Naruto 1. Chapter 1

_An: Good day to all of you. This is my newest work, Naruto: Dark Empire. Like I say in all my work, leave a review at the end and I might reply to you in the next chapter. Now one more thing. This fic is a challenge option issued by Challenger. If you are interested in taking up a challenge option, my advice is to take a look at his profile, as he has a large variety of options, and I will likely be taking more of them after completing some of my other works. Now please enjoy the first chapter of my newest work._

**To Become A Monster**

Naruto sobbed as he sat atop of his one safe place, having been ignored by his parents so that they could train his sister Naruko, who they claimed to be the Child of Prophecy. Ever since the night of the Kyubi attack when the Sandaime Hokage had sacrificed himself to seal the giant fox inside of his sister, his father and mother doted on the girl, always saying that she needed to be ready for the decisive days when she would change the world. This led to Naruto being ignored by not only his parents but by just about everyone. A few hours earlier he had gone to his father and asked if he would help him with his academy jutsu practice, but the older blonde had told him no, saying that he was going to be taking Naruko out to train and work on some more jutsu. His mother had also said that she would be going with and just brushed off Naruto.

"Why do they always ignore me..." he sobbed.

"Who does?" a voice asked from behind him. Jumping Naruto turned to see a person standing there wearing all black, with an orange mask with only a single eye opening on the left side of the mask.

"My parents..." Naruto stated cautiously. The person nodded as he walked over and sat next to the blonde.

"I see. You're Naruto aren't you?" he asked, causing him to nod "I know about you. I've been keeping an eye on the Yondaime for some time now, and I see how he and Kushina treat you. It isn't fair is it?"

"No... Why do they always pay attention to Naruko?"

"Because they have made a mistake in thinking that she will one day change the world." the man replied "But I think they are wrong."

"You do?"

"Yes. I think that you are the special one. You don't have any of those gifts that she does, yet you work so hard and try your best in everything. That is something special that should be embraced by everyone, not ignored for some girl that has a demon inside of her."

"What demon?" Naruto asked. The man then told him about the attack of the Kyubi and how Naruko was the one to have the demon sealed inside of her.

"But just because she has some extra help doesn't mean that she is the Child of Prophecy." the man stated.

"I guess..." Naruto muttered.

"Tell me Naruto, do you know the story of the wolves and fox?" he asked.

"No."

"The story goes that there was a small and clever fox that got trapped by a pack of big strong wolves. These wolves made the fox hunt for them and bring them food, making them start to get lazy while the fox got stronger and stronger. It took some time but soon the fox was able to escape from the wolves that had gotten fat and lazy while the fox was now strong and fast. The moral of the story is that if you work hard you can do anything."

"Wow... I want to be like that fox." Naruto smiled.

"Maybe you can be Little Fox. Tomorrow is the festival for the Kyubi's defeat and the birthday party for your sister right?"

"Yeah it is..." Naruto nodded.

"Come back here tomorrow night, and I will help you escape this den of wolves." the man promised "Come back here tomorrow and I will help you get strong. Come back here tomorrow and I will care for you from now on."

Naruto started to smile and nodded his agreement "Ok. I'll be back tomorrow night... um..."

"Tobi." Tobi nodded as the blonde nodded his agreement and ran off from the top of the monument back to his home while Tobi watched, knowing that what had just set in motion would change the entire world. That night Naruto began his packing, getting what gear he was going to need in order to leave and make sure that he would be able to survive. As he planned he decided that since he was leaving he might as well take something useful from his parents, as a final way of sticking his nose up at them for the way they had treated him.

The next day his parents and his sister went out to do some shopping for the party, leaving Naruto alone just like he had wanted. He soon had the lock picked on the family library and grabbed the Scroll of Sealing that Minato had made and only let Kushina and Naruko look at. Naruto however had watched his father go into the scroll countless times and made sure to disable the security seal on it and then placed it by his pack. He then went to the armory where he started taking several of the weapons, including his mother's sword Aka rippā(Red Ripper) and making sure to remove his father's Hiraishin seal from all of the items. Once he was packed he waited until dusk when the party was in full swing and he was sure no one would notice him missing. Naruto slipped away into the darkness with the only one noticing that he had left at all was a young heiress to the Hyuga clan.

"There you are." Tobi stated as he saw Naruto approach, carrying a large pack with various items including a large scroll and a blood red katana "I see you brought some things."

"Just some stuff to help make me stronger or to live with." Naruto replied with a large grin. Tobi nodded and motioned for Naruto to follow him as they started to walk. By the time Tobi agreed to stop it was dawn and they were quite the distance away from Konohagakure no Sato.

"Now I'm going to tell you a few things while we rest." Tobi began as Naruto nodded "What we are going to do is head for a group of people that I have been gathering called the Akatsuki. There we can start training you and make you stronger."

"Are the Akatsuki strong?" Naruto asked.

"All of them are S rank." Tobi promised "And one of them has eyes that were once the same eyes that the Rikudo Sennin had." Naruto's eyes widened at this and he waited for Tobi to continue "We have plenty of very strong people that will train you and this way you will never be looked down on by anyone."

Naruto had stars in his eyes as he listened to Tobi and soon his masked friend told him it was time to get going again.

It was several hours past dawn when Minato finally noticed that Naruto was missing.

"Kushina? Have you seen Naruto?" he shouted.

"No!" she shouted back "I haven't seen him since last night!"

Minato frowned at this. He didn't spend much time with the blonde, but he always at least saw his son at some point during the day. He walked up to his room and opened the door to see that the bed was made and that there was very little sign that he was ever in this room. Minato searched around the house for Naruto but after not finding him he decided that he must have gone over to a friends house. A few hours later he went to the library to look through his scroll and decide what to work on next with Naruko when he saw that it was gone.

"Kushina!" he shouted as he found his wife "Someone has taken the Scroll of Sealing!"

Kushina's eyes widened at this and they next went to the armory where they found that Aka rippā was gone as well. They soon had an ANBU squad searching the village for the possible perpatrator and any sign as to where the items had gone, but to no avail. That night they realized that Naruto was gone as well. They searched for him through out the village but found that there was no sign of him. Minato had no choice then but to gather the ANBU and have them spread the search beyond Konoha's borders.

"Search the area, the entire border of Hi no Kuni. Find Naruto and bring him back. He may have been kidnapped by an enemy village. Odds are that they also took the items that we have found missing from my household as well." Minato ordered.

"Hai Hokaga-sama!" The ANBU nodded as disappeared. However by this time Naruto and Tobi were already over the border and entering Ame no Kuni.

The blonde was shocked by the constant rain that the country had and was shocked at how much water there was. Soon Tobi led him to a group of three people, one was a man with orange hair and black piercings sticking out of his face. His eyes were purple ripples and he seemed odd to Naruto. The next was a blue haired woman who had an origami flower in her hair and looked at Naruto cautiously. The last was the most unusual of the three. He looked like he was being eaten by a venus flytrap and his body was half white and the other half black. The Black half had a completely yellow eye and no mouth while the white one had a green eye and a visible mouth.

"Naruto, meet the people that will be helping to look after you while I am away." Tobi explained "The orange haired man is the vessel for the true man with the Rinnegan, Nagato." the man nodded calmly "The young lady is his friend Konan. And the last is Zetsu, a literal split personality."

"Cool." Naruto grinned as Zetsu just chuckled, in two different voices.

"Why have you brought him here Tobi?" Konan asked.

"He is going to be a valuable assest one day. This is the true Child of Prophecy." Tobi replied.

"Is he now?" Nagato asked calmly "What makes you so sure."

"Call it a hunch." Tobi replied "Like my hunch about how things would play out here a long time ago."

Nagato simply nodded and Zetsu spoke up.

_"So what can he do?" the white one asked._

**"Is he strong?" the black half continued.**

"He has potential, and he brought with him some very interesting items." Tobi smirked as Naruto set down the scroll and the katana.

"Those are items from Konohagakure." Konan noted "They belonged to the Hokage and his wife."

"And he is their ignored son." Tobi replied.

"I see. Then you are Naruto Uzumaki Namikaze. A distant relation." Nagato noted "I too am from the Uzumaki clan."

"So we're related?" Naruto asked with a grin.

"We are. I will help you train and be strong as well cousin." Nagato promised.

"I will too." Konan smiled as she looked at him "He will be quite powerful when he gets older."

_"I guess I can help too."_

**"Of course we will help."**

"Excellent. Now Naruto, you need to do what they say. I have important things to do and people to recruit. Nagato, get Kisame to help him learn kenjutsu, might as well help him learn to use what he took." Tobi ordered.

"I will inform him." Nagato nodded as Tobi looked at Naruto.

"Now you be a good boy for them and I will see you again soon." Tobi promised.

"Ok." Naruto nodded as Tobi turned and left while Konan kneeled next to him, placing a comforting hand on his sholder.

"Come on, you must be exhausted. Let's find you a room and you can get some sleep. Tomorrow we will see what you can do and help you be strong." Konan promised.

"Right." Naruto grinned as he followed the three into Ame. The next day Nagato and Konan took Naruto to a training ground where they had him do various exercises and had him perform every jutsu that he had learned. It wasn't much but he proved to be at the average level.

"We have a lot of work to do." Nagato stated as he took out a scroll and handed it to Naruto "I want you to learn a jutsu from here every month. The first few are easy, but they get progressivly harder. Also, since you can not seem to use a standard Bunshin I want you to go into the Scroll of Sealing and learn the Kage Bunshin. This will serve multiple purposes."

"Got it Nagato-sensei." Naruto nodded.

"Ok Naruto. I'm going to be helping you learn the knowledge aspect of being a shinobi." Konan explained "Because you can't just be all brawn with no brains."

"Right." Naruto nodded as Konan had him sit while she started with various practical aspects of being a shinobi and different bits of knowledge that he would need. Naruto found that his was rather difficult for him at times, but Konan was a patient teacher and wouldn't move on to the next subject until he had learned what she had wanted him to. Once they finished they stood up and saw that there was a blue skinned man approaching that looked like a shark, carrying a massive bandaged up sword on his back, along with two practice swords.

"So this is the brat that he wants me to train?" he asked.

"This is him." Nagato nodded "Naruto, this is Kisame, your kenjutsu instructor."

"Nice to meet you." Naruto bowed.

"Yeah yeah." Kisame chuckled as he tossed him the practice blade "Let's see what you got."

Naruto held the blade like he had seen his mother hold it when teaching Naruko and moved forward, swinging the blade at Kisame who blocked it easily enough but let Naruto continue the barrage of attacks and smirked that someone who had only seen this much and had never actually done any training himself could do this well. It was a few moments before Kisame blocked another swing and then stepped forward and disarmed Naruto with a smirk.

"You got some talent, and you seem to have watched some good people. But here is where I start pushing you to the point where you could eventually become a swordsman of my caliber." Kisame chuckled as Naruto felt very worried. The rest of the afternoon was spent working with Kisame who worked Naruto to the bone, straight to the point where he couldn't walk and Konan had to carry him back to his room, where she laid him down on the bed and made sure that he ate some soup that she had brought to him.

"Is this what it's going to be like every day?" Naruto asked.

"At first." Konan nodded "But things will get better."

"Really?" Naruto asked.

"Yes. Soon you won't be so tired after training and will be able to walk back on your own, and the training will get tougher and tougher. Soon you will be a force to be reckoned with, once you manage to complete your training." Konan smiled. Naruto only grinned as he ate some more before falling asleep. Konan only smiled as she tucked him in and walked out, letting the blonde rest.

Back in Konoha, Minato was worried about Naruto. He had recieved various reports from ANBU that Naruto was nowhere to be found and that they couldn't seem to locate him at all. What was worse was that they were no closer to figuring out which direction that he had gone in, or where those valuable items had gone to either. Minato sighed as he read through another note and then walked out of the room, only to find Jiraiya waiting for him.

"Minato." he stated.

"Jiraiya-sensei." Minato sighed.

"I heard Naruto is missing." Jiraiya stated bluntly.

"He is. I don't know where he went to." Minato explained.

"And how is that possible. He's your son!" Jiraiya exclaimed, shocking Minato "You should be looking after him!"

"I do!" Minato shouted back.

"Is that so? Then how is it that a five year old boy managed to take both the Scroll of Sealing, and Aka rippā, and manage to slip away without so much as a trace?!" Jiraiya asked.

"He must have been taken." Minato stated.

"By who? Kiri? They are to busy fighting themselves to do that. Kumo? They haven't tried anything since you made it perfectly clear that another kidnapping would end with another war. Iwa? They're too terrified of you to even enter Hi no Kuni half the time. Suna? They would more likely kill the boy and leave him as a message to you. Some other small country? They would have left a ransom." Jiraiya listed off "It's more likely that he ran off while you focused so much on Naruko." Minato blinked at this and was about to respond when Jiraiya cut him off "I've been back for a few days now and I've seen how you treat Naruto. You completely ignore him so you can train your daughter. It sickens me to see the way you treated your son, the way you ignored the boy you named after the character from my first book. You have disappointed me Minato."

Minato now looked down in shame as he realized the truth of his teacher's words. He had focused so much on Naruko, thinking that she was the Child of Destiny, but he had neglected Naruto and now it was possible that he would be unable to remedy that mistake.

"Do you know what has happened to him?" Minato asked.

"No I don't." Jiraiya sighed "I went to meet an informant that night and wasn't around for the party. But that is obviously when Naruto slipped away. Ask around and see who noticed him leave. You might get a lead from there."

Minato nodded at this and soon had his ANBU going to all the party guests to try and find out what had happened the night of the party. It didn't take long to find out that Hinata had seen Naruto leave, heading towards the Hokage Monument, and he soon had a tracking team up there, searching for him. They managed to find his scent and another person's as well and they were soon following the trail, all the way to the border where Naruto had crossed and was now beyond Minato's reach.

"I have failed..." Minato sighed. They were soon heading back to the village where Minato would now have to tell his wife that their son had left the country and was gods knew where, with gods knew who. For all they knew he might be dead. Minato felt shame at his actions and knew that Kushina would as well, knowing that they had driven their only son to run off.

A year later and Naruto was now standing at the level of a genin, having trained dilligently over the months, working hard to master all of the techniques that Nagato had given him. Konan had also drilled more knowledge into him so he could now state different facts about different countries with ease, along with various facts about the wars and important figures from various villages histories. Zetsu had taught Naruto about how to survive in the wilderness and the better aspects of espionage, teaching the young blonde to be a sneaky bastard and learn all that his enemies did before they learned anything about him. Kisame had kept up with the kenjutsu training and now Naruto could last a few minutes in a spar against the older nin, while still being able to walk back to his room. During this time there had been two new members joining. Kakuzu, a man that had taken interest in the blonde and helped him with his ninjutsu practice and even helped him work on his chakra control. The other was Sasori, who looked like a young boy and started teaching Naruto about poisons and puppets.

"Sasori-sensie, I'm not very good at this." Naruto complained as he tried to work the puppet Sasori had given him.

"It's fine. This is a complex skill. It requires great amounts of chakra control and lots of patience. However this is also good for chakra control and teaching you how the different puppets work so you can handle a fight against any puppet master from my former village." Sasori explained as he had Naruto continue his work. During this year Naruto had seen Tobi several times and he always brought back a gift for the blonde, giving him sweets sometimes, or new kunai and shurikens. At the moment the masked man said he was going to be away for a time while he settled some unfinished business in Konohagakure. Naruto was worried about his friend but was certain that Tobi would be fine. It wasn't long before another person joined their group, this one recruited by Nagato.

"Kukuku. So you're Naruto-kun." Orochimaru laughed as he saw the blonde working on his water walking exercise.

"Yeah. Who're you?" Naruto asked, gripping a kunai.

"My name is Orochimaru. I am a new member of the Akatsuki. Leader-sama said that it would be in my best interest to train you." Orochimaru chuckled as he looked at the blonde and could easily tell his parentage "I too used to live in Konohagakure no Sato."

"Why'd you leave?" Naruto asked.

"I was wronged. I was denied the title of the Yondaime Hokage, given to your father instead. Then my former teacher had the nerve to run me out while I worked on experiments to make one stronger."

"Stronger?" Naruto asked with a grin. Now Orochimaru had to grin as he realized that he had hooked the blonde and could now begin his experiments anew.

"Yes. Perhaps you might be interested in this?" Orochimaru asked.

"Yeah." Naruto nodded as Orochimaru motioned for the blonde to follow him so that they could begin. Naruto's screams ripped through the Akatsuki base, shocking both Konan and Nagato who had all of his bodies heading for the source. They found Orochimaru's room and the blonde strapped to a table while being injected by something.

"Orochimaru!" Konan shouted as she sent a storm of paper to seperate the man from the young shinobi "What do you think you are doing?!"

"Helping him." Orochimaru chuckled "He agreed to this experiment."

"Did he?" Nagato's Deva body asked with a glare.

"He did." Orochimaru promised "When the serum is done feel free to ask him."

It took several minutes but finally the serum stopped and Naruto ceased screaming in pain. When he opened his eyes they had changed from the cerulean orbs to red iris's with the whites now black. Konan gasped at the change and Naruto looked at her and smiled.

"It's ok Konan-sensei. Orochimaru helped me get stronger." Naruto chuckled as Konan got him down.

"What have you done?" Nagato asked Orochimaru.

"A new serum. This one brings out the latent potential in the person, unleashing their full strength. However I have had to add another serum that will help heal the person since this much power would shorten the lifespan and I am certain that Naruto would like to live for some time." Orochimaru chuckled "I have various other serums as well that I am sure that Naruto might be interested in."

"I need time to recover." Naruto replied "But I want more."

Konan and Nagato traded looks but knew that the blonde would not be denied. Konan then took Naruto back to his quarters where he would rest while Konan and Nagato informed Tobi about what had occured.

In Konohagakure Minato had thrown himself into his work, his way of trying to avoid the guilt. He had never stopped looking for Naruto, and any time that a foreign diplomat gave them a mission he informed the team to keep an eye out for his son. So far there had been no word of Naruto and this was more cause for concern. Kushina had taken on the full time role of training Naruko, having her work harder then her entire class and trying to forget about Naruto as well.

"Come on Naruko. You need to move faster then that." Kushina chided the young blonde girl.

"I am trying." she panted as they started again "I'm only human."

"You have to be more then that." Kushina reminded her "You need to be the best you can possibly be."

Naruko only sighed at this and they began going again. Naruko silently blamed Naruto for the recent change in her parents and she hoped that he was dead for this. She hated him for not having this grueling training thrust upon him and being trained night and day. Worst she hated him for being able to leave and do what he wanted.

A week later news reached Minato that the entire Uchiha clan had been murdered by Itachi. Minato had known that there was trouble brewing with the clan and Danzo had warned him that there might be a revolt if things didn't calm down soon. Minato had spoken with Fukaku several times and the clan head had agreed that it would not be in the best interest of the village if things didn't settle down, but the hotheads in the Uchiha clan wouldn't seem to listen. Now it seems that Itachi had snapped and killed all of the except his brother Sasuke, who Minato now had under watch, to make sure he didn't hurt himself or someone tried to finish the job that Itachi had started.

Tobi and Itachi soon arrived in the Akatsuki and found Naruto had undergone quite the change. The blonde had grown several inches, his eyes had changed and he was far stronger then Tobi remembered him being before they left. The blonde was currently sparring with Kisame and was holding his own quite well, given the fact that Kisame wasn't going all out against the blonde.

"Nagato, what happened?" Tobi asked.

"Orochimaru performed experiments on Naruto." Nagato stated "Naruto wanted them done, and he has changed signifigantly. His chakra control has stablized, and his reserves are as great as my own. His taijutsu skills are increasing and I have both myself and Kisame sparring against him regularly, though he is now roughly equal to a chunin in ability. His ninjutsu skills have skyrocketed as well. He is mastering ninjutsu left and right and Kakuzu and I are both running out of ninjutsu to teach him. It appears that his primary affinity is for Wind, but he can use the other elements easy enough to the point where you can barely tell the difference. Genjutsu just slides right off of him, and his kenjutsu is at the point where Kisame has to take him seriously sometimes to beat him."

Tobi blinked his one eye at the status report and reminded himself to thank Orochimaru for his. Naruto's progress shocked him but now that he had Itachi here he was certain that he could increase the blondes training regiment twofold at least.

"Keep an eye on him. And work him harder. I want him to be far stronger by this time next year." Tobi ordered.

"For what purpose?" Nagato asked.

"The village ignored the Child of Prophecy. I am simply turning that child into a monter to destroy the world." Tobi replied calmly as he walked away.


	2. Chapter 2

_AN: Alrighty folks. A few reviews for this story so let me get to those before I get to the other notes._

_Guest: The pairing option is open and something that I may or may not do, it all depends on where my muse leads me._

_Challenger: Glad to see that you approve of the opening chapter. Hope you like this one as well._

_Angels will bleed from pain: Glad that you like it. I know that you will update when you can, so don't get depressed._

_bad girl 61: Will she or won't she... That is the question... (Laughs evilly)._

_willowskeith: Can't argue with that, you'll just have to wait and see how it plays out._

_Ok now that that is done, some quick notes. First I will be killing off characters every now and again. I won't say who but I will say that Minato, Kushina and Naruko are safe for the time being since I have plans for them later down the road. Second is that my update speed will be slow since I have four active fics, counting this one, and possibly a fifth one coming. Finally as always, read and review._

**Returning Home**

It has been ten years since Naruto had left Konohagakure no Sato, and the blonde had undergone many changes, both physical and mental. He was just shorter then Itachi now, having undergone quite a growth spurt, and his eyes were still the red and black that they had become from Orochimaru's first experiment. He had gained many things from those tests, along with some that Tobi had done as well, saying that they would help him. He had gained a healing ability equal to most Jinchuruki, a hyper awareness of danger so he could easily dodge attacks that even he couldn't see, and a keen sense of smell and hearing. his mind had also changed quite a bit, becoming far darker then it had ever been before and he now saw most people as pawns, including the Akatsuki. Their goal to end war, or at least Nagato's goal, seemed foolish to him. Tobi had a different goal he knew but he had no interst in it.

The blonde was now walking through the halls, heading to meet up with Tobi who had said that he had a mission for him. The blonde wore all black, with light armor on his arms and legs, meant to be used a shields against an attack, as well as on his chest and back. He also wore the Akatsuki cloak over it all, but he didn't have one of the rings as he wasn't an official member. Over the years the lineup of the Akatsuki had changed, with Orochimaru having fled and new members joining, like Deidara and Hidan. At the moment they were mostly paired off, with Tobi being a shadow and Zetsu working alone.

"You wanted to see me?" Naruto asked as he entered Tobi's room.

"Ah yes. You see I owed Orochimaru a favor for his work on you, and he has sent me a message calling it in." Tobi explained.

"What does he want?" Naruto asked.

"Your help." Tobi replied as he explained that Orochimaru intended to destroy Konoha and wanted Naruto to aid him in this.

"And you think that this is a good idea?" Naruto asked with a smirk.

"I don't. So I am giving you different orders." Tobi chuckled as he explained Naruto's mission and then nodded for him to leave. The blonde only nodded as he went back to his room and reclaimed Aka rippā, strapping the blade to his side as he left the rainy country, soon arriving at Otogakure where Orochimaru was waiting for him.

"Ah Naruto-kun. I have been expecting you." he grinned.

"I was told that you called in your only favor left with the Akatsuki to get me here for this job of yours." Naruto remarked.

"Yes, but with this you can get your revenge against Konoha as well." Orochimaru promised. He then led the boy into the underground labyrinth and to the meeting room where there were several Oto nin along with Orochimaru's personal body guards.

"Now that we are all here, let us begin." Orochimaru stated as he laid out the map "The Chunin exams will be beginning soon, that is our opening. As an official village I will be sending in one team, meant to be cannon fodder for Sasuke once he awakens his cursed seal that I will place on him during the second exam. We won't begin the invasion until the third exam, when most of the village will be distracted by the finals. We have gained the support of Sunagakure in this, and the signal to begin will be their Jinchuruki transforming in the middle of the arena."

"And if he doesn't make it?" Naruto asked with a snort.

"He will." Orochimaru replied calmly "He has never sustained an injury in all of his missions, and he has gone on some very dangerous ones. He will destroy anyone that gets in his way. Now all of you will recieve different assignments on the day of the invasion, but as of now we are in the preparation stage."

"And what am I to do?" Naruto asked.

"You will be entering the exam as well. You will be a team from Ame, going through the exams. Your job is to ensure that Sasuke survives this situation so that I can claim him later." Orochimaru explained "On the day of the invasion, you are free to attack what you will."

"Fine. I will send word back to Ame to get a backround set up." Naruto replied as he walked out of the room.

"My lord, I do not trust him." Kimimaro warned.

"You would be wise not to." Orochimaru replied "I only requested that he be here because he can possibly turn the tides of a bad situation. He is as strong as most members of the Akatsuki."

The majority of the shinobi in the room blinked and looked at the door where the blonde had walked off, worried as to how dangerous this blonde was. It took two days for all the information to be established but once it was Naruto went on ahead with two henged clones to look like his three man cell. He took on an assumed name for this exam and had made sure to leave the Akatsuki cloak behind and take the Ame headband that Konan had sent him. As he walked back into the village he felt a wave of nostalgia hit him as he let his gaze wander the familiar sights. It wasn't long before he heard a disturbance in a side street and decided to see what was happening. Turning down the street he saw a young boy being held up in the air by a Sunagakure genin in a full body suit, with a blonde girl behind him. In front of him were two girls, one pink haired who Naruto quickly gauged as useless. The other was a blonde with long pig tails that Naruto immiedatly recognized.

"Put Konohamaru down!" Naruko shouted at the boy.

"Not til I teach this shrimp some manners." the boy retorted.

"Kankuro, stop it." the other girl sighed as she looked at her teammate "If Gaara finds out he will kill us."

"That's why I'll make this quick." Kankuro stated as he was about to punch Konohamaru. Before the fist could connect there was a short gust of wind as Naruto had moved past the two girls, caught Kankuro's fist and gripped the wrist that was holding the boy.

"I would put down the young boy before I lose my temper." Naruto warned as he looked at Kankuro who blinked at the eyes and remembered the report about the S rank nin that would be working with them with those eyes.

"Ok..." Kankuro stated as he dropped Konohamaru and stepped back.

"Good." Naruto nodded as he turned to look at the nearby tree where a red head with the tattoo of Love on his forhead and a gourd on his back stood "Enjoy the show?"

"Yes. Who're you that has awoken Mother so?" he asked with a monotone.

"You foe in these exams." Naruto replied calmly "I hope you can meet my expectations."

"Gaara..." the girl whispered as she stared at the teen who smirked before disappearing in a swirl of sand. Naruto only smirked as he looked at the other two Suna nin who turned and quickly left.

"I had it under control." Naruko snarled as she glared at the newcomer.

"Clearly you didn't." Naruto retorted as he turned and met her gaze, shocking the two girls with his eyes "If you had then I wouldn't have stepped in."

"Shows what you know." Naruko sniffed.

"Naruko, you shouldn't pick fights." the pink haired girl said, looking kind of scared of the new guy.

"I'd listen to your friend." Naruto nodded as he looked at the other girl and nodded at her, raising her total worth from completely useless to mostly useless.

"I don't care what you say Sakura, this punk just barged in like he owned the place." Naruko snapped.

"But..." Sakura tried to begin.

"Don't bothe Sakura-san. This brat likes hearing herself bark." Naruto stated with a smirk as Naruko glared at him "This is supposed to be the Child of Prophecy? I am disappointed."

Now Naruko blinked at his statement as the boy in black left them standing there. She was confused as to how he had known about that when only a handful of people even knew about the prophecy. Shaking her head she decided to keep an eye on this stranger and see how things would play out during these exams.

The next day the Chunin Exams began and Naruto and his two clones entered the building, walking past a crowd of genin caught in a genjutsu. Once on the third floor Naruto opened the doors and entered the room, moving off to the side where he could observe everyone. He spotted Orochimaru, disguised as a Kusa nin, using the same trick that Naruto had done with the Kage Bunshin. He then found Gaara and his teammates, staring at him with worry. Finally he picked out the Oto team that were going to be sacrificed for Orochimaru's plans. Odds were that they didn't even know what was going to happen to them and Naruto made an effort to memorize each of their faces. One was completely wrapped in bandages, looking like a mummy. The next was a boy who looked like an arrogant bastard. The last was a girl that as Naruto looked her over he decided that she was rather cute.

"Show time!" Naruko shouted as she kicked the door open and walked in like she owned the place. Naruto looked at her and her teammates and smirked at them as he saw them run a gaze over the room. When Naruko spotted the blonde with the strange eyes standing with two other people she moved towards them, but Sasuke stopped her.

"Don't be an idiot." Sasuke warned "You pick a fight here you might get us kicked out of here."

"They wouldn't kick us out." Naruko retorted.

"Yes they would. The proctors don't like anyone starting fights before the designated area." Sasuke stated calmly "And your parents can't do anything about it either."

Naruko huffed angrily at this and just shot the blonde a glare. Sasuke simply shook his head and decided to speak with the person that irritated his teammate so much. Walking over he stopped in front of the blonde and looked at his strange eyes that reminded him of the Sharingan.

"So you're the one that pissed Naruko off so much." Sasuke stated.

"I am. And you must be Sasuke Uchiha." Naruto nodded "I've heard a lot about you."

"You seem to have me at a disadvantage." Sasuke smirked "What should I call you?"

"Yami." Naruto replied calmly "These are my teammates Aku and Tsumi."

"Pleasure." Sasuke nodded as he looked at the two raven haired men who only nodded "So you're from Ame?"

"Yes." Naruto nodded "We're a fresh team and our sensei said that we should take these exams to see how we stack up against other genin our age."

"Not many genin in Ame?"

"Not really." Naruto shrugged. The two small talked for a few more moments when a platinum blonde tackle hugged the Uchiha.

"Miss me Sasuke-kun?" she asked as she hugged him.

"Get off of him Ino!" Sakura shouted as she moved to get the girl off of her teammate. Naruto smirked at this as he saw other genin approaching.

"Troublesome." a pineappled hair teen sighed as he moved by Ino, with a hefty boy who was munching on a bag of chips.

"As lively as ever!" a boy with a dog laughed as he and his team moved over by them.

"Kiba." Naruko smirked at the boy "I was wondering why I smelled wet dog."

"HEY!" Kiba shouted back at the blonde girl.

"Kiba, please don't fight." the girl on his team begged as she looked at the other genin and stopped her gaze on Naruto. She frowned at him and seemed to almost recognize him. Before she could say anything a boy with glasses approached.

"You guys sure are noisy." he stated.

"And who are you?" Naruko asked with frown.

"I'm Kabuto, a veteran of these exams you could say." he smiled.

"How many times have you taken it?" Sakura asked.

"This is my 8th time." Kabuto chuckled.

"Man you suck." Kiba laughed.

"It's not that I'm bad, it's that these exams are tough." Kabuto explained "But because I've been here so often I managed to gather quite a lot of information on the other competitors."

"Even first time competitors?" Sasuke asked.

"Yep." Kabuto nodded.

"Give me the cards for Rock Lee, Subaku no Gaara and Yami." Sasuke stated and Naruto smirked as he realized that Sasuke had identified him as a potential threat. Kabuto then took out the three cards and they had a picture of the person, their general skills and the amount of missons that they had taken since they had become genin. Lee was an interesting case, as he had no ninjutsu or genjutsu skills but made up for having exceptional taijutsu skills. Gaara had no real information except the amount of missions that he had taken and that he had never suffered a single wound on any of his missions. Lastly was Yami, who's card only had a picture of him, and everything else was blank.

"What's with this?" Naruko exclaimed.

"Sorry, but Ame has closed borders so I haven't gotten any information on this guy really except some rumors that I haven't been able to confirm yet." Kabuto apologized.

"What rumors?" the girl from Kiba's team asked.

"Well, those eyes aren't a Kekkei Genkai for starters. The next rumor is that he and his entire team are actually a lot higher in the skill department then chunin but they haven't been given a chance to test this yet."

"Because they are new genin." the pineapple hair boy stated.

"Exactly." Kabuto nodded "The last is that he murdered his previous team and that this one was put together at the last minute."

"That last one isn't true." Naruto stated calmly, shocking them "The others are, but that last one is false. I have been with Aku and Tsume since we were made genin a few months ago."

"That so." Kabuto nodded as he added the information to the card "Care to add anything else?"

"No." Naruto stated as he turned towards the chalkboard where a cloud of smoke appeared and then cleared with a team of chunin standing there with a man with a black bandana and some visible scars in front of them.

"All right you maggots! My name is Ibiki and I am the proctor for the first examination! Now line up, take a number and then take your designated seat and then we will get to the test." Ibiki ordered. It took some time before everyone was seated, scattered around the room and away from their teammates. Naruto was sitting next to the girl that was constantly staring at him, trying to solve the mystery of who he was.

"Now the first test is a written exam, and this is a team event. You will each start off with 30 points, ten for each member of the team, and for every question you get wrong you will lose a point. The teams with the highest point values will move on to the next round. Now for some details. If a member of your team fails to answer all of the questions then your team is out. If you are caught cheating you will lose two points. There are proctors sitting around the room making sure that you little shits don't try anything. Now you have one hour to complete the test, begin!" Ibiki explained.

The genin in the room all flipped their papers over and Naruto read over the questions and blinked at the difficulty of them. This would be too hard for a genin team to handle, even under the best of circumstances. Naruto thought of the way that Ibiki had explained the rules and realized that they had to cheat in order to answer the questions, meaning that there were probably several chunin scattered about the test takers with the correct answers. Smirking Naruto just started answering the questions, already knowing most of the answers himself, and he knew that his clones would know them as well. Once he was finished answering the nine questions he read over the little explanation that the final question would be given ten minutes before the end of the exam. Closing his eyes he let his senses spread out, listening to the sounds of people writing. Opening his eyes he saw that the girl had finished writing as well and he smirked.

"Done?" he asked.

"Yes..." she nodded.

"Who'd you copy off of?" Naruto asked.

"Some from a person a few rows ahead, and then the rest off of you and your team."

"Not bad." Naruto smirked "My name is Yami."

"No it isn't." she stated "I know that much for certain, but you are using a codename."

Naruto's smirk turned into an amused smile as he nodded at her "True as that is, Yami is all you're going to get out of me..."

"Hinata Hyuga."

"Hinata-chan." Naruto smirked as he saw a light blush come on her face. It wasn't long before teams were getting eliminated and then finally Ibiki was prepared to give them the last question.

"This last question comes with the option of wether or not you take it." Ibiki began "If you chose not to, you and your team will leave this exam now."

"Then why would we chose not to take it then?" a genin asked.

"Because if you get this question wrong, you and your entire team will remain genin forever." Ibiki replied curtly as many of the genin started shouting that this wasn't fair and that he couldn't do that "I can do this, and for those that have taken thise exam before, well I guess they never had me as a proctor before. So what will you all do?"

Naruto smirked at this and leaned back in his seat as Hinata looked a little worried but in the end she didn't raise her hand to be removed. Several teams left at this point and once all was finished there were still 22 teams left. Ibiki glanced over the room and in the end nodded his head.

"Very well then. For those of you that remain... You pass." Ibiki smiled, shocking all of them "Let me explain, the tenth question was the test itself. If you become a chunin and are asked to lead a mission, where you don't know where exactly your objective is, how many enemies there are between you and it, or the possible traps and defensive features that are made between you and it, do you take it or wait for a safer mission? YOU TAKE IT! There are no safe missions for a shinobi, and anyone that would rather wait for the guarantee instead of taking the chance on the mission doesn't deserve to be a chunin."

"Then what was the point of the questions?" Naruko asked.

"That was to test your information gathering skills. Almost none of you should have been able to answer those questions, so we had chunin scattered about the room with the correct answers for those of you that were clever enough to find them." Ibiki explained "This is because sometimes, the right information or false information can change the entire mission." Ibiki then removed the bandana revealing the torture marks on him. Naruto stared intently at this and nodded his respect for a man that could suffer such damage and still go on as a shinobi.

"To all of you that have passed I congratulate you and wish you luck. Your next proctor is..." Ibiki was about to finish when the glass was burst open by a black bundle flying in. Just as it was about to reach the center of the room four kunai shot out pinning the corners of it up, revealing a banner and a woman standing there. The banner read "Anko Mitarashi" in big kanji, while below it in smaller ones it read "Sexy Kunoichi".

"All right, don't celebrate just yet! I'm Anko Mitarashi, your second proctor for this exam!" Anko shouted as she started counting the teams and turned to look at Ibiki "22 teams left? You are slipping."

"We have some exceptional genin this year." Ibiki replied calmly.

"Hmph. Well by the time my test is over I'll cut their numbers in half." Anko smirked as the teams all looked scared, with the exception of a few individuals "Now come on and follow me!"

It wasn't long before all the genin were standing outside of a massive gated wood, with trees as tall as some of the buildings that Naruto had seen in Ame.

"Welcome to Training Ground 44, otherwise known as The Forest Of Death!" Anko grinned as several genin shuddered in fear while others just stared at her, waiting for her to get to the point "Now this exam is a survival exam. For five days you all will be locked in here, trying to complete your objective."

"And what might that be?" a genin asked.

"Glad you asked shit stain." Anko smiled as she held up two scrolls, one read Heaven and the other Earth "Now all you have to do is this, each team will be given a scroll to carry on them, and during the five days they must get the other scroll that will match theirs and get to the tower in the center of the forest. Now some general rules are this, you and your entire team must arrive at the tower, no exceptions. Do not open your scroll before you get to the tower, and finally try to stay alive."

"So we're allowed to kill in there?" Naruto asked with a grin.

"Yep, go right ahead. But it's not only the other teams that you need to watch out for, there are plenty of wild life in there that would love to munch on some tasty genin like yourselves. There are also plenty of poisonous plants as well, so be cautious." Anko explained.

"But what about food?" the hefty kid from Ino's team shouted.

"The forest has plenty of food for the experienced outdoorsman." Anko replied "Now all we need for you to do before you get your scroll is to fill out these liability waivers." Soon chunin assistants were handing out sheets of paper, and Naruto and his team were one of the first to sign theres and walk up to Anko to hand them in. Once they were finished they were allowed to get into a line where they recieved a random scroll, where no one could see them, and then assigned a gate number where they were to start off at. It took a few minutes for everyone to get their scroll and then get to their gate. Once there Anko gave them the go ahead over a P.A. system and they were off into the woods. Naruto smirked as he stopped and nodded for the clones to move on ahead, as he stopped and started to cut loose.

It took only ten minutes for Naruto to find his first team, a group from Kirigakure who were moving on the forest floor, trying to stay quiet as they planned on sneaking up on another team. Naruto only smirked as he struck from the shadows, Aka rippā drawn as he struck, taking the head off of two of them on the first pass, before turning and sending a wave of poisoned shuriken into the last nin who couldn't even scream in pain or fear as the poison closed off his windpipe, cutting off all sounds as the poison did it's work and killed him. Sighing at how easy it was Naruto sifted through their gear, taking some of their provisions and then their scroll, a Heaven scroll, which he already had. Shrugging he sealed it into a smaller scroll and then moved on, targeting the next team. For an hour Naruto went about and killed the stragglers, making sure that he took their scrolls as he did, managing to acquire three complete sets and an extra Earth scroll now. Having gotten bored of killing weak genin Naruto made his way towards the tower where he stopped to see Orochimaru attacking Sasuke and his team. Naruto frowned at what he saw but watched as Orochimaru played with the boy while Naruko had been incapacitated and Sakura shook in fear at Orochimaru. It wasn't long before Sasuke managed to unleash a surprise counterattack that trapped Orochimaru and hit him with powerful blasts of fire, but it was revealed to be a Tsuchi Bunshin.

"Impressive Sasuke-kun." Orochimau laughed as he extended his neck and bit into Sasuke, leaving the cursed seal on him. Naruto simply shook his head as Sasuke fell to the ground, suffering from the effects of the new mark on him while Sakura finally stopped being useless and managed to get Sasuke and Naruko to a shelter that she quickly rigged with traps. Naruto nodded at this and decided to move on, knowing that this was part of Orochimaru's plan and that it was too early to start following his orders just yet. It took him a few hours to reach the tower and when he did arrive he found that his clones were waiting for him and he stopped in front of the mural, quickly reading it and then opening the scrolls, at the same time, having a chunin appear who told him he had passed the second exam and that he was the first team to do so.

"Please head for your assigned room and rest there." the chunin stated as he went to inform Anko and the Hokage that a team had passed already. Naruto only smirked as the chunin walked off and he went to his room, planning on resting these next few days while he waited to see who would survive the forest.


	3. Chapter 3

_AN: Hello again everyone. I apologize for the delay, but due to some personal issues, such as losing my home, I have had to delay updating until now. However I am in a hotel and will be until further notice and should be able to maintain a steady update schedule. Now here are the reviews._

_Rikudo Naruto: Glad you enjoyed it, and I will consider the Mei option._

_RedHotMito: Only time will tell my dear reader._

_Guest: No Konan is not an option, I will say that now. Naruto, no matter how dark he is, sees her as more of a mother figure. That is a line that I will not cross._

_God-shadowEx100: I do not take well to threats, let me say that now. I will make the pairing anyone I so choose. I appreciate having readers but I will not be cowed into writing what the people want._

_Amidamaru88: Really... Did you not read the first paragraph? Naruko is the jinchuruki not Naruto._

_KHARAKI TAKAN: Ok, let me explain this. Naruto does know Hinata and while he has changed quite a bit Hinata can see some similarities between him and his younger self. Also Naruto is not one to just tie himself down, he is going to play on peoples expectations of him, which means he is going to manipulate people into doing what he wants._

_Ok, now let me add this in now. There is no one set pairing! Naruto will not have any true relationships, granted he may have sex with various women and he may seem like he is getting close to different people but he is only playing their expectations of what they want. Now on to the story._

**Corruption**

By the time the four days had passed Naruto had found that most of the teams had been eliminated, most by him, but several others were either defeated or dead. At the moment there were six other teams present and still a few hours left for any stragglers to arrive. Just as they were admitted to a large arena Team 7 arrived, looking like the forest had been rough on them. As the entered and lined up the jonin instructors arrived for the various teams, with Naruto spotting Konan there, which slightly surprised him that she had left Ame for this. It wasn't long before Minato stepped forward and congratulated them for passing the second exam.

"However there are far too many of you to move straight into the third and final exam. That is why we will be having a preliminary round." Minato stated, causing several of the genin to protest and question this choice "Let me explain. These exams are held not only to test your abilities but to show them to prospective clients and dignitaries from other villages. This can help your village grow stronger if you show that the genin from the village are skilled enough. However we don't want them sitting around for hours or possibly days while you all compete, that is why we will have a preliminary round to cut your numbers down even more."

"Sir, perhaps I should continue." a jonin stated as he moved forward.

"Go ahead Gekko." Minato nodded as he stepped back.

"Now these will be single combat matches, unless there are an odd number of you and which case we will have a three way battle for that. Now if there is anyone that wishes to drop out now is your chance, this will not affect your team." Gekko explained, coughing every now and again. At this point Kabuto raised his hand, as did Naruto's two clones. Once Gekko took down their names the three left and the back wall opened up to reveal a giant screen that was flashing through names until it stopped on two of them.

"The first match is Sasuke Uchiha vs. Dosu. All others please move up to the viewing area!" Gekko exclaimed. Naruto walked to the left with the Oto nin, Suna nin and Kabuto's two teammates. Konan soon joined him and stood beside him, both intent on the matches.

"Surprised that you're here." Naruto stated "Thought you would be busy with other matters."

"Nagato said that to maintain the illusion of you being a true genin that your sensei should be here. This is only for apperances." Konan replied "Now let's see what Itachi's younger brother can do."

Naruto only nodded as the match started. Dosu charged forward, revealing a strange gauntlett with holes on it that started emitting such a high pitch noise that Naruto was the only one that could actually hear it.

"Ouch." Naruto grumbled at the noise "That gauntlett of his is emitting sound."

"Interesting concept, taking down the opponent's balance." Konan nodded in agreement. Sasuke seemed aware of what the gauntlett did and it took only a moment before he finished the handsigns and launched his technique.

"Katon: Gōkakyū no Jutsu(Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique)!" Sasuke roared as he emitted a massive fireball that Dosu barely dodged, but Naruto saw what Sasuke had actually done and smirked as Sasuke rushed in, two kunai out, one with a flash bomb attached as he threw it while shielding his eyes. Dosu was caught off guard by this and when he tried to use the sound to stop Sasuke he realized that the fire hadn't been meant to stop him it had been meant to take out his weapon. Sasuke soon had his back and the kunai was to his throat while Sasuke had his arms trapped behind him.

"Winner Sasuke!" Gekko exclaimed as the Uchiha nodded before standing and then wincing as he grabbed his neck. Kakashi acted quickly and grabbed the teen before leaving, where Naruto noticed that the Oto's sensei left as well.

"So he did mark him." Konan noted.

"Yeah. Not much we can do about it." Naruto nodded as the next match was announced.

"Temari versus Tenten!" Gekko shouted as the two girls leapt down. Tenten was a girl from Lee's team and she was carrying several scrolls with her that Naruto was sure were all full of surprises. The match started and Tenten tried to defeat her opponent with a barrage of kunai and other throwing weapons but all Temari did was open her fan, swing it once to create a massive twister that threw Tenten into the ceiling where Temari stopped the twister and let the dazed girl fall on to her closed fan, taking all the fight right out of the girl.

"Winner Temari!" Gekko exclaimed as Temari threw Tenten off her fan before walking back up to the stands while the weapons were cleared off the arena floor.

"Konan-sensei, I'm going fishing." Naruto smirked as he nodded towards the other side. Konan only nodded as Naruto flickered from sight and reappeared on the other platform. Moving between a few people he stood by Hinata and her team.

"Yami-san." Hinata nodded as he stood next to her, while Kurenai looked at the blonde teen.

"Friend of yours?" she asked her student.

"Just someone we met during the first exam." Kiba replied "He really annoys Naruko."

"Oh really?" Kurenai asked with a smirk at the other blonde "And what exactly did he do to annoy her so much?"

"Stepped into a potential internation incident." Naruto replied "A Suna nin was about to hit the grandson of the late Sandaime Hokage, and Naruko wasn't helping the situation, so I stepped in and she got mad."

Kurenai nodded at this as the next match was announced, Zaku versus Shino Aburame, one of Hinata's teammates. The taller boy walked down the stairs where he faced the wounded Oto nin, who had both arms broken apparently.

"What happened to him?" Kiba asked.

"Sasuke did that to him." Sakura replied from down the line "They tried to attack us and when Sasuke woke up from his fever he beat them all."

Naruto only nodded at her explanation as he watched Zaku manage to move one of his arms and fire a blast of air towards Shino who disappeared in a cloud of bugs and reappeared behind Zaku while the insects moved towards the Oto genin.

"Give up. You are finished." Shino stated calmly "If you move your arm towards me the insects will swarm you, and if you keep it aimed at them I will attack you."

"You know, I think I can manage with this arm!" Zaku exclaimed as he lifted his arm from the sling and aimed the arms in two different directions. As he tried to fire the blasts again his arms exploded and Naruto chuckled as he realized what had happened.

"He had his bugs go into those holes didn't he?" Naruto asked.

"Yes." Hinata nodded.

"Impressive." Naruto nodded in turn "Never take an Aburame lightly huh?"

"Not if you want to live." Kiba chuckled as the medics took Zaku away and Shino walked back up to his team. The next match was Ino Yamanaka versus Sakura Haruno, and from the way Kiba sighed Naruto guessed that this was going to be bad. Once the pair were down in the arena they both adjusted their headbands to cover their foreheads and created two bunshins and then sent shuriken at each other.

"Kami above it's like watching academy students." Naruto groaned as he looked at them "Please tell me all the kunoichi in this village aren't this pathetic and it's just these two."

"They aren't." Kurenai stated as she glared at him.

"OH thank you!" Naruto exclaimed "I hate weak women."

Now Kurenai blinked at that, before refocusing on the match, where it was going at a snails pace before Ino apparently decide to cut off her long hair like Sakura had done some time in the forest. They fought for a few more moments before Ino struck, preparing to use her families technique and send her mind into Sakura's body. As she was about to do this she poured chakra into her hair and made it hold Sakura still while she launched her mind. Once in Sakura's body Ino was about to forfeit when suddenly Sakura took control again, forcing Ino's mind out of her.

"Didn't see that coming." Shikamaru stated from where he was leaning on the railing "Normally she can't be stopped forced out like that."

"First time for everything I guess." Choji replied as the match reached its final moments where they both charged at each other, slugged the other and both passed out.

"Kami that was pathetic. Can I get those minutes of my life back?" Naruto asked.

"Unfortunately no." Hinata replied "We all want them back."

"Agreed." Kiba nodded as Akamaru barked his agreement. Once the two girls were removed from the arena floor the next match was called.

"Kankuro versus Choji Akamichi!" Gekko exclaimed as the two walked down with Kankuro facing Choji with a smug grin. When the match started Choji used his own family technique to increase his size and become a giant rolling tank that charged towards Kankuro. Now Kankuro blinked in shock at this and leapt aside before opening the bundle and revealing a large puppet that he started controlling. As Choji changed directions to run Kankuro over the Suna genin only had his puppet move forward, extend a blade and make a small cut on Choji's side as he rolled past. Before Choji knew what had happened he was back to normal, screaming in pain.

"Winner Kankuro!" Gekko exclaimed as the medics ran in and loaded him onto a gurney.

"It's Silverthorn poison." Kankuro stated as he walked back up to the stands. The medics nodded at this and soon had Choji out of the arena and towards the hospital where he could be treated.

"The next match is Naruko versus Kiba!" Gekko exclaimed as the blonde girl cheered as she leapt down.

"Kick her ass." Naruto stated as he patted Kiba's arm.

"No problem." Kiba chuckled as he and Akamaru entered the arena, a smug grin on his face. Kiba made the opening move by feeding Akamaru a Soldier Pill and then the dog transformed into a feral looking Kiba. Kiba then immitated the transformation and the pair struck, spinning and becoming a deadly piercing attack that bounced around the walls and floor, making it very difficult to predict.

"Gatusga!" Kiba roared as they struck. Naruko only laughed as she dodged around the technique, following the flow and moving though the ever shifting gaps before she struck, just as they stopped.

"Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!" she shouted as she created a clone that targetted one of the Kibas while she went for the other. Naruto watched intently as she fought, picking apart her taijutsu skills and seeing that Kushina and Minato hadn't been lax on her training and that she was easily as strong as most chunin and that these exams were only a formality to get her a promotion. It took only minutes for her to beat both Kiba and Akamaru to a pulp and they were soon carted out as well.

"That sucked." Naruto noted "I was hoping Kiba would wipe the floor with her."

"Not very likely. She's one of the strongest shinobi this year." Kurenai replied "I'd be shocked if anyone here could best her."

"It's still early." Naruto replied "You haven't seen all the competitors yet, and I know for a fact that the red head over there will destroy his opponent."

Kurenai only looked at the blonde before turning her gaze to the screen for the next match.

"Hinata Hyuga versus Kin!" Gekko exclaimed as the two girls walked down and now Naruto leaned forward, looking forward to seeing how strong these two teens would be. When the match started Kin threw a senbon with a bell attached to it that Hinata dodged with ease and then Kin threw another two, one with a bell, one without that Hinata used a basic jyuken to block them both before closing the gap and striking several of Kin's tenketsu points sealing her chakra and forcing her down.

"Winner Hinata!" Gekko shouted as Hinata walked back up and Naruto nodded to her as the next match was called "Neji Hyuga versus Shikamaru!"

The two teens walked down and faced each other with Shikamaru already running the fight several moves ahead while Neji did the same thing and already had an idea of how to deal with Shikamaru. When the match started Neji had leapt away and took out a flashbomb, triggering it and causing all the shadows in the arena to disappear as he had closed his eyes and allowed his Byakugan to lead him to a blinded Shikamaru where he soon was closing all of his tenketsu points, letting Shikamaru collapse to the ground as the match was ended in a matter of seconds.

"That was ruthless." Naruto remarked "It was like night and day between you two."

"Yes... My cousin is very strong..." Hinata nodded, slightly worried about having to possibly face her cousin in the next round. The next match was Rock Lee versus Subaku no Gaara and Naruto knew for a fact that Lee was screwed up the ass. The match started with Lee coming to face Gaara's sand shield that protected him from getting hurt. It wasn't long before Gai gave Lee permission to remove his weights and when he did there was a loud boom as they fell to the ground.

"Kami... How much do those weigh?" Naruto asked Gai.

"As much as needed." Gai replied with a grin "Lee won't lose easily."

"Uh huh... Have you seen this guy he's facing?" Naruto asked as he saw that Lee was now fast enough to get past the shield and was striking Gaara. As he hit the teen Naruto saw sand dropping and realized that he was wearing a layer of sand as armor. It didn't take long for Lee to strike and unleash his technique, Omote Renge(Front Lotus) trapping Gaara in bandages as he slammed the red headed teen into the ground. However this proved ineffective as the sand had caught him and cushioned him. Gaara stood up and then sent mass amounts of sand smashing into Lee, as the teen was currently suffering from the after effects of using the technique.

"Well this looks like the end." Naruto replied.

"I have to agree with Yami." Kakashi nodded "Lee did good but he is taking the after effects of this technique."

"No need to worry." Gai replied "The lotus of the leaf blooms twice."

Kakashi blinked in shock as he looked at Gai "You didn't... That technique is too dangerous for a genin to learn. I'm disappointed in you."

"What do you know of that boy?" Gai asked as he looked at Kakashi. Gai gave a short summary of how even though Lee had no ninjutsu or or genjutsu skills he still worked harder then anyone he knew, and that by giving him this he gave Lee the potential to be a splendid shinobi. Naruto nodded at this as he saw Lee getting up and releasing more of the gates to fight against Gaara. Lee soon looked red as he moved so fast that most of the jonin could barely follow him and Naruto had trouble keeping track of the movements himself. Lee struck, kicking Gaara into the air where he struck by wrapping the teen in the bandages again and began hammering the Suna genin with such force and speed that Gaara's defense couldn't aid him at all. Lee ended the technique with an open palm strike combined with a kick at the same time, smashing Gaara into the ground, leaving a rather large crater. When Lee landed he looked like he could barely stand and Naruto knew that by using those gates he had pushed himself far past his limits. Looking into the crater Naruto saw that it was only Gaara's sand armor inside of the crater and that a mound of sand was rising with the real Gaara coming out from under it. With a maniacal grin Gaara struck, smashing Lee around before sending tendrils of sand to try and trap Lee. Lee leapt away and only had his right arm and leg caught and when Gaara closed his hand, crushed.

"Winner Gaara!" Gekko shouted as he moved to stop Gaara before he could kill Lee. Gaara was about to fully encase Lee when Gai leapt down and disrupted the sand, glaring at Gaara to make him stop. It took a moment for the sand armor to reincase Gaara and once it had he left, heading back up to the stands where Lee was soon carted off and Naruto leapt down for the final match, the threeway battle.

"The final match is the threeway fight between Yami, Yoroi, and Tsurugi." Gekko stated as the three faced each other, with Yoroi and Tsurugi both agreeing to take down Yami first then deal with each other "Begin!"

The match was short and decisive as Naruto targetted Yoroi and drew Aka rippā and cut off one of Yoroi's legs before taking his back, grabbing his head and twisting so his head was now facing his back. Tsurugi blinked in shock as he saw his teammate killed and before he could forfeit Naruto had thrown Aka rippā and it had pinned him to the wall as Naruto moved right in front of him, grabbed his arms and ripped them off, and then cut his head off. All of this happened in the span of less then twenty seconds, faster then Gekko could stop the match and stop him from killing the pair.

"Whoa..." Kankuro whistled as he saw how quickly the blonde with the strange eyes had killed the two other plants. Gaara was staring intently at the blood soaked blonde and promised the voice whispering to him that it would get its chance to kill this foe.

"Winner Yami." Gekko stated as the medics came in and removed the two bodies "Now would the winners please come down here so we can explain what the next round will entail."

It took a few moments for all nine of them to line up and once they did Minato stepped forward to explain the next round.

"Now the finals will take place in one month, giving the dignitaries time to arrive and see the matches. You will be seeing who you are up against in a few moments. The matches will be just like these were, with hopefully less death." Minato paused to give Yami a look that the blonde only smirked at "Now here is the line up. The first match is Naruko Uzumaki Namikaze versus Yami. Second is Hinata Hyuga versus Neji Hyuga. Third is Shino Aburame verus Kankuro. Fourth is Subaku no Gaara versus Sasuke Uchiha, Temari will then face the winner of that match. You have one month to train and prepare for the matches ahead. I wish you all the best of luck."

With that the genin all began to leave but Minato stopped Naruto to have a word with him.

"I want you to know that I do not approve of needless killing." Minato stated "I do not want to see good shinobi dieing pointless deaths."

"They stood against me, they recieved their fate." Naruto replied "Any that think to oppose me shall perish."

"Just know this, I am giving the ANBU at the arena next month permission to use deadly force if you do not stop when the proctor calls the match, against you and Subaku no Gaara." Minato warned "I will be informing him of this as well."

"So noted." Naruto replied as he turned and left "I'm looking forward to making your daughter bleed in front of your whole village."

Minato had to resist the urge to destroy this threat to his daughther and once he calmed down enough he left the forest, praying that things didn't turn out as badly as he feared. Naruto was soon out of the forest walking back into the village as Konan said her goodbye and returned to Ame. As Naruto walked he decided to take a soak and made his way towards the hot springs. As he approached he saw an older man peeking into the woman's side of the spring. Shaking his head he walked up towards the man and spoke.

"This is a quick way to get yourself killed." he noted.

"Shhh." the man hissed "I'm doing research."

"Research?" Naruto deadpanned.

"Yes research." he retorted "I need the inspiration for my books."

"What on earth do you write, Icha Icha?" Naruto asked, shaking his head.

"How'd you know?" he asked in shock. Now Naruto blinked in shock as he really looked at the man and finally recognized his godfather, the one person from the village that had ever taken notice of him.

"Just a guess. Pleasure to meet you Jiraiya." Naruto nodded as he turned to walk away before Jiraiya grabbed his arm and stopped him.

"Do I know you?" he asked with a frown "You seem familiar."

"Just a coincidence I guess." Naruto replied.

"Is that so." Jiraiya replied as he ran a cursory gaze over the blonde and started piecing together details "Well care to explain where you got that sword?"

"I found it." Naruto replied.

"Where?"

"Does it matter?"

"Yes, since it belongs to my former student's wife." Jiraiya stated "And given the fact that the blade was stolen you are either the thief or you picked it up off a dead body."

"Would it matter either way?" Naruto asked with a smirk "The Hokage has already seen me use this blade and hasn't said a word about it."

"That so..." Jiraiya nodded as he stared at the blonde "Well you weren't noticed then Naruto."

Naruto blinked and soon had a kunai out and at Jiraiya throat "How did you know?"

"I guessed." Jiraiya chuckled "Now are you going to kill me or not?"

Naruto glared at him but in the end he took a step back and decided to see how things would play out.

"So are you going to tell the village?"

"Why? You were able to get away with not only your mother's sword but your father's precious scroll without anyone noticing for over twenty four hours. You seem to have found a new home for yourself in Ame, so I'm content to let you be where you're happy." Jiraiya replied.

"I see why Konan-sensei and Nagato-sensei speak so highly of you." Naruto chuckled.

"You're getting trained by Konan and Nagato!" Jiraiya exclaimed.

"Yeah, and a few other people." Naruto replied "Look I need to take a soak, why don't you take a break from peeping and join me, we can talk there."

"Fine." Jiraiya nodded as he closed the notepad and stood up, walking in with the blonde. Soon the pair were in the hot water and discussing a few things.

"So what about Yahiko?" Jiraiya asked.

"He died. Hanzo killed him before they accomplished the take over." Naruto replied "At least that's what Konan-sensei told me."

"I see. It's a shame that he died. He was a good kid, they all were. So you became a shinobi over in Ame huh?"

"Yeah. After I ran away I made my way kind of randomly and wound up in Ame. Konan-sensei found me and took me in. They agreed to train me when I explained to them why I had left they both agreed to train me."

"That's good. So why are you here?'

"In truth, two reasons. First is for the exams, I wanted to test myself against people my own age. The second is because we owed a favor to Orochimaru."

"Orochimaru?!" Jiraiya exclaimed.

"Yeah. At my request he did some experiments on me, that's the reason why my eyes are like this, and he called in his last favor with us to get me to help him." Naruto explained "But I have my own plans for this, hence the reason I'm telling you all this."

"What's he planning?" Jiraiya asked.

"An invasion with Suna helping him. They plan on attacking during the finals in one month, with the signal being Gaara turning into Shukaku." Naruto explained.

"I see..." Jiraiya nodded "What else can you tell me?"

"He plans on killing the Hokage and destroying the village. He has plenty of forces and with a crazed demon attacking alongside the snake summons, he has the potential to do it." Naruto stated "However I plan on throwing a few problems in his way."

"How so?"

"First telling you all of this." Naruto smirked "Second is to deal with Gaara."

"You realize that I will have to tell Minato all about this." Jiraiya pointed out.

"That's fine. Just keep me out of it." Naruto replied "Just say that your informants gave it to you."

"Deal." Jiraiya nodded "Now how about I help you with something."

"What?"

"The Rasengan." Jiraiya replied as Naruto's eyes widened "I can teach it to you if you like."

"Are you kidding, of course I want to learn it!" Naruto exclaimed. Jiraiya smiled at this and soon they left and Jiraiya bought the supplies needed to teach the blonde the technique. The first step was to make a water balloon pop using your chakra. Naruto observed Jiraiya do it first with careful interest and once it was his turn he remembered how Jiraiya had made the balloon look and replicated it, sending his chakra in multiple directions inside of the balloon and then picking up the speed until it burst.

"Not bad. Now here's the next part." Jiraiya nodded as he tossed him a rubber ball "This step is all about power now that you have the form."

Naruto nodded as he started doing the same thing and then after a good thirty minutes managed to get a hole to pop the ball.

"A good try, but not nearly enough." Jiraiya replied "You need to make it explode like the water balloon."

Naruto grunted as he tried again with a new ball and quickly realized that this was going to be tricky as he went through another ten balls. Finally he just doubled the amount of chakra he was circulating and the ball burst.

"Impressive." Jiraiya nodded "You're learning this faster than Naruko did. Took her a few days to get this far."

"Guess we know who the real prodigy is now." Naruto chuckled darkly.

"Don't get cocky. Here's the last step." Jiraiya replied as he handed him a regular balloon "Now all you have to is repeat what you did on the last step, but not make the balloon pop, it's all about control."

"Control?" Naruto asked with a frown.

"Here, let me show you." Jiraiya shrugged as he walked over to a nearby tree "This is where you are currently at." He paused to make a Rasengan in his hand "You have the form and the power for it down, but not the control" Jiraiya then rammed the sphere into the tree, creating a massive swirl on the bark "It's a good stun technique that can send a person flying backwards but there isn't any real harm done to them. This is what the finished product is like." Jiraiya then made another Rasengan and rammed this one into the tree, shredding the bark and into the underlying wood "This one can be lethal if used correctly. It's why this is an A rank ninjutsu."

Naruto nodded at Jiraiya's explanation and then picked up the balloon and attempted to make the balloon stay stationary but after only two seconds it became lumpy and then popped with a large burst of wind. Scowling Naruto picked up the next balloon and tried again with only a second increase before it happened again. This continued for several hours which Jiraiya at this point had already walked off to do some more research while he still could. By the time the old pervert had returned Naruto was barely able to keep the sphere from popping.

"Not too bad gaki, but I'd call it quits for today. Get some rest and eat something and pick it up again tomorrow. You've already used a ton of chakra." Jiraiya advised.

"You might be right." Naruto panted as he set the balloon down "But I'm getting the hang of it."

"That you are. Konan and Nagato have taught you well." Jiraiya nodded "Here." he then handed Naruto several bills "Go get dinner and meet me here tomorrow. I'm going to go inform Minato about the pending invasion, could give us a chance to counteract the worst case scenario."

"Sounds good." Naruto nodded as he walked off, soon entering downtown portion and making his way to a ramen stand. As he started eating he made sure that the Kage Bunshin that he had shadowing him stayed nearby, just in case someone tried anything against him so he could trade places with the clone and then strike the person from behind. Once he was done he made his way towards the hotel where all the foreign teams were staying when he spotted Dosu and Kin leaving the hospital where Zaku would be.

"Dosu, Kin." Naruto nodded as he walked past them.

"Yami. May we speak to you for a moment?" Dosu asked. Naruto paused before nodding and motioning for them to keep walking.

"What is it?" Naruto asked.

"Orochimaru set us up." Kin hissed with an edge to her voice "We were sent to kill Sasuke in the forest but Orochimaru had marked him with the Cursed Seal, just like his personal guards."

"So you think that you were being used as mere test subjects." Naruto summarized.

"We know it." Dosu replied "He expected us to die in these exams, but we have surprised him. Now the problem is he will be wanting to use us for some new experiment, like he will be doing to Zaku. We were to late to get him..."

"Too late?" Naruto asked.

"Orochimaru already came by as our jonin instructor and took him out, saying he would take him to Oto for treatment." Kin explained "Odds are he'll be coming for us next."

"I see. And you came to me because..." Naruto trailed off.

"Don't play stupid. We know that you're the foreign operative that Orochimaru called in a favor to get. We know that you are strong, hopefully strong enough to beat him in a fight." Dosu retorted "We need your help."

"And if I do, what's in it for me?" Naruto smirked.

"What do you want?" Kin asked hesitantly.

"Your loyalty. Swear your fealty to me, and place an appropriate seal over your hearts that will kill you if you try to betray me and I will aid you." Naruto stated calmly "Do this and I will hide you from the snake and make sure that you grow strong enough to serve me properly."

"Agreed." Dosu nodded.

"Fine." Kin agreed.

"Excellent. Come with me and I will place the seals on you. Then I will give you the aid that you need." Naruto replied as he led them to his hotel room where he had them take off their shirts, Kin having a slight blush as she did, though Naruto was kind enough to have Dosu leave before he started hers. Once finished he had a specialized kill seal on both of them, ensuring their loyalty. Naruto then took blood from each of them and started the jutsu that Zetsu had shown him. Once he finished he created two copies of the two former Oto nin, copies that would leave behind corpses should they be killed, but lacked souls making them nothing more then dolls.

"These will take your place. Orochimaru expected you to die, but on the off chance that you didn't he would have ordered you to wait in your room. Now you will both stay here while I send these two to your room to wait for Orochimaru." Naruto explained as he finished making two seals that he placed on the back of each one's head and nodded as it was absorbed.

"Won't he know the difference?" Dosu asked.

"Nope. This is a technique that only one other person knows how to use, and this is a bastardized version of it. His version is much more durable and combat appropriate. Mine is just good enough to fool assassins and others that a target is actually dead." Naruto shrugged "The seals I put on them are basic instructions to tell them to move and do what Orochimaru says, but they have limited chakra and won't be able to last longer then 72 hours before they die. So I'm going to have to keep an eye on them until Orochimaru does the deed."

The two exchanged looks as they saw the two copies leave and Naruto create a Kage Bunshin to go with them and make sure that they stayed functioning.

The next day Naruto met up with Jiraiya again and continued working on the Rasengan while talking with Jiraiya about a few different things.

"So you're telling me that not only do you get paid for those books but you also get movie rights?" Naruto asked, completely shocked that the smut paid that well.

"Yep. It pays so well that I could stay in the nicest hotels, eat the finest foods."

"Hire the youngest whores." Naruto added with a smirk.

"Who needs whores! I am the Legendary Jiraiya, women fall to me like sakura blossoms in a storm!"

"More like run from you." Naruto retorted with a laugh.

"Hey gaki, notice anything?" Jiraiya asked. Naruto blinked as he looked at the balloon and noticed that it was perfectly smooth.

"... I did it..." Naruto blinked.

"Yep. Figured your problem was that you were trying too hard, so I distracted you while your body did the rest." Jiraiya explained "Memorize that feeling, it's the completed Rasengan. Or at least the furthest completed form of it."

"Completed form?" Naruto asked.

"Yeah. Minato is still tinkering with it. Says that he wants to add an elemental release to it as well, make it into an S rank technique." Jiraiya explained "Personally I think he's biting off more then he can chew. The technique is already deadly enough as it is, and adding in another high level step could be impossible, especially combining the peak of chakra manipulation with the peak of elemental manipulation."

Naruto nodded at this and filed the information away for further use. Jiraiya soon said his farewells and went off to help make plans for the villages defense, letting Naruto begin his wandering around the training grounds where he soon found Hinata training, trying to complete a technique. Naruto observed her for a few moments when suddenly Hinata spoke.

"You can come out now Yami-san." she stated. Chuckling to himself the blonde walked out of the tree line and nodded to her.

"Those are some good eyes you have." he smirked.

"I noticed you moving closer awhile ago and decided to see what you planned on doing." Hinata replied.

"Just seeing how your training is going." Naruto shrugged "Looks like you're having some trouble."

"A little." Hinata admitted "I am trying to complete a technique that's only passed down verbally through my family, but I just can't get it."

"Well perhaps a spar will point you in the right direction." Naruto offered as he set his sword aside and faced her "Show me what you can do."

Hinata stared at him before entering her own fighting stance and moved in, trying to use the jyuken to strike him. Naruto however was far faster then her and easily dodged her attacks by the smallest of margins, using light strikes to hit the gaps that she left open. They continued for a few minutes before Hinata stopped and leapt back before he could hit her.

"You're going easy on me." she frowned.

"No I'm not. I'm fighting at Neji's level." Naruto retorted "You weren't even able to make one blow against me and I was able to make several against you. You leave yourself too open when you take the offensive."

"Then what should I do, run?" Hinata asked.

"No. Fight defensively." Naruto replied as he walked back in front of her "Let's go again, this time don't make the attacks just counter mine."

Hinata nodded as they started again and found that this time when Naruto took the offensive like Neji would likely do Hinata was able to track his blows and use her own Jyuken to strike his arms and avoiding the worst of any possible blows. This time it was Naruto that stopped the match as he leaned back to avoid a strike and then took a step back to show that they were done.

"That was better." Naruto nodded "But against Neji that isn't enough. What's holding you back?"

"Nothing is." Hinata replied calmly. Naruto only frowned as he turned and picked up his blade before beginning to leave.

"If you say so. But while my eyes may not be as special as yours, they can see plenty that yours can't. I can see that you are holding yourself back, and that you are scared of facing Neji." Naruto stated as he walked off, leaving Hinata to think on his remark. Once he was out of sight he created a Kage Bunshin and had it shadow Hinata for the rest of the day, wanting to learn what it was that caused a potentially powerful shinobi to hold back so much. That night as he sat in his room with Dosu and Kin already asleep the clone disappeared and the memories arrived.

The clone had followed Hinata home where it had snuck into the compound and had watched as Hinata's father made her spar against her younge sister, who attacked her mercilessly while Hianta chose not to strike her younger sibling. After the match was over her father berated her pathetic performance and told her that if she were to lose to Neji in the finals that she would no longer be the heiress for the clan and that she would be placed into the branch family. The clone had watched for awhile longer and once it had seen enough it dispelled itself and now Naruto knew exactly the right buttons to push.

The next morning Naruto stood on the roof of the hotel, watching the storm clouds roll in and smiled at them. As he stood there he sensed the presence of another person arrive.

"Naruto." Orochimaru remarked from behind him.

"Orochimaru." Naruto nodded "What do you want?"

"I came to inform you that the Oto nin have been collected, and to thank you for tieing up those loose ends with Kabuto's team." Orochimaru nodded.

"Not a problem." Naruto replied "They thought they could beat me."

Orochimaru chuckled at that as he walked to stand beside Naruto "Everything is moving accordingly."

"Good to know." Naruto nodded "And I finally get to put my mouthy sister in her place, it's going to be a day to remember."

"Feel free to kill her." Orochimaru grinned "No sense in leaving the demon in a container that could be a threat later."

"I might, I might not. We will see." Naruto replied with a shrug as he faced Orochimaru "Anything else?"

"No that is all. I will be going to deal with the Kazekage, so you will be on your own here until the invasion." Orochimaru explained.

"Noted." Naruto nodded as he walked away "Now if you will excuse me I have things to do."

"Of course." Orochimaru nodded as he left in a swirl of leaves. Naruto made his way back to his room and found Kin and Dosu still there, looking at him.

"You're safe for now." Naruto stated "Orochimaru has left to work on the next step to his plan."

"That's a relief." Kin sighed.

"Tomorrow you will be leaving, you know where you have to go. Once I am able to I will send a clone to meet you and give you the scrolls and items I want you to start learning how to use." Naruto explained "So lay low for today and when you leave make sure that you use a henge to slip past the guards, especially since Kabuto is still around."

"Of course." Dosu nodded as Naruto turned and left, soon arriving at the training ground where Hinata was training again, practicing her jyuken on a log. Naruto waited a moment before speaking.

"You're afraid." He stated causing Hinata to turn and stare at him "You fear hurting your family, but you also fear being hurt in turn. You're afraid of having that cursed seal placed on you, but you are also afraid of it being placed on your sister. Your fear bleeds from you, permeating the very air around you. You will never beat Neji, or any true shinobi the way you are."

"What are you talking about?" Hinata asked.

"Your fear is what hinders you. Your fear is what has stopped you from growing and being strong." Naruto replied calmly as he walked closer "When you strike it says I'm afraid of hurting you, when you dodge it's I'm afraid of being hurt. Even when you protect someone it says I'm afraid of them being hurt. You must abandon this fear if you wish to survive."

Hinata tried to speak but Naruto just kept on going.

"You do not want your sister to be hurt, but you do not want to be hurt in turn. There is no safe path in life. Someone must be hurt in order for others to live. It is the simple fact of all life. The weak become food for the strong, but you try to change that with your cowardice? That is simply becoming weak. Rise up Hinata, face that fear of yours, strike down your enemies, do not let them strike you, do not let those you care for be hurt. Abandon that fear and replace it with your rage. How dare they try to hurt you, how dare they try to hurt your precious people. Let your rage out, let it roar to the heavens!" Naruto roared.

Hinata blinked in confusion as she felt Naruto's words strike her in her core and knew that he was speaking the truth, but she didn't want to hurt Hanabi or Neji. But she didn't want to be hurt by her family. Hinata tried to find a way to not have to face his words but his eye's had captured hers and she knew that running wouldn't help her. As she stared into those demonic eyes she could see her own pain and fear reflected in them, see how weak she looked right now. She hated it. She hated that she looked so pathetic in his eyes, hated that she knew this was how her family saw her. She could feel the anger, feel the rage at how she had acted rising up. In a wordless howl Hianta screamed, just as the storm broke. Naruto only smiled as he finally broke her, his plan going so smoothly. Stepping right in front of her, he placed a hand on her sholder and kept his gaze locked with hers.

"Be strong. Do not let those that would hinder you stop you. Do not let your fear rise up again. To be scared is fine, but never let it control you. Face your fears. If you do not want to be trapped in the same way Neji is, rise up and defeat him. Show that you are stronger then him, then your sister. Show your fangs and rip out the throats of those that would harm you." Naruto said "Become a Shinigami if you must, but never let yourself become weak."

Hinata stared at him and felt that she really did know him from somewhere but right now his words pounded into her head and she saw the truth in them, could see that he had gone down a very similar path and was trying to make sure that she did as well, to set her free and to become a more powerful person. Tears started to form on in her eyes and when they dripped down they were lost in the deluge that had struck them.

"I'm scared..." she whispered.

"Don't let it control you." he said.

"I don't know if this is right..."

"We never do."

"What if I hurt someone I love..."

"If they would seek to hinder you then they do not love you." Naruto replied calmly.

"But..."

"Do not be timid. Be a predator. Be strong and fierce. Be a being that fears no one." Naruto hissed "Be the true Hinata Hyuga!"

Hinata stared at him and could feel the pure strength radiating from him, drew it in to herself and she realized that she wanted to be like this man, to be strong and confident, to be free of the shackles that her family had placed on her, that her fear had placed on her. She wanted to be able to be a strong shinobi, to not be held back by anything.

"Show me." Naruto growled "Show me how strong you really are!"

Hinata didn't even know what she was doing when she struck, trying so desparetly to hit this man who seemed to egg her on. Naruto moved around her blows and sent his own in return but Hinata would let nothing strike her as her arms moved on their own, all hesitation gone from her as she blocked and countered his every move while he dodged around her strikes, keeping his movements to those of the average chunin and showing her that she could be a powerful woman. The pair were locked in this intracate dance for nearly fifteen minutes the rain still pouring and lightning flashing as they did, but finally they stopped, facing each other as Hinata started to laugh.

"This is what it's like to be strong?" she laughed.

"This is only the tip of the iceberg my dear Hinata-chan." Naruto chuckled "But this is the first step."

"What do I have to do to take the rest?" she asked with a grin.

"Be patient." Naruto replied "The next step is to defeat Neji. After that we will talk about what you can do to become the true shinobi you were meant to be." Hinata only nodded as Naruto turned and started to leave "Train hard, grow stronger and stronger. Rise up to my level and stand beside me if you can, or fail and fall back to depths of despair you have crawled from. The choice is yours, but I do not want the weak to stand beside me."

Hinata only nodded at his words and started for home, intent on meeting his expectations, this man who would push her to be more then she thought that she could be.


	4. Chapter 4

_AN* Hello again everyone. This I must say has been one of my favorite chapters to write. Anyways let's reply to those reviews._

_God-ShadowEx100: Seriously dude? What the hell crawled up your butt and died? I mean really I don't like certain people but this is harassment. You are the lowest of the low if this is what makes your feel better about yourself._

_Rikudo Naruto: Glad that you liked it. I had to think a lot about how Naruto would be if he grew up with the Akatsuki._

_KHARAKI TAKAN: Ok, first I am just tired of writing her stuttering and my theory is that she would not have the same confidence issues. She is still timid but I am not writing the stuttering. Next, as for the whole Sakura and Ino fight. Naruko is a self absorbed bitch, so she wouldn't be shouting encouragement to her teammates. Kushina hasn't seen Naruto yet, and Minato hasn't seen the sword in awhile and it will explain why Minato hasn't recognized it or mentioned it. Also, he wasn't using Edo Tensei, it was Zetsu's technique that he used to make that fake Kisame in the canon plot that fought Killer B, Naruto just created his own version of it based on what Zetsu showed him. As for him revealing Konan and Nagato being alive, Jiraiya is darker in this fic, and he still cares for his former students, and it's not like Naruto told him that they were in the Akatsuki. Minato is still trying to master it at this point, but he is still more focused on training Naruko and managing the village. As for the Hinata fight, just keep in mind that I only showed three days after the preliminaries, Naruto has spent every day making Hinata stronger, so just wait and see what happens. Thanks for leaving such a long and detailed review, makes me happy to know that there are people that really care._

_Angels will bleed from pain: He has changed quite a bit, so no one really knows it's him. And trust me he does know other things, he just hasn't used them yet._

_Patriot-112: Naruto doesn't really have feelings of love or other what he deems, weaker emotions. All that is in him is a lust for power, a desire for revenge, and the drive to do what is necessary to accomplish his goals._

_Guest: At least you understand what I have to deal with. And as for his family, well you will see and I am pleased to see that I am portraying them right._

_A W: Naruto has his reasons for wanting it. One of the few things that he wants to do is to turn everything that his father has accomplished and turn it against him._

_God of Cake: Yes Naruko is annoying, and Naruto has been learning from the scroll, as I will show in later chapters when he really starts cutting loose and faces much stronger opponents._

_Fush n Chups: Sir, this is a challenge fic, meaning that I had pretty good set up for. This is in no way me, as I personally am not nearly as dark as Naruto has turned out in this one(though I have to admit that I am enjoying writing this one). An example of Gary Stu from me would be my Claymore fic._

**A Matter Of Family**

The day of the finals dawned and Naruto only smiled at the events that were about to unfold. Today he would get the chance to show how weak his sister really was, today he would get to see if Hinata was indeed worthy of standing beside him and today would be the day that this village got the wakeup call that it was no longer the strongest out there. It only took a few moments for him to leave the hotel, walking through the streets as he made his way into the arena and found that only the Suna siblings were there, and all three of them seemed focused on what was about to happen.

"Yami." Temari nodded when she saw him "Is everything ready?"

"I haven't been told anything is amiss." Naruto replied calmly as he leaned on the railing overlooking the arena floor "You all know what to do, just play it safe and stay together and you'll be fine."

Before anything else could be said Neji walked in and glared at the four before taking a seat as the other competitors arrived. Hinata walked in after Neji, her jacket now open and her timidness gone. She smiled at Yami and stood beside him, her way of saying that this was where she was going to stand by the end of the exams. The next person to enter was Shino who nodded to Hinata before taking a seat as well, seeming to prepare for his match. Finally Sasuke and Naruko walked in, both looking confident after the month of training and Naruto was looking forward to seeing Sasuke's growth if he was to be of any use later.

Naruko glared at Yami, knowing that they were first and she was looking forward to putting that smug bastard in his place. Minato had warned her that he was dangerous but she just chalked it up as her father being overprotective.

_"I mean I'm the strongest genin of our generation. There's no way that some no name shinobi from some piss poor country can beat me." she reasoned to herself._

It wasn't long before they were all called down to the matches and Naruto looked up at the Kage box and saw that Minato was up there with Kushina sitting to his right while to his left was Orochimaru disguised at the Kazekage. Minato then gave a short speech about the honor it was to have such fine genin taking part and that they should all be honored that they had made it this far. Once he was finished the proctor for the exam stepped forward and announced the first match.

As the others left Naruto and Naruko faced each other for the first time in a long time. Naruto remembered how they had sparred in the academy and his sister had always won. Now he was looking forward to crushing her, and making his parents watch as their favorite child was destroyed.

"Begin!" the proctor shouted.

"You should just give up." Naruko chuckled as they circled each other.

"Why would I do that?" Naruto asked with a grin of his own.

"You don't stand a chance against me."

"I beg to differ." Naruto replied as he gripped the hilt of his sword "I could have killed you five different ways while we talked."

This caused Naruko to frown as she stared at him, waiting for him to draw and strike so she could counter it with the kunai defense her mother had taught her, but Naruto didn't do that. He flickered from sight as he appeared in front of her, his fist buried in her gut as he lifted her off the ground. Before she could recover he twisted and delivered a kick that sent her flying across the arena and smashing into one of the walls.

Minato and Kushina were stunned at what had just happened. They knew that this shinobi was a strong competitor but they had upped Naruko's training to handle this. Now here was this unknown shinobi that had sent the girl flying in the span of a heartbeat. What was most unnerving was that he now stared at them as if to say "I hope you're watching."

Naruto turned and saw that Naruko had gotten back up and was now sending a swarm of shuriken at him that he simply drew Aka rippā and decided to show off a bit. Channeling his chakra down the blade an unearthly howl started to come from the blade and Kushina's eyes widened as she realized what he was doing.

"Gurētā seishin ken(Greater Spirit Sword)!" Naruto roared as he swung the blade infused with all five chakra affinities at the swarm of weapons and a blast of pure destruction went off, destroying the weapons and smashing into the wall that Naruko had been near, startling the spectators that had been watching. Naruko had been smart enough to move when she saw what he had just done and knew that she was at a disadvantage as long as he had that blade. What shocked her the most was the fact that he could do that technique. Her mother had told her about it, saying that it required a shinobi to have at least a minor affinity with each element to activate the Gurētā seishin ken, and the strongest of affinities to use it like Yami just had.

"What's the matter? Scared?" Naruto shouted at his sister and saw her bristle as he only smiled "If you won't come to me, then I'll come to you!"

Naruto took off at a sprint that only a few of the jonin could follow and they saw that he had Naruko at a complete disadvantage as he crossed the distance, swinging the howling blade at his sister who tried to use two kunai to block the attack and disarm him, but she didn't realize her mistake until it was almost too late. The Gurētā seishin ken not only could create a blast of pure destruction it also enhanced the blade to the point it was next to unstoppable. The Wind chakra would enhance the edge to cut through anything while the Earth chakra would increase the density of the blade so it wouldn't be broken, The Water and Lightning chakras would mix to paralyze the target while the Fire chakra would cauterize any wound, making it all the harder to heal. With this Naruto had Naruko at the perfect disadvantage with this weapon. As Aka rippā hit the kunai there was a moment that the kunai held before the blade started to slice right through them, shocking Naruko who leapt away, just as the blade finished it's arc and created a perfect slash into the ground.

"Too slow." Naruto chuckled as he swung in a sideways slash that forced Naruko to drop to the ground to avoid the blast of destruction. With this technique Naruto controlled his zone perfectly and could attack from afar, forcing Naruko to try and think of something but she quickly realized that as long as he used this technique she couldn't win. Naruto only smiled as he stopped channeling chakra into his blade and sheathed it before walking slowly towards Naruko who looked confused.

"I vowed to myself when I found out that I was facing you first, that I would destroy you in every sense of the word. I've just proved my superiority in both ninjutsu and kenjutsu in that one moment. And I should warn you, while I can't make a genjutsu that wouldn't trap everyone in this arena with you, I am immune to them myself. That only leave taijutsu." Naruto chuckled as Naruko glared at him before charging in, trying to find his opening. Naruto only blocked her strikes as if they were merely flies buzzing around him. It didn't take long for him to start to press the attack and push Naruko back before he began his brutal assault on the girl.

It started with dodging her left hook and going under her arm and delivering three rapid punches to her ribs. As she twisted in pain to grab that side he struck with a rising kick that caught her chin, sending her flying straight up as he jumped up after her, delivering another set of punches to her unprotected stomach and then delivering a flip kick to knock her back down to the ground. Once they were on the ground and Naruko stood shakily Naruto moved into her gaps and pressed the advantage, beating her until she was a bloody wreck. Once she collapsed on the ground Naruto stopped before turning and walking away, knowing that the proctor would likely call the match in his favor. What he didn't expect was to feel her gather chakra and he turned to see her about to hit him with a Rasengan. Twisting and crouching he dodged the attack before rising up, grabbing the arm that had the Rasengan at the wrist and elbow, then brought up his knee and broke her arm with a sickening crunch.

"You're finished." Naruto said as he saw that she had another Rasengan ready in her other hand and was going to try and hit him with that one as well. Naruto turned, keeping a grip on her right arm's wrist before taking her back, and grabbing her other arm before sweeping her legs out from under her, forcing her to her knees. Placing a foot on her back as he pulled her arms behind her he shouted.

"Call the match or I WILL rip her arms off!" he roared. The proctor blinked at the threat but realized that Yami would follow through.

"Winner Yami!" he shouted as the red eyed blond simply kicked Naruko down into the dirt before walking off towards the viewing box.

"Naruko..." Kushina whispered in shock at what had happened to her daughter.

"That was horrible." Minato sighed "I should have known he would have done something like this."

"It could have been worse." Kazekage noted "I read the details of the preliminaries, and he could have killed your daughter easily enough."

"True." Minato nodded.

It wasn't long before Hinata and Neji walked down into the arena and faced each other, Neji slightly worried about the change in Hinata. Hinata on the other hand was showing pure confidence, knowing that she couldn't fail if she wanted to get stronger and prove herself to both Yami and herself. The proctor started the match and Neji was about to verbally berate Hinata but she had charged in before he could begin and made several strikes on him that shocked him. Leaping back he glared at Hinata who smirked and decided to play mind games herself.

"Odd." she stated as Neji frowned "You once asked me while we sparred why I moved away. Should I ask you the same thing? Why did you flee just there?"

Rage was clearly evident on Neji's face and he charged in, aiming to strike her with the jyuken but Hinata flowed like water, remembering the downpour she had fought Yami in and brought those movements to her battle here, weaving through the attacks and dodging them by the smallest of margins while sending her own attacks into the gaps, striking various points but unable to strike the points that she really wanted to strike, his arms. After a few moments of the back and forth that they had just done they both moved back a bit to breathe.

"You are still a failure." Neji spat "So you managed to make some small strikes on me, it won't change anything!"

"Won't it?" Hinata asked "Not so long ago I couldn't even strike you. Now I have managed to hit you ten times and you have yet to strike me."

Neji's rage skyrocketed at this statement and with a roar of anger he charged in again trying to silence this pest that thought she stood above him. Hinata simply let his rage get the better of him as she maintained her defense and let him break himself upon it. It took a few moments for Neji to finally calm down and realize that Hinata had already closed far too many tenketsu points for him to continue fighting like this. Moving back he shifted his stance and grinned wickedly at the girl.

"You're in my divinitation!" he grinned. Hinata blinked in shock that he knew this technique and knew that she wouldn't be able to dodge it. The strikes were brutal and viscious but after the completion Hinata was on the ground and coughing up blood as all of her tenketsu points were closed. Standing up shakily she glared at Neji who felt that he now had the advantage.

"You're finished. I have closed all of your tenketsu points, there is no way you can use the gentle fist anymore." he boasted, just as Hinata entered his zone, her fist slugging him across the face and sending him sprawling onto the ground as the girl stood over him before placing a foot on his chest and slugging him again and again, keeping the barrage up until he was barely conscious and she moved back, thankful for the extra sparring sessions that Yami had given her. He had shown her how to fight without the gentle fist, saying that in the end she couldn't always rely on this style and having a different style under her belt would make her even stronger.

"Your arrogance will be your downfall Neji-ni-san." Hinata spat as she kicked him across the field, letting him try and stand despite the concussion he now had along with the broken nose and swelling eye.

"Pathetic. Can't even beat me without fighting like some gutter wench." he spat, literally spitting out a glob of blood.

"And yet you are the one losing here." Hinata replied with a smirk as Neji prepared to kill this insufferable brat. As he charged in again Hinata flowed with his strike, sweeping his legs out from under him as she brought up her leg and kicked in his falling midsection before using a double hammerfist to smash into his back that was held up by her knee, letting them hear the audible crack as she damaged his spine. Moving away Hinata looked at the proctor who soon called the match in her favor as she looked at her father who had a displeased look on his face. She then turned her gaze towards Yami who nodded at her with a small grin on his face that showed that she had managed to prove to him that she had potential.

Once the medics had taken Neji from the battlefield the proctor called for Shino and Kankuro to come down, but the puppet user shouted that he forfeited. Frowning the proctor called down Gaara and Sasuke, with the two both entering the arena. Sasuke had trained til he vomitted blood this past month to make sure that he could defeat Gaara, all so he could have a chance to face the true challenge of this day, Yami.

"Begin!" the proctor called as Sasuke sent a few shuriken towards Gaara who let his sand intercept them before he did something shocking and had the sand rise up and turn into a copy of him before throwing the shuriken back at Sasuke who dodged the weapons with ease as he had his Sharingan activated and prepared to take down this threat. Charging in he shocked Gaara by being just as fast as Lee was and slipping by the sand shield, managing to deliver a few kicks to the teen that shocked him before he sent waves of sand at Sasuke forcing the teen back as he glared at the Suna nin. Gaara soon had a grin stretching his face as the sand wrapped around him, creating a dome with an eye appearing over it to watch what was happening outside. Sasuke frowned as he charged in and tried to punch through the barrier but found that not only was it stronger then he thought, it also sent out massive spikes toward anyone that tried to attack it.

Sasuke had barely managed to dodge the spikes and he cursed as he realized that he was going to have to reveal his ace in the hole if he wanted to get past this fight. Moving back he flashed through a few handsigns before holding the finished technique.

"Chidori!" he shouted as he ran towards the barrier, his Sharingan letting him avoid the spikes as they came out and he stabbed the barrier, punching through it and leaping back as a monsterous arm shout out after him, shocking him at that as he saw some kind of rippling inside the sphere.

"This is blood... MY BLOOD!" Gaara shrieked as the dome dropped and he was holding his wounded sholder.

Naruto smirked at this and looked up to see that a flare had gone up and Temari and Kankuro had gone down to collect their brother before more damage could be done against him. Naruto started to laugh as the invasion began and he could begin following his true orders.


	5. Chapter 5

_AN* Hello again my dear readers. Here is the latest chapter for Dark Empire, but before we begin let me answer the reviews._

_KHARAKI TAKAN: Ok, another long review from you, which I do enjoy. To begin, Jiraiya is darker in this, but not evil to put your mind at ease. As for why, well the child that had been named after the character of his first book gets ignored and treated like he's nothing by his star pupil. Then that child not only runs away, but manages to stay hidden for more than ten years? Needless to say that Jiraiya is very disappointed in Minato and is thus angry at him. Next I will give more Hinata back story later on to explain why she doesn't have the same major confidence issues. As for Aka Rippa, well there have been many copies and knock offs of it running around and in their mind there is no way a genin from a small country like Ame would have the real sword. Jiraiya noticed it because he was the one that had given that sword to Kushina before the war. Now Naruto does consider everyone pawns, but you can't win a chess game with only pawns. You need more powerful pieces to move around and that is what he is doing with Hinata, grooming her up to be a more powerful weapon to him while making her loyal to him at the same time. He is playing mind games with her and letting her think what she wants. Now as for the whole Hinata beating Neji, Naruto is going to explain how she did that in a few chapters so just be patient, but you are right that she shouldn't have won, but let's just say that Naruto helped her cheat. And I am sorry if the last fight was hard to understand, it was meant to essentially follow the canon._

_Angels will bleed from pain: Edo Tensei? Are you referring to the whole fake Dosu and Kin thing? Because that I explained last chapter in my reply to KHARAKI TAKAN. Will they recognize Naruto? They haven't seen him in ten years and he has changed a lot. And finally who will Naruto kill... Well that will just have to be a surprise._

_Dragolight: No his eyes don't have any powers, they are just a side effect of the first experiment that Orochimaru did to him._

_Ok, that settles the reviews. Looking forward to your next batch. Enjoy._

**Darkness Approaches**

Minato muttered a curse for not suspecting Orochimaru replacing the Kazekage, and he was now on the roof with Orochimaru holding Kushina at the point of a kunai as his two guards became four and created a powerful barrier that held back the ANBU unit and protected them from Minato and Kushina.

"I must admit that this went far smoother than I thought." Orochimaru chuckled as he pushed Kushina to Minato and stood there grinning.

"It won't go as smoothly as you think." Minato remarked as he pointed to the toads dealing with his snake summons. Orochimaru glanced and frowned before focusing entirely on Minato and his wife.

"It doesn't matter if Jiriaya manages to stop them, there is no one that can save you, especially since you can't Hiraishin out of this barrier." Orochimaru replied as he placed his hands on the ground and three coffins rose up, marked one, two, and three "Now let's see how you fare against your predecessors." Without a word the three coffins opened, revealing the bodies of the Shodai, Nidaime and Sandaime Hokages. As they stepped out the first two Hokages simply disappated and Orochiamaru blinked at this in shock.

"Looks like it didn't go quite as well as you thought." Kushina chuckled "One Edo Tensei against the two of us is simple enough."

Orochiamaru mentally paniced at this, not knowing what had gone wrong with the ones he had put Dosu and Kin in. Shaking away those thoughts he looked at his former sensei and saw that he was looking at Minato with sadness.

"I'm sorry Minato, it looks like I will have to fight against you today." Sarutobi apologized.

"It's alright Sarutobi." Minato nodded "I'll be sure to make this quick."

"It won't matter if you do. The village is doomed." Orochimaru remarked "Besides you couldn't even keep your family together, what chance do you have of keeping this village safe."

"SHUT YOUR MOUTH!" Kushina shouted.

"What is he talking about?" Sarutobi asked as he looked at Minato and Kushina and saw the pain and anguish there.

"Oh this is amusing. The legendary Yodaime Hokage negletted his son in favor of his Jinchuruki daughter." Orochimaru laughed "The boy ran away after stealing their most precious items. A boy after my own heart."

"Is this true?" Sarutobi asked as he looked intently at the two and saw the guilt "Why Minato... Why?"

"I made a mistake." Minato sighed "I have searched for him for the last ten years but I can't find him."

"Because he went where you could not follow." Orochimaru laughed "And he is hellbent on getting revenge!"

"You lie!" Kushina shouted.

"Do I? I have seen the boy, and I must admit that he has become a force to be reckoned with." Orochimaru explained "He's a powerful shinobi now, one that would have turned the tides of this invasion in your favor if you had been smart enough to pay attention to him."

"Minato." Sarutobi began.

"I know." Minato stated as he looked at Orochimaru "Where is he?"

"Last time I saw him was in Ame." Orochimaru replied "And he had such eyes filled with hate and anger that I couldn't resist helping him. And who knows, he might make for a promising vessel one day."

"So he's not with you?" Kushina asked.

"No, unfortunately not. He enjoys independence." Orochimaru replied "But he would gladly help me if I asked, since I helped him get so strong."

Kushina looked at Minato and could see that he was furious, but keeping a calm face to hide it. Without a word he sent a kunai flying at Orochimaru who dodged it with ease and threw one with a seal into the back of Sarutobi's head, activating the full transformation into an unstoppable killing machine. Minato only cursed as he unsealed a katana for Kushina and then warped to the kunai that was behind Orochimaru, running at the traitor who only laughed as he dodged the attacks while Kushina fought off Sarutobi who had summoned his legendary partner Enma and turned him into a staff, pushing back Kushina who was using just a regular katana. The two fights raged, going back and forth before Minato stopped fighting Orochimaru and sent a kunai into the back of the distracted Sarutobi which he Hiraishined to and rammed a Rasengan into his head, stopping him while he nodded for Kushina to protect him while he performed the sealing. It didn't take long for him to place the appropriate seal onto his predecessor and soon had him sealed into a tight bundle that only he could unlock as he faced Orochimaru who had drawn Kusanagi and was keeping Kushina at bay with ease.

Minato took this moment to examine the village and spotted the enemy in the stands with the various shinobi that hadn't been caught in the genjutsu. The villagers were being evacuated quickly, with the genin and chunin covering them while the jonin fought off the enemy that were trying to follow after them. The clan heads were in peak form as they fought off the enemy as well and he could see Jiraiya on one of his toads as he fought off the multiple snake summons. Nodding his head he stopped when he saw a giant Tanuki in the forest and realized that it was Gaara and he had transformed. Shaking his head at the worried thoughts that had crossed his mind he refocused on Orochimaru and knew that to get out he would have to deal with this madman.

In the forest Naruto watched in amusement as Sasuke had pursued Gaara and his siblings and another team of genin had followed after. Sakura, Shikamaru and Shino were hot on the avengers tail, with Shikamaru dropping back to deal with a platoon of Oto shinobi that were chasing after them, then Shino stopping to deal with Kankuro who was trying to attack them. Finally Sakura caught up to Sasuke who had come face to face with Gaara and Temari. Temari looked worried as Gaara started to transform and had the bright idea to get out of his way as she leapt away. Sakura realized that she should follow the other girl's lead and moved out of the way as Sasuke and Gaara faced each other. The battle was fast and Naruto already knew the winner before the first blow had hit.

Sasuke had started with a fire jutsu and Gaara, in his transformed state used his Biju arm to block the strike and then send a barrage of sand shurikens at Sasuke who dodged them and then attacked again. The back and forth went for a few minutes before Sasuke struck with his Chidori and manged to wound Gaara again, but in his maddened state he barely noticed as he smashed Sasuke into a tree with his transformed arm. Naruto only sighed as he leapt down and cut Gaara off before he could finish Sasuke off.

"Sorry, but I can't let you kill him." Naruto stated as he eyed the mad Jinchuruki and only smirked as he decided that leaving him alive to be of use later would be much more beneficial then killing him here and now.

"You... Mother wants your blood!" he shouted as his arm shot towards him and Naruto smirked as he flipped over it and drew his sword, slicing through the appendage with ease, shocking Gaara who howled in pain as he reattached the arm. As he reattached the arm he started to transform even more, and soon all that was left of his normal self was his legs.

"You've gone quite insane it seems." Naruto noted as he dodged around Gaara's arms and tail "But then again, having a demon that doesn't let you sleep can do that to you."

"Shut up!" Gaara shouted as he struck out again.

"Why, am I touching a nerve?" Naruto asked as he bounced off a tree that was soon destroyed by the rampaging demon "You see in the end you can't beat me, because I have put much more into getting stronger than you. You rely on that demon instead of putting it in its place."

"Silence!" Gaara screamed as he struck again.

"You're only mad because I'm telling you the truth. What's the matter, too weak to even surpress a single demon? You'll never be strong if you don't learn to control that massive power of yours." Naruto continued as he weaved around the attacks, already seeing his weak point but enjoying tormenting the young man.

"DIE!" Gaara roared as he struck with all three of his limbs, making it very dangerous for Naruto to dodge without getting hit. Naruto simply smirked as he did the one thing that Gaara hadn't expected and charged him, getting right in his face as he wrapped his hand in Lightning chakra and smashed it into his face, jolting him and sending him skidding back as Naruto flickered from sight and took his back before his tail could retract and placed a seal on the bottom side of the tail. Leaping higher up Naruto saw the limbs retract and made a single seal before smirking as the explosive tag went off and destroyed the sand body that Gaara had been building.

"You have much potential Gaara no Subaku, but until you master that demon's powers you will never best me." Naruto stated as Gaara gave him a death glare before making a seal and all the sand wrapped around him and soon he was growing to a massive height and Naruto realized that he was transforming into his full Biju form. Grinning Naruto leapt back from the giant foot as he created a clone to get Sasuke out of the line of fire as he started flashing through the handsigns for the jutsu that Kakuzu had shown him to use against Biju like this.

"Futon: Arashi-shin no ken(Fist of the Storm God)!" Naruto roared as he finished the jutsu and felt the drain on his chakra, nearly taking everything that he had as the weather started to change and a funnel cloud started to form over Gaara before a blast of pure wind and destruction smashed down into the unsuspecting Jinchuruki, smashing him into the ground and kept putting more pressure until Gaara was almost unconscious. and the sand had completely disappated. Naruto chuckled as he swalled a soldier pill to keep up his strength as he leapt down to Gaara and walked over to the red haired boy who was barely alive.

"Let this show you Gaara no Subaku. You have much to learn and greater heights to reach." Naruto stated as he looked at the teen who stared at him with something akin to fear "Learn to master your demon and come find me then. I will help you reach the greatness that you so deserve."

"Wh... Who are you?" Gaara gasped.

Naruto leaned down and whispered in Gaara's ear "I am Naruto Uzumaki Namikaze, the prodical son of the Yodaime Hokage, and I will bring this world to a new age."

Smirking as he stood up and walked away he saw Sasuke near the edge of the blast zone and staring at him.

"You are no genin." Sasuke stated.

"I'm not." Naruto nodded "I was hired to keep you safe."

"By who?"

"Orochimaru. I owed him a favor and he wanted me in this exam to make sure that you didn't bite off more than you could chew." Naruto shrugged.

"And how will he take you betraying him like that?"

"Not well, but he can't do jack shit about it. I am just as strong as he is, and he well knows it." Naruto replied with a sadistic grin "And as for you my young Uchiha, you still have a lot of growing to do if you want to kill Itachi."

"How do you know my brother?!" Sasuke snapped as he tried to stand but found it impossible at this time.

"I met him during my travels. I have seen his strength, and you are far from his level. Allow me to give you some advice. The village fears that cursed seal upon your neck, as well they should. While it does leech your chakra it is also capable of making your far stronger than you normally would be, as I am sure that you have noticed. Learn how to utilize this power and you will grow even stronger."

"But Kakashi-sensei said that if I grow dependent on it I would fail." Sasuke noted.

"Only if you just use the cursed seal. There is a balance that must be reached if you want to use it's power with minimal drawbacks. Learn that balance and I am sure that you could grow even more powerful than your could even imagine." Naruto grinned.

"And how would you know?" Sasuke asked.

"Because Orochimaru's experiments have helped me grow as well. I let him experiment on me when I was a child and it allowed me to unlock my latent potential. That is one of the reasons as to why I am so much stronger than you."

"And the other reasons?" Sasuke snipped.

"I have trained until I couldn't even move for ten years, plus plenty of experiments were conducted on me. I am not foolish enough to say that I am the strongest shinobi in the world, but I am one of the most deadly shinobi to be born in a very long time." Naruto chuckled as he started to walk away "Grow stronger Sasuke Uchiha, grow stronger and I may come find you again one day to have you stand beside me as I change this world to fit my image. And I promise you that if you do, I will help you kill your brother and help you learn the truth behind the Uchiha massacre."

"WHAT?!" Sasuke shouted as he turned to look at the blonde but he was gone, without a single trace to show where he had gone.

On top of the Kage viewing box Orochimaru realized that his plan had been foiled and that Naruto had betrayed him. No one else could have used an S rank jutsu like that without any preparation. Now he was trapped fighitng against another Kage level shinobi and his wife who was almost as strong. Leaping away he created several dozen Tsuchi Bunshin as he had his bodyguards drop the barrier as they fled, letting the clones distract the shinobi as they quickly escaped the village, giving the order to retreat. Minato frowned at how Orochimaru had retreated and saw that the enemy Jinchuruki had been dealt with. Sighing Minato let his gaze wander the village and saw that for the most part the enemy was falling back.

"Lord Hokage!" an ANBU agent said as he approached from the other side of the viewing box "The enemy is falling back, and somehow Gaara no Subaku has been defeated."

"Do we know who did it?" Minato asked.

"No. We had reports that Sasuke Uchiha pursued him and his siblings out into the forest, and Kakashi had Shikamaru Nara, Shino Aburame and Sakura Haruno pursue him. We have sent ANBU to pick them up and so far we have found Shikamaru and his sensei Asuma Sarutobi with several captured Oto nin, and Shibi Aburame has found his son and is treating the poison that he had been exposed to." the ANBU agent explained.

"I see. What of Yami, I don't see him amongst the fighting." Minato noted.

"He seems to have disappeared sir." was the answer and Minato had a bad taste in his mouth about this entire situation. Shaking his head he soon made his way towards the various areas that still had enemy shinobi fighting and aided in their defeat.

By the end of the day Konaha had lost several dozen shinobi and a handful of civillians that hadn't managed to get to the shelters in time. Suna had lost nearly half of their invading force and were sueing for peace, saying that Orochimaru had killed the real Yodiame Kazekage and had taken his place to make them go to war. Gaara and his siblings had managed to escape back to the village where the red headed Jinchuruki was now working on subdueing Shukaku, something that none of his predecessors had ever attempted. Oto had lost two thirds of their shinobi, with most dead but plenty captured to be interrogated. And Naruto now stood atop the Hokage monument again as he watched the sun set and decided that it was time to begin his plan. He now had followers that would obey him and he had placed the seeds of darkness into Hinata, Sasuke and Gaara, and with Gaara would likely come his siblings. Things were starting to unfold just the way he wanted.

"With the setting sun comes the end of an age." Naruto mused as he walked away, heading for Ame "And with the end of an age shall come a much darker night."


End file.
