-Land of Rivers: Slug Sage-
"Okay." Tsunade clapped her hands. "So here's what we're gonna do. First, you'll sign the contract. Second, we go to Shikkotsu Forest. Third, we learn Sage. Fourth, I'll help you draw out the Byakugo- I'll set aside a non-activated copy for you to study later. Fifth, Iryo Ninjutsu basics. Sixth, Sage again, this time to try and balance your chakra after pumping chakra into the Byakugo. Seventh, or eighth, or whatever, continue the Iryo Ninjutsu program."
"Might as well write a list-ttebayo." Naruto nodded. "Aw shucks, this is kinda annoying; because of the Byakugo thingy, my chakra reserves will keep on going wonky, so it'll be hard to do everything."
"That's exactly right. Now without further ado-" With a few quick hand seals, a large scroll appeared in a plume of smoke. Naruto blinked at it, tracing the intricate patterns with wide eyes.
"Sign it with your blood." She gestured to an empty space once she unfurled the scroll.
"Senju... Ha-shi-ra- Shodaime? " He exclaimed.
"Mm, he'd signed it as well although he never really used Katsuyu." Tsunade waved off. "Hurry along now- and make it neat."
"Yes yes," He flicked a chakra coated finger over the palm of his left hand, using his index to dab into the pool of... blood paint. "U-zu-ma-ki... Shit, fox, stop healing me so fast... Na...ruto, done!"
"Cool, now look at my hands. Boar. Dog. Bird. Monkey. Ram. Go."
With a resolute nod, he copied the seals, feeling the movements begin to twist his chakra- "Kuchiyose no Jutsu." He slammed a hand against the ground and a little pop sounded in the area. "Eh?"
"Oh." Katsuyu- mini Katsuyu- glanced around. "Greetings, Tsunade-sama, Naruto-kun."
"Wha- WHAT? Why are you so small?" Naruto scratched at his head. "Hi Katsuyu-san."
"Just Katsuyu now." She inclined her head- or... where Naruto thinks her head is. "I felt the contract binding. I suppose I should call you 'Naruto-sama' now-" He made a face. "-But I suppose not, judging by your aversion towards honorifics like that."
"Thank god, Katsuyu." Naruto dramatically clutched at his chest. "You know me so well. Anyway, why are you so small? I channelled enough chakra to summon a way bigger you!"
"It's the same thing as always." Katsuyu beckoned for Tsunade to continue.
"Right. The reason why I've taught you Ninjutsu with limited hand seals is because they aren't suited for enormous reserves like yours. Who created them?"
"Your great-uncle." He chorused. "For peasant ninjas with meagre chakra rese- Ouch! I'm just telling the truth!"
Well so what if Naruto was a little salty over the fact that he was failed continuously because he couldn't do Jutsu with the hand seals that his distant relative created for people with smaller reserves?
"Right. Chakra at its purest form is Yin-Yang Release, but no one short of a god could use that. That's why my great-uncle created the hand seals so that we could channel chakra without it all spilling all over the place. But with you, you automatically shove in too much chakra into a hand seal until the hand seal because null and it's just a little sliver of your energy going in."
"Bah, same annoying thing as always then." He grumbled. "I either needa dump in more chakra, or hold it back. Okay, okay. I got this. Kuchiyose no Jutsu! GAH! No! Kuchiyose no Jutsu. Kuchiyose. Kuchiyose. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. NO-"
An array of tiny Katsuyus stared at the irate Naruto and amused looking Tsunade.
"Okay, okay. I got it this time." Naruto shaved it down to just the last three hand seals. "Kuchiyose!" A Katsuyu, two times as large as the previous, appeared. "Damn. Kuchiyose." A little bigger. "Hah! I got this, dattebayo." He relentlessly went through the hand seals over and over.
"Ay ay- stop- stop it, Naruto. You dumb brat. Katsuyu has a limit, you know?" She rolled her eyes with a laugh. Katsuyu chuckled along with her as she began to melt together.
"Besides, I can just attach myself together anyway."
"Oh true." Naruto scratched his cheek. "I was... planning that all along."
"Sure you were." She laughed. "Anyway, Katsuyu, I'm pretty sure you know the plan, so reverse summon us."
Naruto found out that reverse summoning meant being absorbed into Katsuyu before she reverse summoned herself. Ack.
-Shikkotsu Forest-
Trees. He immediately noticed. All around him.
"How astute of an observation." A tiny Katsuyu perched on his shoulder chuckled and Naruto flailed a bit- 'She could read his thoughts?'
"No, Naruto." She chuckled again, completely contradicting his beliefs. The slug then quickly explained. "The Shikkotsu Forest is very thick in Nature Energy. It's brimming with life, so it's easy to get lost and confused around here."
Katsuyu was right, Naruto realised as he peered around. The trees seemed to warp around his vision and he felt too lightheaded for it to be normal. Chakra- no, energy was all over the place and he drowned in it.
"Tsunade-baachan?" He called out, squeaking when he realised that a certain tree was actually made of a white thing that looked like bone.
"I'm here, brat." She snarked back as she walked slowly towards him, appearing through the foliage. "It's hard to sense you with all this Nature Energy smothering us."
"Now that Tsunade-sama is here as well, let's head towards my main domain." Her antennas gestured to his right.
"Trees." He couldn't help but describe aloud as he had to physically twist around to get by. There was no path, nor were the trees spread apart. Tsunade behind him had to yank herself through sometimes because she couldn't punch them down.
"Trees, and more trees- Oh look, there's another tree! Bone tree! Tree tree! Bone tree point two. Tree tree point two. Tree tree point three! Point tree!"
"Oh shut up!" Tsunade waved a fist irritably as she got caught again.
"Baachan just tree jump. Go to the canopy." Naruto deadpanned.
"Oh shit, you're right." She mused. "Katsuyu, what does your place look like?"
"It's fairly obvious a place and I'm all over the place, so you can ask another me for guidance." The slug replied. "An enormous pit, almost, although it's more like a hollow bone. The drop is far."
"Okay thanks. Race ya there, brat!"
"What? Hey, wait- OWCH, bone tree point tree!"
"That was a flexibility test on its own." He panted as he stumbled down into the place, bruised and bleeding. ...Or... not so more as they promptly closed and healed.
Naruto then belatedly realised that there was an enormous Katsuyu there and his jaw unhinged.
"Good job." Tsunade shot him a thumbs up and he hissed back in an exaggerated manner.
"Katsuyu's so big!" He exclaimed, "That's, like, taller than the Konoha walls!"
"Uh, this is actually only a portion of my true size." Katsuyu laughed. "I am about twenty-thirty times larger than this."
"No... way..."
"Yes way." Tsunade nodded. "With my Byakugo, I could at most summon about one twentieth of Katsuyu. ...Anyhow, down to business. Katsuyu, does time pass differently here?"
"Ah, yes, slightly slower-"
"Fuck damnit, we should've come here earlier then! "
"-Although it's mainly just the mind tricking yourself, not the actual time slowing down."
"Oh."
"Right," Katsuyu chuckled lightly. "When you start to meditate, because this is almost like a spirit realm, time will seem to bend around your consciousness. Anyway, Slug Sage Mode. It is not that hard at all to do, in my opinion, but I hear the toads have many summoners who ended up dying because of it."
"D-Dying?" Naruto squeaked.
"Mm." She nodded. "Turning into stone toads and whatnot. Only Hashi-sama had tried my Sage Mode, and he'd succeeded very quickly with little obstacles. After he, I hadn't had summoners apart from the two of you. This realm and my existence is far different from the toad and snake after all. I hadn't told you this, Tsunade-sama, but I was not entirely sentient before I met Hashi-sama and Mito-sama."
"My grandparents?" She exclaimed.
"Right. I was also alive during the time of the Sage of Six Paths, but my memories from it are bleary at best. This place was originally a piece of the lands blessed by the Sage. It was a forest of bones filled with what was rumoured to hold immortality."
"Immortality..." Tsunade echoed with a frown.
"Right. The Sage's mother- the Rabbit Goddess, Kaguya's powers, I believe, were centred around bones as well, so it might have been a homage to her."
"That she'd live on forever." Naruto thought aloud, absentminded.
"...After the Sage's passing, it had been ravaged by greedy men of your kind and torn to waste. The Sage's blessing can't be removed, but with enough malevolence around it, it can be quelled."
The slug paused for a moment as if turning over her words.
"Mito-sama sensed the blessing, and Hashi-sama drove out the corrupt and regrew this forest with his Mokuton. After it was given chakra again, the life energy returned and it was filled with an abundance of Nature Energy. I, who had been here in its growth and demise, became a partial spirit with powers beyond the average slug. I was purified a white, and given the blue of chakra."
Tsunade had never heard the quiet slug talk so much in little time before, and she didn't know whether to be more surprised about that or her era long history.
"I gained a clear mind then, and Hashi-sama had been shocked out of his wits when I started multiplying and talking. I told him that the energy from the Sages was an energy he could master. I told him it was thanks, and he'd accepted."
"And since Ojii-sama, no one else?"
"No one else." Katsuyu confirmed.
They were both stunned into silence. Tsunade, with the implications of what the slug had told her, and Naruto, with the weight of this contract starting to press on him.
It was one thing to be the official student to sign the contract of a Sannin, but it was another thing entirely to learn the Sage Mode that only the Shodaime had learnt as a gift.
It was almost like... a hereditary contract. Suddenly the 'Baachan' title he'd slapped onto the end of Tsunade's name seemed a lot more serious than he intended it to be.
To think that out of the thousands of shinobi, it was he who was standing there with Senju Tsunade and a being that traced back to a myth's time.
Naruto didn't like to ponder semantics and titles, but he couldn't not when it only greatened the significance of his scenario.
"Anyway," Katsuyu cleared her throat- or made the sound of doing so. (Did slugs have throats?) "This Sage Mode is arguably more powerful than the other legendary two because of how unique it is. You have a total control of your own body and chakra, and the chakra of all other living beings."
Naruto took a moment to digest and figure it out while Tsunade immediately stepped forward with a loud- "What? This isn't what you said last time! That isn't possible..."
"Many things are seemingly impossible when they actually are." Katsuyu countered smoothly with a gentle tone. "When I say total control of your own, I mean it like biofeedback, but greatened, without backlashes, and far easily accomplished. When you're in Sage Mode, it's like your Hundred Healings, but without any repercussions."
"But... how?" Tsunade furrowed her brow.
"Yours work as a fast regeneration. This, however, is like a 'statis'. Your body temporarily mimics mine, sort of. You can manipulate everything within yourself to a certain degree. Your damaged cells don't need to divide, they multiply. Usually it means the same, but it means as it is said in this case."
"Like bacteria?" Naruto wrinkled his nose, trying to figure it out.
"...Let's just leave it at that." Tsunade nodded. "So what if I pile Byakugo on top of Sage Mode?"
"Adding it on top of what you've got already... you'll be near invincible." Katsuyu stated firmly. "You'll be as strong as Hashi-sama."
"...Strong as... Ojii-sama..." The Sannin breathed in awe, in complete bafflement because that man was a god. He was... unreachable. "...Sorry, I'll... take a moment to register that... What else then?"
"Well it would be useless to you two, but you can suck chakra out of people as well. Like Hashi-sama." She seemed to pointedly mention. "He did it out of his Mokuton. It is possible as long as your chakra is somehow touching theirs."
"Shizune's teaching you chakra strings." Tsunade immediately told Naruto. "It's a good back up plan."
"And you can turn your chakra to whatever property you wish- corrosive, sleeping gas, medicinal- like how I have my acid." Katsuyu turned to Naruto. "That's why it meshes perfectly with your Kyuubi."
"Not my Kyuubi. Kyuubi is itself. Will the fox even like you?" Naruto frowned. "Cuz... I can sorta feel his chakra- funny thing, if I concentrate, it feels exactly like the chakra in the forest. ...Anyway, what I mean is: I have my chakra, the fox's chakra, and if I get your chakra as well... Isn't that too many chakras? Won't it be incompatible-ttebayo?"
Because- "But chakra's meanta be my friend, right? Not my bitch."
"Perhaps." She replied. "You could still use Sage Mode; it would be multiplied with power if combined with the Kyuubi, but you could still use it by itself. And the reason why you feel its chakra the same may be because it's an entity like me. ...No, even more powerful than I. Undoubtedly from the Sage's era, and made of raw Nature Energy. Tsunade-sama has told me that you regenerate quickly because of it; that might mean that its chakra would have both physical and spiritual chakra properties as well."
"Woah. ...Just woah." Naruto stared dumbly at his hands. "There are so many 'woah's lately."
"Haha, perhaps. But apart from this, all the other benefits are similar to the other Sage Modes. There's nothing fancy like the snakes' abilities to breathe life into inanimate objects and control them."
"There's plenty of benefits already without the specialisation: enhanced all stats." Tsunade listed. "Enormous ass fucking sensory range. And within that enormous ass range, complete sensory awareness over the chakra within it, making you able to sense all attacks and people and just everything including seals. All Jutsu, Nin, Gen, Tai included, are boosted. Nature Energy can become an extension of your body and that opens a ton of options as well..."
"Holy shit, Baachan, why didn't you do this before?" He gawked.
"I didn't tell her the trickier stuff." Katsuyu offered. "And I doubt she would have been tempted. There was no time during the war for this-"
"Although apparently Jiraiya had the time to ditch the war to raise orphans, but Sarutobi always favoured him."
"-And after the war ended, Tsunade-sama had..."
The three of them turned silent as they all mutually agreed to not breach that topic again.
"Yeah, so anyways..." Naruto cleared his throat. "There's gotta be downsides."
"...Uh..."
"...Right?"
"...I suppose... so..." Katsuyu's antennas swivelled away. "There is one where you have to stay completely still in order to gather Nature Energy, but really, I can attach myself to you and channel energy into you anyway. Staying still is really only the down side."
"Huh." Naruto smacked his head. "I can also counter that easy peasy with Kage Bunshin."
Naruto, when facing any trouble, had always turned to Kage Bunshin because it proved to be useful in basically any situation. Couldn't remember something? Kage Bunshin makes it twice as fast. Couldn't reach something? Kage Bunshin. Cleaning up a mess? Kage Bunshin. Ninjutsu that required two people? Kage Bunshin. Wanted to do two things at once? Kage Bunshin.
Forgot the toilet paper roll when he was on the toilet? Kage Bunshin.
And so once he applied 'Kage Bunshin' to every issue he had... Well, needless to say, there weren't any 'issues' after that.
"Oh right, there's another potential downside, although it really isn't." Katsuyu added. "Nature Energy doesn't give you infinite chakra. Your physical and spiritual energy are at a 1:1 ratio, correct? Nature Energy is just added alongside with it so it becomes 1:1:1. If you run out of physical and spiritual energy, you cannot use Nature Energy."
"That... is not a downside." Naruto agreed flatly, slowly pointing to himself. "Spawn of an Uzumaki pureblood, and a genius shinobi, who has about three-four times the amount of chakra a Kage has, and would have exponentially more if it weren't for the seal, and would have more more if the fox would be a kind friend willing to hold hands and throw daisies."
He then pointed to Tsunade.
"The first Hokage and first Jinchuuriki who was also a royal, pureblood Uzumaki's granddaughter with at least double the amount of chakra a Kage has, and more in her Byakugo and a quarter of it dumped into making her look pretty."
"...That's exactly what I meant." Katsuyu nodded.
"That's insane. That's just-"
"The process can go two ways." Katsuyu explained. "The easy and quick way, or the-"
"The easy and quick way." Tsunade immediately said. "Why is there even a second way if the first is easy and quick?"
"...You're right." The slug agreed. "Anyway, it is to be completely absorbed by me and to meditate that way. This means that I can forcibly dispel Nature Energy from your bodies if it overcomes you. I'm pretty sure you'll turn into a stone statue of a slug if that happens, but I'm not too sure. This also means that you'll be completely still and covered in my..."
"Helpful slime." Naruto offered.
"...Helpful slime, therefore making it easier."
"Huh." He nodded, wincing when two large Katsuyu's splatted onto the stone next to them. "So... like a bed, right?"
"Yep. Don't worry, you'll be able to breathe normally and everything."
Folding his haori and removing his pouches, he climbed onto the... sticky... squishy... slug, immediately feeling himself sinking in. Resisting the knee-jerk reaction of disgust or panic, he let himself be encased by the warm... sticky...
Casting the thoughts out of his mind, he stilled when he appeared to be fully sunken in. Using the Kyuubi's chakra as reference, he reached for the Nature Energy- an extremely simple thing.
It was far easier than the water moulding exercises from ages ago. (How long ago, actually?)
Balancing it though...
It had to be even.
-Well, 'odd', actually, because there were three parts and 'three' was an odd number, but- Shut- off topic, Naruto! So, balanced, yes, 'balanced' wasn't a number-word.
Balance...
Starting off slowly, he began to draw in the Nature Energy, feeling his chakra twist strangely at the intrusion. It made him feel a little unsettled and... itchy, almost, so he quickly took in more. It was still unbalanced.
He drew in more, and more, and more... Still unbalanced. He stopped himself when he felt the urge to just dump in all the energy. Slow and steady.
Soon, he felt the three energies clashing with each other, tipping like scales. It soon became something akin to a tug of war, where Nature Energy spilled in before Naruto yanked it out, then he needed a little more- Then yanked it out.
For what felt like hours, it happened. In and out, and in and out- like a swing that never stopped swinging. Right! Visualisation. Tsunade always told him he worked best when visualising something.
So what had a 1:1:1 ratio?
...Nothing he could think of.
Switching directions, he imagined a weight scale with... three... arms. Physical chakra on one, spiritual on the other, and nature on the last.
After a few attempts, it... balanced, and the world felt perfect, like everything was aligned and the universe was happy.
Then Nature Energy tipped the scales and Naruto yanked it out instinctively and ugh, all over again-
-Konoha-
"What?" Genma exclaimed, brows furrowed. "That's it? You just- just left?"
"That was not very Youthful of you, Kakashi." Gai frowned.
"What was I meant to do?" Kakashi replied exasperatedly, maybe-maybe-not sulking because he was getting reprimanded by Gai of all people.
The man sputtered, senbon almost poking into the Hatake. "Anything but just leave. You should've asked Tsunade-sama about what they were teaching him, or- I don't know, their plans-"
"How brightly Naruto-kun's Youth was burni-"
"We had to leave soon because of Hanako." Kakashi defended himself, cutting off Gai, before he grimaced at the mention of the boy.
"Oh... Aoba's brat." Genma winced. "What's he like now?"
"Threw a tantrum when he woke up." He hunched his shoulders a little. "Aoba was there and he wasn't very impressed. His parents are screaming for Naruto's head, but then for some reason, Hanako seemed extremely opposed to it. Right now, he's incredibly quiet and sullen. I'm not surprised."
"He would be." Genma inclined his head. "I bet he feels humiliated. What about you? Weren't you, like, disgraced in Hokage-sama's office?"
"Oh please," He groaned. "Don't even remind me. I felt like chopping off my leg and offering it up right then and there."
"Right, Kakashi was not... blooming in that moment." Gai cleared his throat.
Genma snickered humourlessly, "When is Kakashi ever blooming? Another topic then: what about your other two brats?"
"Sasuke found out when he awakened his-" Kakashi half-heartedly gestured to his face. "Sakura found out after she visited Hanako while he was in the middle of his temper tantrum. I think Sakura's still in a state of shock."
"Anger?"
"No, guilt."
"Guilt?" Gai boomed. "What does the flower have to be guilty for? I've seen Sakura-chan once or twice, and she seems incredibly Youthful!"
Then came an awkward silence and Gai cleared his throat again. "Well, what now then, my Eternal Rival?"
"Well, once they get over their shock, they'll be demanding Jutsus 24/7." The Jonin slapped his forehead. "I dunno how you do it, Gai. Don't you have this Hyuuga prodigy and your little two point oh? How does that work? Genma, take over my job."
"There there." He patted his shoulder.
"I'll probably throw Sakura at Kurenai, and just beat Sasuke to the ground. That way there's no talking or teaching needed." Kakashi let out a- to Gai and Genma's horror- sincere breath of relief. "Maybe I can do this."
"No-" Genma made an aborted move to shake his head. "No, Kakashi."
"Joint training sessions work just as well." Gai offered far quieter than normal.
"No way, I can't deal with Gai and mini-Gai." Kakashi shook his head. "The first option will have to do-"
"My Rival..." "Kakashi..."
-Shikkotsu-
What felt like a year later, he was pushed out of the warm, sticky, squishy bed of slime and he rolled to a crouch. "Katsuyu?"
"Ah, I've decided you should take a rest as Tsunade-sama has-"
"I fucking did it!" Tsunade crowed, whooping with glee as she all but levitated out of the slug. "I did it! I did it! I fucking did it! Oh my fucking god! Naruto, I did it!"
It placed a beam on Naruto's face and he whooped with her. "Go Baachan! That's so fast! That's awesome! And, um, what did it feel like? Did you feel powerful? Ooh, what about your Mokuton? Did you feel woody?"
"I know. Like I was a badass! Yes! Not yet! But yes, woody indeed!"
Naruto cackled in glee and tackled Tsunade. She was all but vibrating with contagious excitement and Naruto felt as though he wouldn't be able to focus for the next hour from the sheer giddiness he felt on behalf of her.
"Congratulations, Tsunade-sama! You should move onto the next stage shortly after- Or, whenever you please. Just head towards one of the tallest bones and stand at the very top. It is harder than this, but I believe you will master it quickly.
Tsunade nodded aggressively, squeezed Naruto once before she sped out the door with a cheer.
Naruto smacked his cheeks, "Wow, I've still got a long way to go before I catch up to Baachan!"
"Tsunade-sama and you are both impossible." Katsuyu chuckled. "How much time do you believe had passed, Naruto?"
"..Erm," Naruto squinted. It had felt like weeks had passed, but he knew it was his impatience speaking. "Realistically, probably about sixteen-twenty hours?"
"No." Katsuyu sounded like she was smirking. "One."
"...A day?" His voice wavered.
"An hour." Katsuyu replied in a hushed tone. "One hour."
-Konoha-
Sakura decided that she sort of liked Team 8.
Kurenai didn't have to accept her in the odd training sessions, but she was extremely kind about it. Shino was a guy she used to avoid because he was creepy- and that sentiment hadn't exactly changed, but she could appreciate his calm intelligence.
She'd also never gotten along with Kiba because he was always... filthy. Akamaru was cute though.
Hinata was an invisible girl. She'd never been in the 'fangirl wars' and she hardly speak out during class. She seemed... to have an extremely low self-esteem; worse than when Sakura had been bullied because of her forehead. It made Sakura feel a little closer to the shy girl upon that realisation.
Hinata could only stutter responses and couldn't keep the boys in line. Sakura could become the girl's 'Ino', pulling her out of her shell. She feels like she'd done nothing so far, and this was hopefully something she could change.
(She couldn't help but compare her progress to Naruto's. A boy who'd pinned down elemental chakra, water walking, and so many other accomplishments that Sakura didn't know existed. Now that she knew how many leaps he'd taken, it felt like all everyone had done so far was miniscule in comparison.)
-Shikkotsu-
The jutsu Tsunade cast on herself to make her look younger took quite a lot of chakra. She realised that yet again as she released it.
If what Katsuyu said was true, then Sage chakra could potentially reverse the aging effects of the Byakugo.
"Permanent anti-aging is impossible," She said to a small Katsuyu besides her. "But I'm gonna try anyway."
"It isn't impossible." The slug contradicted. "Humans are bound to a set of biological laws, true, but once you learn Sage Mode, you aren't a hundred percent 'human' anymore."
"Just like how Orochimaru isn't really 'human' anymore." Tsunade mused. That snake appeared to not have aged a day. She stared down at her hand. It was thin and the skin was slightly grey. Her bones stood out and her skin was sagging. "Can I do this, Katsuyu?"
"Whatever you wish for, Tsunade-sama, I'm sure you will be able to accomplish."
The tip of the bones in Shikkotsu Forest held just enough room for two adult feet. The height caused his vision to tunnel whenever he lost his concentration, but months of going in and out of a meditative trance had made this far simpler than what the Naruto of the past would have perceived it.
Five seconds after standing still, he felt his chakra grow- Sage Mode. Not fast enough. Tsunade had proven that one could enter the stage in a second. It was risky as he could overshoot and die, but four seconds made all the difference. Battle calm was another thing Naruto had yet to achieve, so that further put a damper on things.
He slowly pushed the Nature Energy out of his body before he tried again, drawing in a select amount of energy before regulating it.
Four and a half seconds.
Expel. Exhale. Inhale.
Four and a half seconds.
Again.
-Konoha-
"You're insane." Sasuke deadpanned instantly.
"H-Huh?" Kakashi stuttered, not understanding how the avenge-obsessed emo brat would turn down the opportunity to learn an A-Rank, potentially S-Rank, Jutsu.
"Let me get this straight," The Uchiha narrowed his eyes and Kakashi distantly thought that he was meant to be a teacher, not the brat. "I just learnt what my affinity was, and you're gonna jump straight from 'being able to summon a little zap' to an assassination technique that takes years of refining and training? Naruto sai-"
He stopped himself, irritation flickering over his features. "Look, there's going to be backlashes to this, won't there?"
"Yes..." Kakashi replied carefully. "With your chakra reserves, you could only use it once or twice a day." Then he realised where he'd gone wrong.
"Ah. Right. That's kind of a bother. You might also fry your nerves because you're conjuring actual lightning. Let's start with a D-Rank instead, hehe."
-Shikkotsu-
Naruto scrunched up his face as he peered into the mirror Tsunade'd stored inside of a storage scroll. His face was... weird.
He had a kinda big outline of a diamond on his forehead which was weird.
He also had this same purple-but-more-bluish-maybe-green-is-that-green? markings around his eyes which looked like how Shizune put on eyeshadows sometimes and that was super weird. Is this Sage Mode or drag queen mode?
...But this was better than when he'd felt his eyes slowly elongate to become an antenna- Naruto shuddered and banished the thought. That was far scarier than when he started to drip slime.
He also had the same weird coloured stripes running down his outer arms, from his nape down to his tail bone (a Kage Bunshin checked), and on his outer thighs from his hip bone down to his ankles. It was really weird because it felt like his actual skin had turned that colour.
He'd seen Tsunade's, and hers was... sorta similar, but also not. She also had the eyeshadow thing around her eyes, but it was the colour of Katsuyu's blue markings. She had two thick stripes going up and down from the corners of her eyes and also- from what she said- had the same body stripes as he did.
But her marks hadn't changed colours like his.
"Hey Katsuyu," He turned to a stray Katsuyu that was just... there. He had quickly learnt that Katsuyu was practically everywhere here. "Why do these stripes keep changing colour?"
"Ah, that's because it's the colour of your chakra." Katsuyu explained. "My natural chakra contains healing properties, so that's when it turns green. Your normal chakra is blue, and the purple is the little leak of the Kyuubi's chakra."
"The fox's chakra is red? " He asked. "That's kinda cool, to be honest. So it's a visual thing as well, huh. That's cool."
"Glad you think so."
Tsunade sat by one of the trees, only now recognising her grandfather's chakra within it. It was at the very roots of it, buried so deep down that she hadn't noticed it at first.
She sat cross-legged, staring at her palm and wondering what she must do to potentially gain access to her grandfather's Mokuton. He hadn't gotten it as a result from Sage Mode, but the theory she made up didn't cancel itself out because when she gained the Sage chakra, she felt something... click.
It was like Tsunade had been missing a piece of herself the entire time.
With a light exhale, she closed her eyes and opened them a moment later when Sage chakra bloomed within her.
What was Mokuton conjured from? Earth and water, at it's base. But Kekkei Genkai were more than those silly basic explanations. It held the sturdiness of Doton, but the fluidity of water.
But her grandfather could conjure so much more than wood. Flowers, poison, ointment, leaves, thorns, vines...
Tsunade stared at her palm and remembered back when she was just a young child, and the Senju and Uzumaki Clans were actually Clans. She used to love growing plants- it seemed to be some genetic trait all Uzumakis shared regardless of purity.
Tsunade had been impatient many times and would constantly pick through the dirt to see if the seeds had grown their little tails. Her grandmother would have scolded her, but her grandfather would just boom in laughter and put his hand over it, saying some dumb 'magic' word before it'd bloom.
"A little seed for me to sow, a little earth for you to grow." The words felt heavy, stupid, on her tongue. "A little hole, a little pat. A little wish-"
"I'll grant any wish you have, Tsuna-chan!" "You spoil her too much-"
"-And that is that. A little sun, a little shower." She pressed her lips together. "A little time... and then..."
Miraculously, her hand began to stiffen, turning fibrous and textured. From the middle of her palm, a small bud began to wiggle upwards, blooming sunnily into a deep blue felicia.
"...A flower." She breathed.
Seventy hours has passed since they first entered Shikkotsu Forest.