Uzumaki Naruto; Guardian no.6." He turned and began walking away from the two to get them to follow once Naruto made a clone to clean the blood off of the floor,

"You two should get yourselves settled in quickly so you can rest." Nobuyuki advised from the front door as the daimyo's attendant prepared to leave to return to his own quarters inside of the main palace, "As members of the Ninja Guardians you will start regulated training with them to determine the state of your conditioning. I will see you all within a few days time to inform you of your audience with the daimyo."

The door closed to the large building and Naruto and Shikamaru followed to be shown around the premises that would be their new home for the next three years.

XxX

(Later That Evening – Guardian Ninja Building – Naruto's Quarters)

It took an hour to be shown everything in the place such as the kitchen and dining area, the recreation room, the other staying places of the other Guardians, and the armory. The floor layout was first floor: armory and training area where the fights had taken place earlier, second floor: kitchen, dining room, massive pantry (that was stocked with instant ramen much to Naruto's delight and Shikamaru's chagrin), third and fourth floors were the living areas of the guardians.

There were twelve separate living areas, one for each guardian, that was roughly the size of Naruto's one-bedroom apartment. From getting a look at Shikamaru's room that was selected first it was broken down into a living room, a bathroom, and a bedroom.

He wished he had more decorative stuff to put around the place, but that would come in time Naruto surmised as he opened the door to his particular residence that he was assigned and entered, shutting the door behind him before he turned around and almost had a heart attack at what he found waiting on him, "AAAAHHH!"

"Quiet down brat. You're making a racket."

Perhaps the term 'who' would have been more appropriate on what was waiting on him.

Or maybe three different uses of the word who?

"Oink."

…Make that four.

Since Jiraiya and Tsunade sat around in two of the chairs in Naruto's new living room drinking while Shizune puttered around the home with Tonton following along trying to make sure things were straightened up since the Guardian Ninja didn't get servants to keep things spotless for them and dust had settled over a right many things.

"What the hell are all of you doing here?" Naruto demanded to know, pointing a shaky finger of accusation at the adults in the room as Shizune stopped once Naruto had done his initial yell of surprise, "Tsunade-baachan I thought you were in Konoha! What's going on? How'd you get in here?"

Jiraiya just smirked at Naruto and held up a saucer, "Kid, the daimyo loves me. He'd recommend me Hokage if I had the ambition to actually do it. All I had to do was tell him that I wanted to wait here for you since everyone knew you and your friend were coming and they let me into the room they were going to assign you when word spread that you were here. It took forever by the way. What took so long?"

"The monkeys in the mountains are bastards…" Naruto said cautiously as he carefully treaded into the room and set his filled pack to the ground. He'd unpack later, "What is Tsunade-baachan doing here?"

The aforementioned Tsunade let off a rather unladylike snort and downed the alcohol in her saucer, a sake-induced blush on her face. She must have been at it drinking in there for quite a while, "I told you that I was only staying in Konoha until I got my money from Sarutobi-sensei. When he paid me and when I found out that Jiraiya would be heading up here to make sure you settled in properly I decided I'd leave with him."

Jiraiya chuckled as he refilled his saucer and Naruto took a seat on the floor on front of them since all of the chairs were taken, "Yep. Tsunade-hime cared so much she had to see her little blonde bundle off for his first day, just like a mother at school." He let out a few laughs until he heard Tsunade cracking her knuckles, getting him to stop instantly, "I'll be good."

"It was just on the way." Tsunade asserted gruffly, "Now that we can see the brat's here and he's fine Shizune, Tonton, and I are going to be on our way at first notice-."

"-But she'll be right back here at first summons because Tsunade-hime agreed to be the lead physician of the Fire Daimyo's court." Jiraiya blurted out, grinning roguishly when he saw Tsunade's head snap towards him with a glare, "So she can't go too far from the capital because who knows when her services will be needed? As a matter of fact I'd say she can only go really as far as her feet can carry her within two or three days…"

Which was a subtle way of saying that the distance to Konoha or the coast for a vacation was her limit.

"The money was so good though." Tsunade said, almost gushing over how much she would be getting paid for what she felt would be little to no work, "I mean just how sick or hurt could a bunch of straight-laced, neat-freak nobles get? The most dangerous thing that happens behind these walls are arguments between nobles. And with all the money I'm being paid I can gamble forever!" She started cackling madly until Jiraiya shook her shoulder and got her to stop.

Once Tsunade composed herself, Naruto just stared at every adult in the room with a deadpan look on his face, "Uh huh…" He said, glibly reaching for his backpack to fish out a pack of cigarettes, "Well I guess that makes sense." He said, about to stick a cigarette in his mouth until he noticed Tsunade glaring at him, "What?"

"Are you telling me you're really trying to smoke in front of me?"

"Yeah? So what?" Naruto replied, but when Tsunade's glare didn't relent, Naruto sighed and spit the cigarette out and back into the pack, 'Later.' He promised himself mentally, "So you guys waited here for me all day?"

Jiraiya nodded, "I wish you had been just one day later. That way I could try to convince Tsunade-hime to help me test out your bed in the fun wa-." He was cut off when Tsunade slapped him in the head with Naruto's heavy backpack and knocked him down the small hallway into Naruto's bedroom with a resounding crash.

She handed Naruto back his pack and he instantly opened it to see if she had broken anything inside while also choosing to take Jiraiya's previous seat while he was busy diagnosing himself with a concussion.

Everyone in the room started casually conversing over nothing of great importance at that point, not really caring about the white-haired pervert's well-being for the most part until Jiraiya walked back in holding his head with a bloody nose caused by physical trauma.

Jiraiya stood over Naruto waiting for him to get out of his seat but when he caught another glare from Tsunade he simply let the kid be, not wanting to risk his health by getting hit from the slug princess twice within the span of five minutes. Stupid brat… how'd he even get halfway on her good side, "So, how's the Rasengan going?" He asked, "I don't expect you to get it that fast. It took Minato three years to get it down himself from scratch-."

While Jiraiya was talking, Naruto pulled out a rubber ball from his bag and tossed it in his hand before a few seconds of intense focus forced it to explode from the force of his chakra. Naruto picked the remnants of the ball from his hand and grinned sheepishly at Shizune's pout over the mess he had just made on the floor, "Sorry… I'll clean it up myself."

Instead of showing disbelief over what Naruto had just done, Jiraiya jut fist pumped and broke into something of a victory dance in front of everyone, "Oh yes, I'm the best fucking teacher that ever lived! I knew I had the right idea not trying to teach you that first!"

"What are you on about now you goat?" Tsunade asked with a raised eyebrow at his sudden outburst. It was weird even for him. But to hear that he was teaching Naruto Rasengan? She bit her tongue on the matter since for some reason Jiraiya seemed ecstatic about what was going on.

Jiraiya laughed victoriously before yanking Naruto out of the chair by the collar of his top, getting an indignant 'hey' out of the boy, "The second step of learning the Rasengan is harder than many other training steps so I had him work on his inner strength and discipline first before I chose to test it-."

"-By making me climb a cliff with one hand." Naruto interjected, getting a rough shake from Jiraiya for his trouble, telling him to shush up as it was his moment to gloat and explain his thought process.

"Oh shut up. It helped didn't it?" Jiraiya replied in turn, "So now you just have to put step one and two together adding rotation of the first step to the power of the second step."

Naruto nodded before his eyes widened, "Wait, I've got to start training tomorrow for some rite of passage jutsu I've got to see if I can learn for the Guardians. Who knows how long that'll take?"

Jiraiya simply dropped Naruto back into the chair now that he was done with him, "Don't you worry about that. I've seen you train with those clones of yours. Trust me, use a few dozen clones for Rasengan like you've been doing and show up in person for your training. They just want to make sure that you're up to snuff so that you don't die in the field on your first mission for them."

"I'm not that much weaker than them am I?" Naruto asked, not getting a vocal answer from anyone, getting him to hang his head.

"Either way…" Jiraiya then picked up where he left off from, "For the time being until you prove that you're ready for action I want you to use clones to train Rasengan and I want you to show up in person to work the Guardian training. Doing both can only get you stronger faster."

Naruto looked at Jiraiya like he was crazy, "That sounds hard."

An evil grin came over Jiraiya's face as he rested a hand on Naruto's head, "Oh it will be. Did you think this would be a cakewalk? You're in an elite unit of ninja that go on nothing but the most treacherous of missions for your statehood and in three years you're going to have to be ready to fight the best of the best or die a miserable death. This is the easy part. I'll be here for a week and then I've got to get to work dredging up info on your Akatsuki problem but when I come back I don't care how beat up you are, I want progress or I'll force some progress into you."

The look of horror on Naruto's face as he realized the brevity of the fact that if he didn't keep up he was going to die a horrible death miles away from everyone he loved actually got Shizune and Tsunade to have to hold back some laughter at his expense. That was a rather dark concept. But for once Jiraiya's attempts to ham it up seemed to be entertaining.

"You're gonna bleed son." Still palming Naruto's head like a ball, Jiraiya lifted him off of the ground to hold his ear closer to him where he could hiss menacingly, "You've gotta love the pain… you've gotta love it. Love. It. Pain means you're alive. You like being alive don't you?" Naruto would have nodded if he could move his head, but he was unable to do so, "Then pain is your friend."

Now that Naruto was sufficiently good and scared, Jiraiya shifted his grasp on Naruto to hold him like a javelin and threw him down the hall into his room at his bed, "Now sleep! And rise again tomorrow to bring great pride and honor to your incomparable master; the great Jiraiya-sama!" He bellowed as he threw Naruto's pack into the room with him and shut the door, "…Good luck brat." He said quietly after doing so.

With his little performance over, Jiraiya sighed and walked back out to the living area where Tsunade was still waiting with her apprentice and pet pig as she watched him head towards the door, "I'll keep an eye on him. Just don't stay away too long perving on the women of the world." She said in a confident manner.

"Sure." Jiraiya said with a modest smile as he opened the door to leave, "After all, we all know that the only thing that can tear me away from my research on international ladies is the chance at research on you. Especially now since I know where I can find you Tsunade-hime." He witnessed Tsunade pick up one of Naruto's couches with one hand and bolted from the apartment before she could use it on him.

Knowing that after he got his head start she would wind up tearing half of the daimyo's property apart if she were really dedicated to catching Jiraiya, Tsunade set the couch down with a thump and stood up to leave Naruto to his own devices as well, "Come on Shizune. Let's find our own room we'll use whenever we stay here."

"So we're not staying in Konoha, but we're staying here?" Shizune said, questioning the entire reasoning behind leaving Konoha if they were just going to go to the capital.

"We're not staying here either." Tsunade corrected as they left Naruto's room and began walking down the halls to find her way out of the Guardian Ninja Building and over to the main palace of the daimyo where she would be staying as such an important person, "We're not standing doctors meant to treat every boo-boo that comes up. We're meant to be summoned when the existing medical staff can't handle what's going on already. It's just so we have a reason to keep an eye on the kid. I told Jiraiya I would when he wasn't around."

Shizune chose not to mention the fact that Tsunade had accepted the offer to work as a doctor in special cases before Jiraiya had ever asked her to keep an eye on Naruto at all, 'Then again… Naruto was sort of the reason that she returned to Konoha for even as long as she did.'

While she would never hear her mistress say it aloud, that was the reason she had gone back as throughout their stay over the last few months Tsunade had never brought up the point of payment for her previous services until others had addressed the fact that she was still in the village.

And now they were at the capital as well. What a coincidence.

Shizune let out a sigh before an exasperated smile came over her face and she started laughing nervously, 'Well at least we're still in Hi no Kuni… and hey, at least I can slip back to Konoha when I get permission from Tsunade-sama to see my friends.' And maybe she could get Tsunade to come along with her too.

Either way, if the migration patterns of one Uzumaki Naruto held Tsunade's interest it would at least let them establish a few roots for the first time in countless years. She also had to admit that the boy was very interesting. It would be kind of fun to see what he would be within three years time.

Omake: Training Day 9

Meanwhile while Naruto and Shikamaru were getting into their stride as members of the Guardian Ninja, in Konoha as time dragged on and the days turned to months it actually started going slower for one particular shinobi than others, and it wasn't just because of his valuable eyes that could see things happen in slow motion.

Sasuke sat on one of the three stumps that adorned the training ground that Team 7 used regularly with his travel pack on his back all ready to go at a moment's notice. His hands linked in his normally broody manner while his teammates, his sensei, and his supervisor all looked at him trying to let what he had just told them sink in.

What he had told them was stunning to say the least and the first one to regain their composure was the ever-stoic and levelheaded Kakashi, "Sasuke… if you wanted to learn how to summon you could have come to me."

Sasuke simply shook his head in the negative, "You didn't teach me that jutsu for a reason Kakashi." He said, explaining his reasoning for his soon-to-be actions, "Anko too. It's because I'm not compatible with her snakes and you raised your ninken… they just aren't for me."

"Well at least he knows that much without needing to be told." Anko replied, her arms crossed over her ample trenchcoat and mesh covered bosom, "You know what, I say go for it. It can't be any more dangerous than the stuff I make you do during my missions I make you go on with me."

She got a small sadistic measure of satisfaction out of the fact that Sasuke involuntarily shivered as if he could feel the wind whistle of a would-be life ending kunai whizzing past his ear.

Chouji meanwhile, had a headache from this whole thing and pulled out a bag of barbecue chips to settle his brain down from pounding against his skull at the news that had been dropped on them, "So let me just get all of this straight." He said before munching on a few chips, "The weird guy that writes those books that Kakashi-sensei reads-."

"-Jiraiya-sama." Kakashi supplied helpfully with an eye-smile, always happy to pass down knowledge of his favored author to potential readers.

"Right." Chouji then picked up where he had left off from, "-Is also Naruto's sensei… who is actually really strong and taught him how to summon, and he gave you the hand-seals for the jutsu too, but not a contract like he did for Naruto." Sasuke nodded stiffly as his rotund teammate had things correct so far, "So you're about to just use the jutsu right now anyway, because when you don't have a contract and you summon you're taken to the home of the creatures that you're best suited to have a contract with?"

Raising an eyebrow, Sasuke nodded again. The way Chouji put it he made it sound like what he was about to do was completely idiotic. Granted it was kind of dangerous, but the payoff in the end could and most definitely would be well worth the risk.

"This is crazy." Sakura spoke up, taking a step forward to try and appeal to Sasuke sense of reason, "Who knows where you'll end up? How will you get home all by yourself?"

The thing about it was though, that Sasuke's sense of reason took a cardinal backseat to his overwhelming sense of confidence in himself in the face of odds that hadn't already proven themselves to be insurmountable to his skills. In other words; if it hadn't already been shown that what he wanted to do was impossible for people that were far stronger than himself he would believe that it was within his potential to accomplish.

Things like overcoming certain foes… namely his older brother, but that was another story altogether. This would help with that. It was the entire reason he was set on doing it.

"I don't care if it's crazy or not Sakura." Sasuke said, choosing at that point to hop down off of the stump to stand as tall as he could as a thirteen year old boy with two adults in the vicinity, "It's not even like this is the most insane thing that someone can do to get stronger. It's been done all the time."

Jiraiya did it, and more than likely countless other shinobi with summon contracts did it. Sasuke even did a little digging around the village and found that Maito Gai, the strange man in the green jumpsuit, did the same thing he was about to do and wound up with a contract for summoning a tortoise.

He certainly hoped that his summon animal would be more… attuned to battle.

But that would mean that Jiraiya's warning would hold greater importance depending on the natural temperament of the summon creature.

Eventually Kakashi came to understand that even though Sasuke was still young, he technically wasn't under his command any longer as a chunin as he only was Kakashi's subordinate during missions that he ran with Team 7. It wasn't like Anko whom was assigned to handle Sasuke and steer him away from the Cursed Seal.

"If this is what you feel like you have to do…" Kakashi said, finally relenting his mother hen stance on the matter, "…Then go ahead. But just be careful. You have no idea what kind of situation this jutsu could put you in." He advised.

As much as it made him want to bite at his fingernails, these younger ninja had to learn how to develop themselves on their own, and at least Sasuke was showing the ambition to do so, refusing to rest on his laurels as a chunin.

"I will. I'll be ready for anything." Sasuke assured his primary sensei with a confident smile, "Honestly… I just decided to tell all of you this out of common courtesy. I was going to do it whether you wanted me to or not. I already cleared it with Hokage-sama."

Anko's jaw dropped before she glared at Sasuke, "You cheeky brat. You went around behind my back? Whatever happened to respecting my authority?"

"You don't have any authority you crazy bi-!" Sasuke almost finished blurting out the ill-advised curse but held back in favor for turning to Chouji and Sakura, "You two had better keep training. I don't want to have to carry you two as the only chunin out of the three of us for much longer." That was his subtle way of saying that he hoped if his summoning attempt took him a few months to return from they would be strong enough to pass the chunin exams the next time around without him trying to push them.

Chouji grinned widely and extended his hand to his Uchiha teammate, "I guess I can do that. Good luck Sasuke." He then realized that his hand was covered in chip dust and he brushed it off on his pants before extending his hand again which Sasuke actually shook this time.

As Sasuke took the time to turn to Sakura he just stared at her impassively as she looked unsure of what to do. Well he couldn't just let her suffer on the vine like that and he decided to suck it up and take one for the team in a literal manner. He sighed and rolled his eyes, "Go ahead Sakura…"

Her eyes lit up and she walked forward with a beaming smile to wrap her arms around Sasuke's neck in a hug that his image wouldn't allow him to even consider returning. In fact he looked downright miserable, especially since Anko was snickering at him and he was quite certain that Kakashi was getting a kick out of his misfortune as well.

"…Let go now Sakura." Sasuke directed, and she did so albeit reluctantly, returning Sasuke's much valued personal space to him. With nothing really left to say, Sasuke just shrugged his shoulders and bit his finger to draw blood before quickly making the necessary hand-seals, sticking on the last one for long enough to take a good, hard, deep thought about what he was about to do, "Well… later." He said before slamming his palm directly onto the ground, "Kuchiyose no Jutsu (Summoning Jutsu)!"

And just like that he disappeared in a puff of smoke and vanished from that spot.

Anko let out a sigh as the smoke dissipated and shook her head, "Oh, who am I going to torment on a daily basis now?"

She slowly turned her gaze toward the remaining members of Team 7 only for Kakashi to pick both Sakura and Chouji up and shield them with his back, "No." He said firmly, getting Anko's head to sag.

Elsewhere out of sight and keeping himself concealed, Kabuto appeared from the ground behind a tree with a sharp look in his eyes at what he had just borne witness to, "…Orochimaru-sama will not be pleased with this." He muttered to himself before choosing to make himself scarce for the time being as he wasn't set to train Sakura or Ino that day in their medic-nin studies.

Hopefully he wouldn't have to give any status reports to Orochimaru until Sasuke returned, as he didn't want to be the unfortunate messenger to break the news of his master's next prospective body up and vanishing to who knew where. It damn sure wasn't going to be him. Let the grunts die from Orochimaru's rage for all he cared.

XxX

(Unknown Location)

Not willing to take any chances, immediately upon appearing in his new location, Sasuke was standing in a stance with his Sharingan active, allowing him to be ready to at least have a fighting chance of defending himself if he had thrown himself face-to-face into the den of some treacherous beast.

But no immediate attack came, and Sasuke settled down enough to look around and get a feel for his location.

He seemed to be in some kind of mountainous valley, right on some ledge that overlooked a deep river below that did not look friendly for humans in the least. As a matter of fact nothing about this place looked friendly to humans in the least.

So where were the creatures that were supposed to be here?

Below Sasuke in the river far below he heard a splash over the sound of the rapids and saw a fish that was his size leap out of the water twenty feet into the air. His eye twitched at first as if his summoning creature attuned to him happened to be fresh water fish, no matter how big, he would be pissed off beyond all belief.

But at that exact second a mammoth shadow, many times larger than Sasuke himself passed by him at an absurd speed, diving down toward the water. With his Sharingan active, Sasuke stood witness to the largest bird of prey he had ever seen swooping down to snatch the human adult sized fish right out of the air, skidding across the water before flying back up into the sky towards one of the many high peaks in the area.

Hawks…

Hawks that were at least four times his size.

There was some good news though. They were perfect match for him, with eyes just as sharp as his, speed that was absolutely murderous, and they could fly. That was the clincher right there.

His eyes panned upwards towards all of the high mountain peaks and he selected the one that was the highest. If he was going to be doing this he needed to know where the big boss of the hawks more or less would have been so that he could get this over with and done.

He'd get up there and establish a contract or die trying.

And as he heard the deafening, ear-piercing cry from the skies past the clouds that the mountain peaks pushed past them hawks of all kinds of sizes scattered in fear of the noise. Sasuke then concluded that the 'die trying' part was a very definite possibility.

Jutsu List

Fuuton: Hasai no Kyouki (Wind Release: Shredding Madness). B-rank ninjutsu, offensive, mid-to-long range. The user will force out a horizontal wave of invisible wind that flies at the enemy swiftly. It is very deadly due to the difficulty to anticipate the wind blade and has a high killing potential for a ninjutsu.

Odori o Tsubusu (Crush Dance). Taijutsu, fighting style, short range. This is Suzukuro Kotoko's method of defending herself whenever her enemies get past her ranged attacks and get close to her. Using nimble and athletic twists and spins that take advantage of her flexibility and the concealing ability of her kimono sleeves she will avoid the attacks of her opponents and get her distance or either lash out with her weaponized shamisen. The technique is named as such because of the graceful motions that look like dancing and from the at times lethal attacks from the hard body of her instrument that can break bones with the force of the attack.

Kyouki no Eiyou Buyou (Dance of the Madness Hero). A-rank ninjutsu, offensive, mid-to-long range. A very wild and reckless attack by nature. The user will strum the strings of the shamisen wildly with little rhythm or aim, sacrificing this for the sheer quantity of dart-sized drilling air projectiles that can be fired. The unpredictable swaying flight pattern of the jutsu can result in the injury of the user's comrades, but it can also be used against multiple enemies in combat or as a wide-area jutsu.

Keimoudama (Sphere of Enlightenment). Supplementary ninjutsu, all ranges. The user produces a constant flow of chakra from every tenketsu in their body, varying in intensity depending on how much chakra they wish to use and the distance that they wish to sense their surroundings. It is in essence a more complex and complete version of the Chakura Hankyouteii no Jutsu (Chakra Echolocation Jutsu), however it requires not only a massive amount of chakra, but also near perfect chakra control so that the user does not exhaust themselves within a short amount of time of activating the technique. The difficulty of the jutsu's control and the amount of chakra one must build up in order to effectively use this jutsu makes it exceedingly difficult to master, taking around a decade of rigid training to eventually keep active for long lengths of time. Sadao of the Ninja Guardians uses this jutsu as a replacement for his eyesight.

Katon: Hikeimoudama (Fire Release: Enlightened Sphere of Flames). A-rank ninjutsu, offensive, close range. Follows the principle of Keimoudama (Sphere of Enlightenment) but allows it to serve a purpose in battle with the use of nature transformation, in this case of the fire release variety. Like the necessary prerequisite jutsu one will expel a layer of chakra from one's body, but instead of a dense, full amount it is a hollow layer that can extend outward and retract, controlled by the inhalation and exhalation of the user along with the amount of chakra used to vary the intensity of the flames. Can be a double-edged sword of a ninjutsu. If it burns too hot and for too long the user can damage themselves within the sphere.

Ongoing Stats (Out of 5)

Ninja Guardians

Uzumaki Naruto

Ninjutsu: 3.5

Taijutsu: 3

Genjutsu: 1

Intelligence: 2

Strength: 3.5

Speed: 3

Stamina: 4.5

Hand-Seals: 1.5

Total Score: 22

Nara Shikamaru

Ninjutsu: 3

Taijutsu: 1.5

Genjutsu: 3

Intelligence: 5

Strength: 2

Speed: 2.5

Stamina: 2

Hand-Seals: 2.5

Total Score: 21.5

Suzukuro Kotoko

Ninjutsu: 4

Taijutsu: 3.5

Genjutsu: 3

Intelligence: 2

Strength: 2

Speed: 3.5

Stamina: 2.5

Hand-Seals: 3.5

Total Score: 24

Sadao

Ninjutsu: 4

Taijutsu: 4

Genjutsu: 3.5

Intelligence: 3.5

Strength: 4

Speed: 3

Stamina: 4.5

Hand-Seals: 2

Total Score: 28.5

Densetsu no Sannin

Jiraiya

Ninjutsu: 5

Taijutsu: 4.5

Genjutsu: 3

Intelligence: 4.5

Strength: 4.5

Speed: 4.5

Stamina: 5

Hand-Seals: 4.5

Total Score: 35.5

Tsunade

Ninjutsu: 5

Taijutsu: 5

Genjutsu: 3.5

Intelligence: 5

Strength: 5

Speed: 3.5

Stamina: 4

Hand-Seals: 4

Total Score: 35

Konoha Ninja

Shizune

Ninjutsu: 4.5

Taijutsu: 2

Genjutsu: 4

Intelligence: 4.5

Strength: 2.5

Speed: 4

Stamina: 3

Hand-Seals: 5

The time skip is next chapter. This one was just to set up the environment that Naruto and Shikamaru were placed into and the main things that are keeping Tsunade around the storyline despite the fact that she did not become the next Hokage.

If it was missed by those reading, despite the lack of the bet bonding them, with the time Tsunade spent in Konoha Naruto still somehow wormed his way into her heart with a combination of grit, looking like her brother, and his overall personality that makes him so very popular amongst readers of manga and watchers of anime.

That aside, next chapter three years will have passed and this ain't gonna be your daddy's Shippuden… or more accurately Kishimoto's Shippuden (it could still be an accurate statement if Kishimoto is in fact your daddy, and if he is and he claims you I would like to meet you… so that I can get some of that money.).

I've got new things all set up instead of just the regular run of the mill tier of Akatsuki to run through. Orochimaru's dangerous and growing in power and influence in the shadows and will be very important instead of just cannon fodder to merely show a character's growth.