A Thirst For Power (Naruto Neglect Story)

Chapter 10 - Teams & Truths Revealed

Kushina was feeling really guilty. She had decided to cast a genjutsu on herself to appear invisible, so that she could follow Naruto and see what his training was. She was feeling guilty, as it was probably infringing on his privacy, but Kushina felt like she needed to see what her Son was doing. Naruto was almost never home, and even when he was, he was locked away in his room, sleeping, or having breakfast in the morning. He didn't socialize with the kids his age very much. He was always out on the training grounds, training. Kushina wanted to make sure her children were safe, and who knows, he may even ask her for help. She had always wanted to pass down her kenjutsu skills to someone. Kinato and Natsumi wanted to learn, but their style of fighting wouldn't be good for the graceful art of kenjutsu. Maybe Naruto could learn it.

Kushina stood, looking towards the direction that Naruto was training. She was amazed. He was fighting an army of clones with only his taijutsu. Countless clouds of smoke appeared as he destroyed every clone. After the smoke cleared out, she saw Naruto scowling and muttering something that she couldn't pick up. Naruto sighed and spoke, "Wood Style: Wood Golem Jutsu" and a large golem of wood rose out of the ground. Kushina was amazed. Her son, had the legendary kekkei genkai of the First Hokage. The kekkei genkai that allowed him to gain the title of the "God of Shinobi". It let him go toe-to-toe with extremely powerful people and creatures, even things like the Kyuubi. She put her hand to her mouth to stop herself from gasping. She continued to watch as Naruto looked at the wood golem and sighed. He held his hand out and spoke, "Lightning Style: 1000 Volt Rasengan" Kushina watched in bewilderment as a Rasengan formed in his hand. That in it of itself was extremely impressive, as it involved very heavy shape transformation, and very precise chakra control. Not only that, but he had completed the Rasengan, adding a chakra nature to it, something not even Minato could do.

She watched as Naruto, with the electricity crackling Rasengan in hand, rushed at the wood golem, and slammed the orb of chakra in the body of the golem. The golem was immediately completely vaporized, leaving nothing but smoke and a small pile of ash. She was amazed at first, until she watched, horrified, that Naruto's hand was completely mangled and injured. It looked like his hand could have fallen off any second. She was about to dispel the genjutsu and try to help him, that was, until she saw a group of 4 clones grabbing his hand, and squeezing it. She was about to yell, through tears, that that wouldn't help the injury. Before she could, she saw that once the clones let go, Naruto's hand was completely normal. It looked as if nothing had happened at all. The only thing she noticed that was off, was that there were wooden roots that were wrapped around his hand, that were slowly shrinking, until they disappeared. Kushina sighed in relief, wiping away her tears.

She figured that what the clones did was some sort of medical ninjutsu, though the green glow that was usually with medical ninjutsu was absent. She stopped thinking about it and watched intently as Naruto made more types of Rasengans. "Water Style: Tidal Wave Rasengan" he spoke as a larger sphere of chakra formed in his hands, with rushing water encircling the ball of death. He made another wooden golem and hit it with the water Rasengan. The water from the Rasengan rapidly expanded until it was the size of a small tidal wave, with the shape of a whirlpool. The immense amount of rotating water slammed into the golem and after the water went away, She saw a large pile of wood rubble and wet sawdust on the ground. She was amazed yet again. Her son had first, shown affinity to the crazy powerful kekkei genkai of wood release, and had also shown to be able to add elemental chakra to the Rasengan, completing it, which was something not even the Hokage, the most powerful in the village, could do.

Naruto made a third wood golem and formed another Rasengan. This time, chunks of earth and rock formed around the surface of the sphere. Then, large earthen spikes formed around the Rasengan, so it looked like a large, spiky boulder. "Earth Style: Stalagmite Rasengan" Naruto rushed at the golem and slammed the orb into it. Massive rocky spikes pierced the golem, and it was pushed onto even more stalagmites on the ground. The golem looked like Swiss cheese, and when he retracted the spikes, the remains of the golem fell apart into a pile of rubble. Kushina was watching the whole time. Her son had to have been way beyond Genin rank. She saw Naruto dispel the remains of all three golems, and he created a single wood clone. He handed the clone a kunai and gave it some instructions. Kushina watched, apprehensive about what Naruto had told the clone to do. The clone nodded and slashed at Naruto's left arm, and cut it clean off. Kushina watched in horror as Naruto winced and started doing one handed handseals. Even while Naruto was injured, he was impressing her. One handed handseals were extremely difficult to do. She herself couldn't do them. She was running towards Naruto to try and help him, while tears streamed down her face.

Naruto, after finishing the handseals, muttered a Jutsu. "Wood Style: Ecological Rebirth" His mother watched through tears, in shock and amazement as wood started expanding from the cut off part of his arm. It shaped itself into an arm, that was Identical to Naruto's original arm. While this was happening, the arm on the floor started disappearing. Naruto smiled and whispered, "I did it." as he promptly fell to the ground. Kushina had already dispelled the genjutsu, and ran to Naruto's side. He was out cold. She started checking the part of his arm where he had cleaved off his arm. There was no sign that there had been any injury on his arm. It looked perfectly normal. Kushina was extremely bewildered, but concerned at the same time. Her son and created a wood style medical ninjutsu, which was on par with the Tsunade's 100 Healings Technique. He had fully regenerated his arm. Kushina laid him down on the ground and sat, apprehensively, as all she could do was wait, as he had no injuries, and taking him to a hospital wouldn't mean anything, as he was just knocked out.

1 Hour Later

Naruto woke up to see his mother at his side. "...Kaa-san?" Kushina smiled through tears, and gave Naruto a hug. Naruto hugged her back and asked, "How much of the training did you see?" He said with a worried face. Kushina looked at him and spoke with a small smile, "Enough." Naruto started thinking of ways he could answer her questions. He was thinking of all the possible questions she would bombard him with. Kushina smiled as she said, "Don't worry, I only have three questions." Naruto was a little taken aback. Did she just read his mind? Naruto looked up and nodded, to let her start asking. Kushina spoke, "Why did you hide the fact that you had the wood release kekkei genkai?" Naruto sighed "It would be too annoying to explain it to everyone. Besides, I don't even know how I got it. I don't want to be a weapon for the village either. Please don't tell anybody, especially Tou-san." Kushina laughed, "You know, you sound so much like a Nara. If you hadn't come out of-" "Kaa-san!" "Oh, sorry. Anyways, I won't tell anyone. But, if I can ask, why do not want your father especially to not know?" Naruto thought about his answer cautiously. To tell the truth, he resented his father for his mistreatment. He wasn't like his mother, who started to pay attention to him more and more. His father was always focused on his siblings. "Uh, well he's the Hokage, so he would probably have to tell the elders, and you can never trust those old coots." Kushina nodded. "Well that makes sense. My second question is, does anybody else know about your abilities?"

Naruto, thinking about a certain Uchiha, responded, "Yeah. You know Sora Uchiha? We used to train together, and she knows about my wood style. She doesn't know about the elemental Rasengans though. She also doesn't know that I have advanced with my wood style. She still thinks I only know the first three jutsus for it." Kushina nodded. She smiled at Naruto and suddenly frowned. "My third question is, WHY THE HELL WOULD YOU DO SOMETHING SO WRECKLESS?!?" She said before smacking Naruto in the head. "Ouch. Well, I just wanted to test it out on myself. I've tested it on some clones, and it had worked, but I wanted to make sure it worked on a real person." Kushina sighed. Her son was worrying her a ton. "Well I'm glad your ok. Do you want to go to Ichiraku's and get some ramen?" "Naruto gave small smile. "Yeah, I'd like that."

Naruto felt like he had a huge weight taken off his chest. He had been dying to tell someone  about his abilities. Obviously Sora knew, but she only knew the surface of what he could do. He desperately wanted to tell someone, but he didn't know who to trust with the information. 'I guess Kaa-san would have been the most trustworthy person with that information.' He slurped down his ramen and got up from the seat. His mother got up and they walked back home. Naruto broke the silence. "Kaa-san, can I ask you something?" Kushina smiled. "What do you want to ask?" "Um, well after I become a Genin, can I change my clan name to the Uzumaki?" "Of course you can. Can I ask why?" Naruto was inwardly worried, because he didn't want to explain. "Well, not for any reason in particular. It's just I've also taken up the art of fuinjutsu, so I think the Uzumaki name would suit me better." His mother was pleasantly surprised. "You're practicing fuinjutsu? Of course you can change to the Uzumaki name, ya know!" Naruto smiled as they walked back into the house.

Timeskip, next morning in the academy.

Naruto sat in his chair, bored. Iruka was giving a speech about how they were ninja now, and their lives would be more serious... blah blah blah. Nobody cared about what Iruka was saying. Naruto was just waiting for the team assignments. Another thing was that a lot of the students in the class were staring at Naruto. He had gotten the highest scores on the graduation exam. He had gotten perfect scores in every category, the closest person to him being the Uchiha prodigy, Sora. Kinato was still sending dirty looks at Naruto, as if he personally offended him. Naruto figured it was because he sat next to Sora everyday, and Kinato liked her. Naruto thought this was stupid, because it was pretty obvious that him and Sora did not like each other. The only competition Kinato had would have been the other fanboys of Sora. 

"Hey idiot." Naruto looked over to Sora. "Yeah?" "Just because you got better scores then me on the graduation exam, doesn't mean your better then me. I'm an Uchiha. No one is better then us." Naruto sighed. "Ok whatever you say.." Iruka, looking like he had been weeping, finished up his speech. "...Alright, I'll be telling you all about your team assignments now." Naruto dozed off for the first six assignments, as they would just be the civilian teams. "Team 7 will be Sasuke Uchiha, Hiruko Hyuga, and Sakura Haruno, and your Sensei will be Kakashi Hatake. Head to room C2" Sasuke looked indifferent. The Hiruko kid looked excited. Sakura looked as if she was about to faint out of happiness for being on her Sasuke's team. Naruto rolled his eyes and kept on listening. "Team 8 will consist of, Hinata Hyuga, Kiba Inuzuka, and Shino Aburame, and your Jonin will be Kurenai Yuhi. Make your way to room D7" Naruto figured that team 8 would be a tracking and information gathering team. 

"Team 9 is still in service from last year, so team 10 is going to be Ino Yamanaka, Choji Akimichi, and Shikamaru Nara. Your sensei is Asuma Sarutobi. Go to room A4." Ino was the only one who looked mad about the team placement, and it was pretty easy to guess why. Naruto had expected the team to have those three members, because the Ino-Shika-Cho trio was always used for clan heads and heirs. "Team 11 will have Natsumi Namikaze, Kinato Namikaze, and a transfer student, Sai Shimura. Your Jonin sensei is Rin Nohara. Head to room C9" Naruto didn't know who Sai was, but he knew why Rin was chosen to be the sensei of Natsumi and Kinato.

Flashback

Naruto was in the Hokage's meeting room. Well, not in it, but a clone was on top of the roof, listening in to the clan heads, Hokage, and civilian council talk about the assignments for the Genin teams. There were also four Jonin, and an Anbu there. Minato spoke up. "The team assignments this year are... well troublesome to say the least." Shikaku Nara snorted. "Well, we know how to assign two of the teams. We will reinstate the Ino-Shika-Cho, trio once again, under Asuma Sarutobi." Minato glanced at the Nara, Yamanaka, and Akimichi clan heads. They nodded. "We're also going to make a tracking team, with Hinata Hyuga, Kiba Inuzuka, and Shino Aburame. The respective clan heads nodded. "Alright. Those two teams are settled, but if anybody has any suggestions, let me know." Kushina interrupted "Minato-kun, I think we should assign Natsumi and Kinato with Rin-san. Since Rin is a jinchuriki, like Natsumi and Kinato, she could teach them how to make use of the tailed beast's power." Minato smiled. "That's a great idea. Does anybody else have anything they want to say?

"Minato-sensei, I do have a question." "What is it, Kakashi?" Kakashi cleared his throat. "I would like to be the sensei for the heir of the Uchiha clan, Sasuke." Minato looked over to Fugaku. "Are you fine with this, Fugaku?"  The clan head merely nodded, not saying a word. A woman from the civilian council, Mebuki Haruno stood up. "I want my daughter, Sakura, to be on the young Uchiha's team." Minato nodded, though on the inside, he knew that Sakura had told her mother to ask to put her on the same team as Sasuke. "Hokage-sama, if I may ask, why was I called to this meeting?" the Anbu asked. "Yugao, you can take off your mask. The reason I have called you to this meeting, is because the Uchiha clan Head has requested you be the sensei for his daughter, Sora Uchiha." Minato nodded to Fugaku, to let him explain. "Well, my daughter has taken a liking to kenjutsu, and seeing as you're one of the best kenjutsu specialists in the village, I would like you to teach my daughter. Yugao, who was clutching her mask responded, looking at both Minato and Fugaku. "What will happen with my duties in Anbu?" Minato smiled. "Your time in Anbu will be over, and you will be promoted to Jonin. You can choose the other two members of your team, if you'd like.

Yugao weighed the pros and cons of becoming a Jonin sensei. She finally spoke up. "I accept your offer." Minato smiled. "Alright, what other members would you like on your team?" Yugao stared down at the list, and gave it some thought. After a minute or two, she looked back to the Hokage. "I will choose Naruto Uzumaki, and Rimara Sarutobi. I think they will make good team members." Minato nodded and turned his attention back to the meeting. "Alright. So, we just need to find a third person for Rin and Kakashi's team.

Flashback End

Naruto didn't know who Yugao was. He knew that they were an Anbu member at one point, a captain no less, but other then that, she was a mystery. "For the last team assignment, Naruto Uzumaki, Sora Uchiha, and Rimara Sarutobi. You three will be team 12, and your Jonin sensei is Yugao Uzuki. Head to room D12." Kinato had overheard the assignment, and, looked back to the classroom and shot Naruto a dirty look. Naruto sighed and walked with his team to the room where they would meet their sensei. The three Genin arrived and saw their Jonin leaning on a wall. She looked bored, but when she saw the three, she immediately looked excited. "It's nice to see you three finally." She grinned. "Meet me on the roof, and we can do introductions and stuff up there." Yugao body flickered away, and the three students, before they could even reply, had started walking up the stairs. Sora kept on glaring at Naruto, for some reason. Rimara looked eager to start doing their Genin activities, and Naruto looked bored.

They finally made their way to the roof, and saw their sensei waiting for them. She smiled and spoke, "Lets start the introductions. You can say your name, what you like and dislike, goals or dreams for the future, and what you specialize in. You start, brown hair." Rimara started talking. "My name is Rimara Sarutobi. I like dango, cats, and learning. I don't like people who talk too much, and when I can't figure out something. My goal is to surpass the third Hokage, and to be the most knowledgeable ninja in the world! I specialize in summoning jutsu, and I have a tiger summoning contract." Yugao smiled as she thought, 'She would be a good backline supporter. I should train her chakra control, and help her advance her ninjutsu.' "Alright, black hair, your next." "My name is Sora Uchiha. I like ramen and training. I don't like tomatoes."

Sasuke, with his own team, felt a sudden stinging sensation in his heart, as if somebody had struck him in a pressure point.

Sora continued. "I also don't like people who distract me. I don't have a goal or a dream, because I know it will be reality. I will avenge the death of my brother, Itachi. I specialize in ninjutsu, and I'm doing kenjutsu as well." Yugao smiled, but she was worried on the inside. She hoped Sora wouldn't be hung up on revenge. She pointed to Naruto. "Now you, blondie." Naruto frowned, but spoke. "My name is Naruto Uzumaki. I also like ramen and training. I don't like annoying people. I hope to be the strongest shinobi to ever exist. I am an all-rounder, but I specialize in ninjutsu mainly. I am also doing kamajutsu." Yugao raised an eyebrow. "Thats a lofty goal, kid. You think you can live up to it?" Naruto grinned. "Of course. I can, and I will." Yugao grinned. "Well, it's unfair of me to know about you all, without talking about myself. Well, I also like dango, and swords. My goal.. you're too young to know. I'm a kenjutsu specialist." The whole team nodded and Yugao spoke. "Well, enough of that. Lets start your Genin test." Naruto had already known this would happen. Sora narrowed her eyes. Rimara spoke up, "I thought we were already Genin?"

"You thought that weak academy test was all it took to be a ninja?"

(A/N: My bad for the wack ass upload schedule. You can expect another chapter tomorrow, though.)

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