Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ The Road Less Travelled By ❯ Scrolls and a Sensei! A Resting Place At Last ( Chapter 4 )

Authors Note - Credit to ~tiggspanther, my friend and faithful beta for the ramen gag.

 

Scrolls and a Sensei! A Resting Place At Last

 

Sasuke estimated that it was about nine o'clock when they reached the tower with their newly acquired scroll. The tower seemed to have many sets of doors set into its base, each with a paper seal placed over the seam. Together they approached the door, and entered cautiously, alert for any other ninjas who might, even at this late stage, try to intercept them. Inside the building was cool and oddly comforting after their five days in the wilderness. There was no one to be seen.

Naruto hopped around the room, taking in the raised walkways and the large notice placed on the back wall of the room. “No one's here.”

“You have a talent for stating the obvious,” said Sasuke in reply, earning a glare.

“Oh? So what do you think we should do, Sasuke?” asked Naruto, grinning. “Maybe we missed the exam ending, that's why no one's here,” he teased.

“Well what about that?” asked Sakura, pointing to the notice placed on the wall.

Naruto screwed up his eyes. I hate kanji. “If you do not possess heaven…” he read haltingly. He shook his head. “I don't understand it.”

Sakura took pity on him. “If you do not possess heaven, gain knowledge and be prepared. If you do not possess earth, run through the fields and seek strength. If you open both heaven and earth scrolls, dangerous paths turn into safe paths. This is the secret of… something… It shall lead you on your way.”

Naruto frowned at the sign. “So? What does all that mean?”

Sakura pointed to a space. “That part looks like it's missing a character, but it's obviously referring to the scrolls from the exam. I think it's telling us to open them.”

“Okay.” Naruto reached into his back pouch, and retrieved the scrolls, passing one over to Sakura. “You sure about this? That funny jounin lady did tell us that we weren't to open them.”

Sakura nodded, and started to peel hers open. “I'm sure that's what the notice tells us to do.”

“Okay, Sakura-chan,” agreed Naruto, having complete faith in her. He unrolled the scroll and squinted at the writing. “Huh? What's this?”

Sakura was likewise confused at the writing. “Person?”

Sasuke looked over their shoulders at the scrolls, his eyes widening. I recognise this form! The centre of the marking began to expand and give off smoke. “This is a kuchiyose no jutsu inscription! Naruto! Sakura! Get rid of those scrolls!”

Immediately they did as Sasuke asked, the scrolls tracing paper arcs until they landed together hissing and spitting smoke which quickly filled the room. A loud crack sounded, and a shadow appeared in the centre of the smoke. Instantly they fell into a combat ready position, hands resting over kunai, waiting the signal to draw. It wasn't until the air cleared that they could see who it was they had summoned with the scrolls.

“Yo,” said Iruka with a smile. “Long time no see.” He kept smiling as they slowly relaxed from expecting attack, and took in their battered appearance. “Looks like the three of you went through a lot of trouble.”

Naruto was the first to recover his ability to speak from the shock. “What? Why? Why did you appear through a kuchiyose no jutsu, Iruka-sensei?”

“We chuunins are to welcome the examinees at the end of the second exam,” explained Iruka. “I was given the chance to pass this message on to you three by chance.” He pulled a small watch from his pocket, and looked at it. “Not bad on your first try, either.” He pocketed it again. “Congratulations on passing the second exam. I'd like to treat you at the Ichiraku, but…”

Naruto's world had dissolved into incoherence somewhere around the time Iruka had said `you pass'. Currently his mind was doing cartwheels of celebration, and he threw himself at Iruka in a hug, abruptly cutting off the offer of free food. “Yeah!” He hugged Iruka, laughing, and ignoring the chuunin's requests that he let go and let him finish talking. Finally the free food offer sunk in, and he started bounding around the room. “Ramen! Ramen! Whoo! I did good! I'm the best! I want to eat ramen!”

Sakura flopped to the ground like a puppet with her strings cut. How Naruto ever has enough energy to do that, I'll never understand. She looked over to see Sasuke sit in a similarly tired fashion, watching Naruto's antics with a faint smirk.

“What an energetic guy.”

Sakura decided that she'd had enough of Naruto's bouncing. “Be quiet, Naruto.”

Iruka seemed to join in their amusement at Naruto's antics. “Geez, you're still as restless as before.”

Sakura laughed slightly at that, then remembered something. “Oh. Sensei? What does that text on the wall mean? It seems to be missing a character, and we can't understand it at all.”

“Who cares, who cares?” gloated Naruto. “We passed! We don't need to worry about some silly sign.”

Iruka laughed nervously. “No, my other mission is to explain this sign to you.” He turned to look at it. “Read it. This is the principle Hokage-sama wrote that you should keep in mind as chuunin. The `heaven' in this text points to the head of a person, and `earth' points to the body. `If you do not posses heaven, gain knowledge and be prepared.'” He turned back to face the group, smiling. “That means, for example, if Naruto's weak point is his brain, he should study and prepare for his missions.”

Sakura giggled. That does sound like good advice for Naruto. He never thinks things through before rushing in.

“That's none of your business,” retorted Naruto to Iruka, crossing his arms, and looking annoyed at the friendly jibe. Sakura only giggled more.

Iruka smiled and continued. “`And if you do not possess earth, run through the fields and seek strength.' For example if Sakura's weakness lies in strength, then she should train herself every day. That's what it means.”

Sakura giggled again, rubbing the back of her head embarrassedly. I suppose that's just as true for me as Naruto needing to study more.

“And if you have both heaven and earth attributes, any dangerous mission will become safe. It can even become easy.”

Sakura paused, then pointed to the sign again. “Then what about the letter missing from there?”

Iruka smiled again. “That's the letter that symbolises a chuunin. It was the human letter that was marked on the scrolls when you opened them.” He paused before continuing. “The survival mission you took part in these past five days tested the basic abilities of the examinees as chuunin. And you guys completed it. A chuunin is a commander. He has to be able to lead his team. Deeply inscribe into your hearts the importance of knowledge and strength in missions. Never forget that chuunin principle, and go on to the next step.” He smiled. “That's all I was ordered to tell you.” The smile faded slowly from his face. “But… don't push yourselves too hard in the third exam. Especially you, Naruto, I'm worried about…”

“Iruka-sensei,” interrupted Naruto. “When I got this Konoha forehead-protector, I graduated from the academy. There's no need to worry. And this is the proof you have to me to show I'm no longer a child, right Iruka-sensei? I may still be restless, but I'm not a kid any more. Right now, I'm a ninja.”

“I see. I'm sorry, Naruto,” said Iruka. He's grown a lot in just these few months. I did right to let him graduate, even if he didn't know how to perform bunshin no jutsu correctly. He smiled a little. The one who knows their abilities the most might just be you, Kakashi-san. “In the mean time, I'm afraid I have other duties to attend to. If you follow me, I'll show you to a room you can wait in for the end of the exam.”

 

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The room was sparsely furnished, with only some rough beds, a table and some chairs set in, but there was some food and water set out, and an adjacent room with plumbed facilities.

Naruto more or less fell onto the table, snatching up pieces of fruit and bread before sitting with them piled in front of him.

Sasuke shook his head. You'd think that the food was trying to escape, the way he acts. He moved to the table, and sat heavily in the chair opposite, pouring out some water for himself. “Leave some food for us too, Naruto.”

Naruto stuck his tongue out. “I got here first. Go find your own.”

Sasuke grabbed an orange out of the food Naruto hadn't hoarded for himself. “Don't let your guard down too much. We don't know too much about what this third exam is, or when it's going to happen. It's probably the combat we're used to seeing in the stadium, so from here on, it's going to be one on one.”

Sakura shifted uncomfortably in her own seat. “Sasuke-kun? Why didn't you tell Iruka-sensei about the bruise on your neck? You said you'd get help once the exam was over.”

Sasuke's hand automatically moved to rest over it. “This exam is over, Sakura, but the next one isn't. Until I know that I have time to get this sorted out, no one is going to know outside of we three.”

Naruto paused in his eating. “That's a really dumb idea, Sasuke. If the third exam is a fight, how will you manage without being able to use chakra? Before you had us to watch out for you, cover for you. Going it alone is gonna be impossible.”

Sasuke glared at Naruto before shaking his head. “I could use my sharingan a little before the pain got too much, and we have time to rest now. As long as I don't overdo it, there won't be any problem.”

Naruto snorted. “Liar. You always overdo it. Getting into trouble over this is stupid. Just drop out, and go again next year.”

“No,” said Sasuke forcefully. “There's no problem. I haven't felt any pain in my neck since then.”

“Please Sasuke-kun,” said Sakura. “I saw you when that bruise took over your mind. It was horrible. Like you didn't even care about what you were doing, like you were happy that you were hurting that man.” She lent in closer to him. “Please.” She tried to put all of her desperation and fears into that one word.

“No.”

Sakura jerked back like she'd been slapped. “Why? You're not going to achieve anything here other than get hurt, Sasuke-kun. This exam isn't that important!”

Sasuke looked down. “You're right. I don't care about this exam.” He looked back up again, into Sakura's eyes, his face expressionless, and his eyes cold. “I don't care about becoming a chuunin either. I'm an avenger. I just want to know if I'm strong, or not. I'm going to fight the strong guys in this exam and I won't allow anyone to take away my path. Even you.”

Naruto growled. “Stop trying to act so cool you idiot! Sakura-chan is worried about you, that's why she's asking you. Stop being so selfish, and realise you're in trouble!”

“Naruto.” Sasuke smiled as the answer to this argument came to him. “I want to fight you too.”

Naruto spluttered a bit. Sasuke wants to fight me too? Like that creepy sand-guy and Hinata's relative, and the Fuzzy-eyebrows guy? He met Sasuke's level gaze and could see only sincerity. He's serious. He thinks I'm one of the strong guys. Naruto grinned. “You couldn't handle fighting me, Sasuke.”

Sasuke snorted. “Sure, dunce. Ours will be the shortest bout.” And now he's on my side of the argument, for now. There are usually only six to nine people in the finals, and with the large number of teams going in, there might be more passing this year. How that will change things, I don't know. He started to peel the orange, looking forward to eating food that he hadn't had to forage for himself.

Sakura looked between the two of them. “What? Naruto, how can you just agree with him like that? Just because he says he wants to fight you, you suddenly don't care about the bruise?”

“But…” Naruto looked between the two of them. “Of course I care, Sakura-chan. But Sasuke really wants to fight, and he says he'll be careful. We may not even have to fight again in this exam, we've only got a few more hours to go until it's over, and maybe they'd disqualify us about that bruise if they knew.”

Sakura was furious. It all comes down to fighting with these two, and their stupid little `Who is strongest?' contest. Doesn't Sasuke-kun's health matter to either of them? “You stupid, immature… Naruto! Don't you think of anything except fighting?”

“Ramen,” answered Naruto, promptly.

Sakura's mouth worked for a few moments, before she started giggling. “Naruto, you're an idiot.”

Sasuke made a gentle noise of amusement, and went back to eating his orange. “Do you ever think before you open your mouth?”

“Nope!” Naruto grinned at Sasuke. “And I want to fight against you too. A proper fight. But only once you've gotten rid of that tadpole mark.” He made a face. “I don't like it.” And I don't want you to do to me and Sakura-chan what she says you did to that sound-guy. There is something very wrong about that mark, but if you say it's not bothering you, then even if I don't believe you, I still trust you.

Sasuke nodded. “Agreed. I don't like that it's affecting my chakra system. I'm just glad that whatever that Orochimaru did to you, it only knocked you out.”

Naruto shook his head, and rubbed at his stomach. “I don't remember much. Just him punching me in the stomach and throwing me with his tongue. I guess I blacked out.”

“Remember calling me a scaredy-cat?” asked Sasuke with an edge to his voice.

Naruto nodded. “Think so. You just weren't moving away from that snake. But I can just about remember your face. You were scared.”

Sasuke suppressed a shudder. I was terrified, Naruto. He was strong enough to kill us without breaking a sweat. So I couldn't move. But the fear when you called me that, it wasn't fear of Orochimaru, but fear of you. “Well it was a bad situation. You looked pretty beaten up at that point.” And I know his eyes looked wrong. I don't think he's a relative any more than Kakashi is, but still…

Naruto was sure that Sasuke was thinking about something, but didn't want to ask as he didn't think it was any of his business. And Sasuke is already ashamed about freezing. Rubbing it in won't help us much figuring out what to do.

“Well we made it out alive,” said Sakura, trying to drag them out of their thoughts. “That's what's important. Now we have to focus on the third exam, and get our wounds tended.” And get Sasuke-kun some help.

Sasuke nodded. “We could all do with a decent meal, and sleeping in a bed rather than the ground.”

“Well,” said Naruto. “I say we celebrate once we get out of here. We should make Kakashi-sensei take us out for ramen!” He grinned as he remembered the smells of the Ichiraku. “It could be like… a date?” he asked Sakura hopefully.

Sakura smiled at Sasuke. “Yes, Sasuke-kun. Want to get some ramen after this? Or go somewhere else?”

“I decline.” Sasuke looked thoughtful. “As we've passed this exam, we should start training for the next, once they release us back to Konoha. If it's the same as other years, we'll have a month.” He rubbed at the bloodstain from the self-inflicted wound on his leg. “We're too battered to have another exam immediately after this.”

Sakura nodded. “I'm sure you're right, Sasuke-kun.” She stood up. “Please excuse me, but I'm really tired from the last fight.” She made her way to the beds, and laid down, obviously hoping to catch a few hours sleep.

Naruto watched her. She looks so tired. She must have spent a lot of energy protecting us while we slept. “Hey, Sasuke? Let's not wake her up, huh?”

Sasuke nodded. “Sure.”