Naruto journey has lead him back to his home konoha, he stood on the Hokage tower's roof along with a few other individuals including Tsunade, Jiraiya and two of the three elders of konoha, koharu and Hamura.
"Starting from today this village is my responsibility, as the Hokage" Tsunade looked down at the village she would carry on her back as it's leader and protector... as the Fifth Hokage.
"I'm amazed you were able to persuade her" Hamura praised Jiraiya for succeeding in a mission that seemed to be nigh impossible. Flattered by the compliment Jiraiya chuckled "A handsome devil such as myself has enough charm to persuade anyone, but I can't take all the credit when I didn't do much myself, he's the one the one that got her to come back" Jiraiya, standing behind Naruto, discretely pointed his finger at his back.
Hamura looked at Naruto with a calm demeanour taking a mental note of the statement made by jiraiya. "Well let's summon the local lords and celebrate the inauguration of the fifth hokage, Genma, Aoba inform the village" koharu ordered the nearby leaf Shinobi.
"Not yet I have some patients to attend to... What were their names again". The one to reply to Tsunade's question was Naruto "How could you forget, it's bushy brows, kakashi sensei, Sasuke and don't forget about Garm, he hasn't been looking all that well, his Chakra has been building up for so long. At this rate he won't make it...".
Tsunade walked towards Naruto and ruffled up his hair "Don't sweat it Naruto, Shizune's a fast learner, right now she's busy taking care of Garm as we speak. She should be done within the day if I'm not wrong".
Relieved by the long awaited news of Garm's recovery Naruto was still concerned with the state of everyone else. On their way down the stairs Naruto bumped into shikamaru and his Father Shikaku Nara "Naruto?, what's up".
"Hey shika... What are you doing around here? The only building around here is the ninja administration" Naruto asked out of curiosity.
"I'm just taking care of some annoying business" as shikamaru and Naruto conversed, shikamaru noticed how respectful his father was towards Tsunade. "hey Naruto who's that young lady over there?"
"Oh that's the fifth Hokage and even though she looks young, she's actually 50". Naruto whispered in secrecy. Shikamaru grew tense, he gave a sideways glance at Tsunade, memorizing her face 'The new Hokage huh'.
"Oh is that so your son is quite the talent... You know, I would like to personally hand him his promotion" Tsunade turned around signaling everyone to follow her.
In the Hokage office Tsunade stood facing shikamaru "For your excellent performance in the chunin exam, you have recieved a promotion to chunin congradu-" Tsunade got interrupted mid speach by a shout of shock.
"Whaaat!! Shikamaru became a chunin" Naruto's world came crashing down, shikamaru seemed to be cruising through the ninja ranks even though he's the laziest of them all.
"What's there to be surprised about, shikamaru is a sparkling example as to what a chunin should be like.... Although he has his faults he more than makes up for it" Tsunade gave shikamaru a konoha flack jacket. Shikamaru accepted and wore it with a tired expression on his face "my genious is such a drag".
"Well, god job shikamaru if it makes you feel any better, green looks good on you". Naruto laughed as he playfully smacked shikamaru's back. "Hahaha... Well, we better get going now".
"We're not quite done here Naruto, I have something prepared just for you~" said Tsunade in a doting tone. "Shikamaru isn't the only one that has the qualities of a chunin, Genma do you have it?".
Naruto stood in utter disbelief as he watched Genma approach Tsunade with an ornate wooden box "Ofcource Lord Hokage, I retrieved it the moment you asked". Tsunade opened the box and smiled as she looked inside and pulled out a jacket.
"This here is a relic of the past, the konoha decoy jacket, we used to use this a while back to distract our enemies but they caught on quick as expected and so we no longer use these anymore" Tsunade pulled out an orange jacket from within the box in Genma's hands. "But I think it would look great on you, don't you think!?".
"All riiiight!!!..... It's better than I imagined, so coooool !!" Naruto ripped it from Tsunade's arms and admired it while his eyes shone like twin stars. 'as I expected, Naruto got promoted to chunin, that's going to cause alot of annoying reactions... What a drag'.
The day moved along smoothly, Tsunade healed both kakashi and Sasuke but she found Rock Lee to be in a far worse condition than previously thought his body was almost irreversibly damaged. She advised him to give up on the path of a ninja. Although her words deeply hurt him, he persevered dead set on becoming the strongest!.
In konoha hospital Sakura happily tended to Sasuke's every need. As she brought over a plate of apple slices Sasuke smacked it out of her hand spilling everything on the floor. His face, dark and full of rage. A moment later Naruto walked in to the room, as sasuke glared at him a sense of inferiority and frustration washed over him 'That jacket it looks like....'.
Sasuke's mood grew worse by the second while Naruto felt confused as to what he had done to be on the receiving end of that glare "what's with you?".
"Naruto, fight me.... Now!" Sasuke wasn't asking, if he couldn't even beat Naruto then there's no way he could exact his revenge on itachi. "What are you on about, you just woke up an-".
"Just shut up and fight me!!" Sasuke vaulted out of the hospital bed and charged towards Naruto, his eyes turned red as he unleashed his sharingan.
"HuuhhHh!!" Naruto startled by Sasuke's sudden advance stumbled back and fell on his back. Sasuke leaped into the air and delivered an axe kick towards the ground. Naruto barely managed to roll to the side avoiding the kick witch shattered the hospital floor with ease sending shards of tile flying in every direction nearly impaling Naruto and sakura.
Naruto rolling on the ground pushed off the ground with his arm, catapulting his body into the air transitioning into a flip and landed with the grace of a skilled ninja "what's gotten into you Sasuke, are you out of your mind who's gonna pay for the floor!!?"
Naruto's unserious behavior irked Sasuke "If you wount take this seriously.... then I'll give you a reason, to get a little motivated" in a flash of speed Sasuke dashed towards Sakura aiming to strike her gut with his battle hardened fist. Unable to defend herself, Sakura watched in horror as Sasuke's fist approached her at blinding speeds.
In a moment of desperation, Naruto formed the tiger seal and after a moment's pause he flickered infront of Sakura to confront Sasuke head on.
They clashed... their forearms crossed, neither one backing down. Sakura watched in horror as Naruto emerges the victor launching Sasuke back a meter into the hospital wall nearly bringing him down to his knees. "Sasuke!!" Sakura rushed over to his side.
"Are you hurt?, let me see" as she aproched to lend him a hand Sasuke once again slapped it away "This....haah.... is what I want.... don't get in my way!"
Sasuke looked into Sakura's eyes, the two tomoe in his sharingan spun as he placed Sakura in a genjutsu.
Sakura fell to the ground as a puppet with severed strings would. Naruto immediately lowered his eyes avoiding Sasuke's gaze 'genjutsu im not good at breaking out of those at all, just one look and it's over for me'.
Suddenly the hospital doors swung open a female nurse walked inside "What's with all this notice ". Looking over at Naruto her face grew cold and her tone restrained and professional"if you do not have any business here then leave as soon as possible, there will be no visitors allowed in this room for the rest of the day". Her fists clenched tightly asif she was holding back something from surfacing.
Naruto complied, he walked over towards Sakura in silence. "That's fine by me, this place is a little too cramped, we wount be able to go all out here, let's take this outside". Sasuke left Sakura behind and walked past Naruto and out of the hospital room after telling Naruto to meet him at the training ground.
"Sakura are you awake?.... you're supposed to be good at this genjutsu stuff, if you can't dreak out of it what chance do I have...." Naruto carried Sakura out of the hospital room past the stiff nurse, he gently smiled at her on his way out causing her to stumble internally. She no longer had a cold face but rather a confused one watching Naruto leave carying Sakura on his back. She only later realised that she watched a patient leave the hospital prematurely.