Naruto - Part 11

It was a couple of days after Tsunade had settled into her job as Godaime Hokage and Naruto was doing something that he found immensely tedius.

Shaving.

Stupid blond peach fuzz growing all over his face, wasting several minutes of his day. There was no such thing as a teenager that looked good with facial hair though, especially if that facial hair was blond, so he had no choice but to shave it or feel ridiculous.

At the very least, he seemed to have inherited his father's weak propensity for facial hair, making the whole thing go by fairly fast, not to mention that he didn't have any growing on his chest. Don't get him wrong, Naruto knew that his father had been a badass, but he looked like a damn sissy.

He was willing to bet that he got his manly appearance from the Uzumaki side of the family. There was just no way a clan as awesome as the Uzumaki looked like a bunch of milk toothed sissies while they were kicking ass.

"Naruto, what is this?" The question snapped Naruto out of his ruminations on the manliness of the Uzumaki. He noted that there was a distinctly odd inflection in the voice of the woman he loved more than anything.

He walked into the living room to see Xanna scrutinising the sword that he had stolen from Orochimaru. "That's the sword that I stole from Orochimaru on my last mission. I think it's called the Kusanagi no Tsurugi." The blond explained.

"It is." The demoness replied simply.

Naruto quirked an eyebrow in interest. "You seem to be familiar with it." He stated.

"I'm should be, considering that it was my...father who created it." She replied, hesitating slightly at the mention of her father.

"The Sage of Six Paths?" Naruto asked incredulously. He knew that the sage was the only one who fit the description of her father and knew that she hesitated to call him that, considering that she had only known him for a little over a week. What had him so incredulous was the fact that he had apparently come into the possession of the man's sword.

"Yes. See the magatama marking on the hilt?" She pointed out the marking in question, sitting innocently just below the blade. "He often used the magatama to mark his own creations. He was slightly obsessive about it actually." She chuckled at some memory before continuing. "I remember that he had a magatama necklace and nine magatama markings on the back of his coat."

"That...does sound a bit excessive." Naruto said, inwardly wondering whether power and eccentric behavior were linked somehow and how incredibly eccentric the sage had to have been in that case.

"I surprised you managed to stumble on his sword." Xanna commented, idly swinging the sword through the air.

"You can keep it if you want." Naruto said, making the demoness look at him in surprise. "It's yours by right anyway, since it belonged to your father."

"I..." She looked conflicted for a moment before answering. "...thank you Naruto, that's very considerate of you, but I'm afraid that I can't make proper use of it." She hadn't really expected him to just be willing to give her the sword. As far as she was concerned it was his by right of conquest.

"What do you mean?" He asked curiously.

"The Kusanagi was created for combat against demons. It will only respond to human chakra. I think you should keep it, I'm sure that the blade will serve you well." She explained and offered.

"Thank you." He said, touched that she would want him to have it. "Wait...you said that it responds to human chakra?"

"Oh yes, it was made with a special technique, the Creation of All Things. Anything created with that technique is highly chakra attuned. It was after all, the technique that was used to create us Bijuu from the chakra of the Shinju."

"Sweet." Naruto said with a grin. "So, what can it do?"

"Try flowing your chakra into it and then willing your chakra to extend further than the actual blade." She advised.

Naruto grabbed the sword and did as she instructed. He hadn't had too much practice with chakra flow, but the Kusanagi was highly receptive to his chakra, eager even, glowing bright blue with the chakra flowing through it. After it had flowed to the tip of the blade, he tried to extend it further and finding this to be somewhat more difficult. As soon as he managed it, the blade itself also extended, stabbing into the wall it was pointed at like a spear and easily cutting right through it.

"That's amazing." Naruto said admiringly before looking at his wall. "But I'm going to have to do something about that hole in my wall now."

"It has some other abilities, but you probably shouldn't practice them indoors." The demoness said dryly.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Hyuuga Neji, Uzumaki Naruto, Nara Shikamaru." The newly instated Godaime Hokage spoke to the three Genin in front of her. "You three were the only Konoha Genin that fought in the finals of the Chunin exam, so you three are the only ones eligible for promotion at this time."

The three of them said nothing, one of them standing at attention, another slouching lazily and the third looking intently at the purple rhombus on Tsunade's forehead.

"Hyuuga Neji." Tsunade stated, doing her best to ignore Naruto's scrutiny of her forehead. "Despite showing impressive combat ability, you were deemed to lack the proper mentality to be a Chunin."

Neji simply nodded in acceptance. It had been what he was expecting after all. He knew that he hadn't made a very good impression with the way he had insulted Naruto during their fight or the way that he had ranted about fate the entire time.

"Uzumaki Naruto." She said, turning towards the tall blond. "You showed great combat and analytical ability with the way that you defeated your opponents. Not to mention your achievement in singlehandedly preventing the Ichibi from breaching the walls." The new Hokage praised.

"However..." She dragged out. "It has also been reported that you abandoned the field and acted on your own initiative instead seeking out a Jounin for orders, apparently so that you could get two ramen chefs to safety. Along with that, it has also been reported that you apparently engaged in sexual intercourse with an unknown female immediately after defeating the Ichibi."

Tsunade's voice had steadily been getting more incredulous the farther along the report she got, until she was staring at her fellow blond as if he was some particularly interesting species of two headed troll.

Neji and Shikamaru were similarly staring at the blond as if he was insane.

"In my defense, the invasion was apparently over by then."

"Did you know that the invasion was over by then?" Tsunade's voice was very dry when she asked this.

"No." He admitted without shame. As far as he was concerned, he had done the right thing.

"I didn't think so. Normally offenses like that would carry a severe penalty, but considering that you did save the village from an giant sand demon, I'm going to let it slide." Tsunade concluded.

Naruto nodded, actually rather pleased about not getting promoted. It meant less annoying missions.

"Nara Shikamaru." Tsunade said as she turned towards the final Genin. "You showed highly impressive strategic and tactical ability with the way you defeated your opponent, as well as great foresight in forfeiting due to lack of chakra. For this reason I am promoting you to Chunin."

Shikamaru groaned in disappointment. This was exactly what he had been hoping to avoid when he had forfeited. Maybe he should have made a more lame excuse?

"Thank you Hokage-sama." He said without enthusiasm.

"Promotion too troublesome for you Shikamaru?" Naruto asked, grinning at the pineapple haired Chunin.

"You have no idea." Shikamaru grumbled. "I'm actually impressed and envious of you. You somehow commited what amounts to dereliction of duty, but did just enough good to offset it and get away with it."

Naruto shrugged and Tsunade's eye developed an annoyed twitch at just how dismissive the two of them were about getting promoted.

"Now get out of my office." The three of them turned around and began to walk out the door when her voice rang out again. "Except for you Naruto, we've still got some business."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Tsunade sat at her desk, which was incidentally full of unfinished paperwork, staring at the bare chested blond in front of her.

"You mentioned something about a secret way to avoid paperwork." She said blankly.

"Indeed, there is a secret way. I'll tell you about it if you agree to answer a question for me." Naruto told her with a grin.

"Agreed." He knew pretty much every big secret already, what could he possibly ask that she would be reluctant to answer?

"Shadow clones."

Tsunade was motionless as she processed that bit of information.

"Right now you're wondering why your sensei, the famed professor, hadn't figured that one out himself right?"

"That question has crossed my mind yes." Tsunade answered, feeling fairly stupid that this had to be pointed out to her.

"Well, nevermind senile old men right now, what I want to know is if that mark on your forehead is a seal and what kind."

"It's my Yin seal, I use it when I need an extra burst of chakra to heal myself if I ever get badly injured. It's a last resort though, since it speeds up my aging every time I use it." Tsunade explained. It wasn't any big secret anyway.

The incredulous look on Naruto's face however, was making her feel as if she'd just said something incredibly stupid.

"So, if I understand you correctly, you're using a burst of Yin chakra to direct the flow of your body energy into a rapid regeneration technique, which accelerates your aging." He said, voice bland.

"Yes?" Tsunade said/questioned in a confused tone. People were usually impressed by that.

"Did it ever occur to you that the rapid aging happens because Yin chakra only provides the form of what you need to heal the injuries? Without a Yang chakra component to provide the energy, it was sucking the life out of you." Naruto informed her, leaving the blond Hokage gaping at him in shock.

"You mean that it was possible to make this technique safe? I could have been using it without getting older everytime?"

"Well it would still leave you drained even with a properly made Yang chakra component, but it wouldn't shorten your life anymore." Naruto confirmed.

"The two of us are going to be adding that Yang chakra component right now brat." Tsunade said as she made a shadow clone to do her paperwork, inwardly cackling with glee over the fact that she was never going to have to sign another document for the rest of her life.

"If you're gonna start calling me brat again, then I'm going back to calling you tits." He told her with a smirk.

"Is that anyway to talk to your Hokage?" Tsunade said with a playful scowl.

"Oh, excuse me tits-sama, I wasn't aware that you wanted to be in charge this time. Shall I get the chains?"

Tsunade fought down an embarrassed blush at the memory of how he'd chained her up in Tanzaku-Gai.

Tsunade was not too well used to dealing with embarrassment, so she defaulted to her typical response to a perverted comment like that.

She punched him into a wall.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Shōmon: Kai (Gate of Pain: Open)!"

Naruto felt the immense power that releasing the fourth gate granted him, increasing the strength and speed of his body to many times it's natural potential. However, he also felt the strain of controlling it. He was practically vibrating with energy, ready to be unleashed and more importantly, barely able to think clearly. He knew that with repeated use, he would grow used to it and be better able to direct it, but never fully control it.

The longer he kept it active, the more he also felt his muscles tearing. With the amount of muscle development he had, he could keep it up longer than Lee, but there was no avoiding the muscle damage. The human body was simply never meant to operate at this level.

Shutting the gates, Naruto sighed in disappointment at another failure. After Gai had taught him how to open 5 of the gates, he had thought that he could learn to control their power, but it was not to be. The gates were either open or closed, there was no middle ground. Despite that, he was still going to learn how to open the last 3 gates, even if Gai refused to teach him how. Now that he knew how to open the first 5, he could learn the last 3 on his own eventually.

Picking up a scroll, he focused on a different project. If Yang chakra wouldn't work, then perhaps the answer lay in Yin chakra.

While helping Tsunade add a Yang component to her seal, he had learned how to make a Yin seal, which was what he now held. Since his body was apparently naturally far more attuned to Yang than Yin, it had been a pain in the ass to create a seal that would convert his chakra into Yin, but he had done it.

He had no idea what would happen once he flooded the Yin chakra into his body, so he created a clone to keep watch on him. He had learned long ago that it always paid to have contingencies ready when dealing with experimental seals.

Placing the Yin seal on his chest, he released and flooded his body with the Yin natured chakra held inside it.

He felt the change immediately. It felt as if he had gained an incredible awareness of his own chakra and the way that it flowed through his coils. Willing it to flow in a different direction than it would naturally, he was fascinated to see it do exactly as he wished. The chakra was responding to his will so easily, he merely had to want it and it would obey. With this kind of control over his own chakra, he could do anything, he could even...

Naruto's concentration was broken as the clone punched him hard right in the jaw, which broke him out of his trance. Gasping, he shot a dirty glare at his doppelganger.

"What's the big idea?!" He demanded.

"You stopped breathing you imbecile." Was the dry response from his clone.

Naruto looked stunned for an instant before commenting to himself in a disbelieving tone.

"Yin chakra is even more dangerous than Yang chakra."

Clearly, having too much Yin chakra flowing in his body gave him a powerful control of his chakra, but it simultaneously caused a disconnect between his body and mind.

Perhaps if they were properly balanced the negative side effects would cancel out?

Deciding to try this theory out, he readied another Yin chakra scroll, preparing to absorb it.

"Kaimon: Kai (Gate of Opening: Open)!"

His body once more flooded with Yang chakra as it's full potential was released and Naruto wasted no time in absorbing the Yin chakra from the seal.

Immediately, he felt more in control of himself, as the furious physical energy of Yang was balanced out by the calm spiritual power of Yin. Naruto couldn't help the wide grin that stretched across his face at this realisation.

He started running around the training field, marveling at the control that he now had despite having opened the first gate. If he could gather enough Yin chakra to balance out the opening of the other seven gates, then he would be unstoppable.

Before he could get lost in happy thoughts of having found a solution to his problem gaining the power to be worthy of Xanna's hand in marriage, the muscle damage that characterised the opening of the gates made itself known.

Groaning in disappointment, he closed the gate and slumped down on his butt.

Apparently, even though the Yin chakra did balance out the opening of the gates and allowed him to retain better control of himself and his chakra, it didn't do a damn thing about the muscle damage. Clearly this was another dead end in his quest for power.

At least Kurenai was going to be happy that he had finally managed to create a workable seal to collect Yin chakra. The Genjutsu mistress had been quite upset the last time he'd spoken with her. Minimal prodding had revealed that she was upset because of how little she'd been able to do against Uchiha Itachi and Hoshigaki Kisame, who he had learned had come to the village in an attempt to capture him.

He could certainly understand her frustration when all of her hard won skill with Genjutsu was made worthless because of the Sharingan or a chakra eating sword. It was even more galling that Itachi had even turned her own illusion against her. Of course there was no getting around the fact that Itachi was the Genjutsu boogeyman of the Elemental Nations, but to be defeated so easily just because he was an Uchiha would annoy anyone.

No doubt this breakthrough in their research into Yin release would allow her to take her illusions to the next level, eventually perhaps even allowing her to achieve Yin release without the help of Fuinjutsu.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Did you know that your pink haired teammate has been asking me for training as a medic?" Tsunade asked as she took a drink from her sake bottle, her feet resting on the coffee table that she had brought in to the office for this exact reason.

Next to her on the couch in the Hokage's office, his feet similarly resting on the coffee table, Naruto answered her. "Someone must have clued her in on the fact that her high chakra control would be a good starting point for medical Ninjutsu."

There was a shadow clone of Tsunade grumbling as it did paperwork behind the Hokage's desk. This allowed the real Tsunade and Naruto to slack off and talk about other things while her work was being done for her.

"Not only that, but that Tenten girl also came in here wanting to learn medical Ninjutsu, but she just doesn't have the aptitude for it. Her chakra control is decent enough, but not nearly good enough for medical training, though I am going to start teaching Sakura, or at least have Shizune start her on it." Tsunade said. She felt a bit bad about refusing Tenten, since she could respect the girl as a serious kunoichi, but medical Ninjutsu really didn't suit the weapons user. The girl had been terribly disappointed at hearing that, but had pulled herself together quickly enough.

"Tenten seemed to be pretty decent with Fuinjutsu though. I was actually thinking of teaching her a thing or two." Naruto admitted. Fuinjutsu users were so rare that he had honestly been surprised to see that Tenten knew anything at all about the art.

"Speaking of Fuinjutsu, I've got something that I think I'm going to need your help with." The male blond said.

"Oh? This should be interesting."

"It is. I'm trying to figure out Orochimaru's cursed seal you see and I need a skilled medic to help me."

Tsunade raised an eyebrow in interest. Even Jiraiya hadn't managed to do that, though she had no idea why he wanted a medic to help him. "Are you doing this because you want to find a way to remove it from your teammate?"

"Huh?" Naruto said in confusion before remembering that Sasuke had a cursed seal on him too. He'd completely forgotten about that. "No, I'm doing this to find a way to remove it from Anko."

"Of course, why would you help your teammate if you can help a pretty woman." The blond Hokage said dryly.

"Exactly, though I guess I can remove it from the princess too once I learn how."

Tsunade chuckled at his nickname for the Uchiha. Having met Sasuke, she could certainly understand why he called the boy a princess with the way he pouted sometimes. Oh sure it wasn't really a pout, more like a jealous scowl, but that was just a pout that used different facial muscles.

Their conversation was interrupted as Shizune entered the office and froze at seeing her mentor and Naruto on the couch together, leaning against each other with their feet on the table without a care in the world while an angry looking shadow clone was doing paperwork.

"What is it Shizune?" Tsunade asked

"Umm...It's time for the monthly council meeting to go over village finances." Shizune said after she got her composture back. She would just never get used to seeing Tsunade so relaxed and 'hanging out' with Naruto like a teenager. Though at least it made her happy to see that her mentor had stopped drinking so heavily.

Tsunade groaned when she heard that. She hated council meetings. It was even worse than paperwork, mostly due to the fact that the annoying elders kept pushing to increase the military budget and the civilians trying to get more money for themselves.

"Just send a shadow clone to deal with it." Naruto said airily." That's what I'm going to do." Since he had announced himself as the Uzumaki clan head, he actually had to attend council meetings now. Well, his shadow clones had to attend them, he was off doing more important things during those times.

"That is an... excellent suggestion." Tsunade said with a wide grin forming on her face.

"I'll inform the council to gather in an hour." Shizune said and left. She had also started using shadow clones to deal with paperwork and other menial tasks, so she didn't even bat an eyelash at their strategy.

"Aren't shadow clones just about the most useful technique ever?" Naruto asked rhetorically.

"Yes, yes they are." Tsunade agreed wholeheartedly. Anything that got her out of paperwork and council meetings was nothing short of pure gold. "With all these genius ideas you have, maybe I should make you my advisor instead of those old guys."

"And miss out on all their geriatric nagging?" Naruto asked with mock horror. "How could you possibly think that it would be a good idea to replace a couple of power hungry old people that should have been stuffed into a retirement home and forgotten years ago?

"No need for all the sarcasm Naruto, everyone knows you don't like them." Tsunade said with a chuckle. She had nearly died of laughter when he had told her what he'd said to Koharu and even now just thinking about it made her want to laugh.

"I'm serious though, those three fossils have gotten entirely too comfortable with the power that being on the council gives them. Every time that people get too comfortable with the power they have over others, they start abusing it." Naruto said cynicaly. That had always been his experience with it at least. The things that Hinata had told him about the Hyuuga elders only confirmed it further.

Tsunade mulled it over and the more she thought about it, the better it was starting to sound.

"Even if I am Hokage, I'm not sure if I have the power to just remove them though." Tsunade admitted.

"Tsunade, Konoha is a military dictatorship, if you tell them to get down on their knees and lick your cunt, then they had better hope that their jaw doesn't go numb before you tell them to stop." Naruto told her with an eyeroll. The woman had clearly spent too much time around Sarutobi in her youth, not to mention that the elders had no doubt been 'helping' her adjust to her new position by telling her that kind of nonsense. Naruto never saw the point of pussyfooting around laws like that if you were a military dictator.

Tsunade spat out the sake she had just drank in shock, before she started laughing so hard that she wasn't even able to make any noise.

"You alright there Tsunade?" Naruto asked in amusement.

"I think I've been spending too much time around you, because I'm actually tempted to say that just to see the look on their faces." Tsunade said with a chuckle, wiping away a tear that had leaked out of her eye due to her mirth. "Jokes aside, they do actually have an important function in the workings of the village, but I'll keep the idea of removing them in mind if they ever start becoming more trouble than they're worth.

Naruto nodded but felt that he had to give her one final idea. "Since you're such a great medic I'm sure that it would also be pretty easy for you to induce an artificial heart attack." He grinned at her. "That way you can keep them from protesting."

Tsunade couldn't help but grin back at him. That idea certainly had merit for taking care of Danzo. Nobody would find it out of the ordinary for such an old man to have a heart attack after all.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Naruto, Tenten, Neji and Hinata were sitting in Naruto's private training ground. Tenten because he had asked her to and the two Hyuuga because they had something that they wanted to talk to Naruto about.

Naruto had been a bit surprised at their addition, but had easily agreed to their request for a private conversation. Neji and he had even become sort of friendly after their fight in the finals. A good fight is worth years of therapy for men.

"Why did you want me to come here Naruto." Tenten asked curiously.

After joining him on the mission to retrieve Tsunade and getting into a fight with Orochimaru of all people, the weapons user had come to have a great respect for his strength. Not to mention that she was also jealous that he had managed to steal the legendary Kusanagi no Tsurugi from Orochimaru. She would have given her left pinky toe for a weapon like that.

"Well I heard from Tsunade that you asked her to train you and she refused."

Tenten nodded sadly, still feeling disappointed about the refusal. The newly instated Godaime hadn't been mean about it, explaining that her chakra control just wasn't good enough, but it was still a huge let down to be turned away by her idol while someone like Sakura got accepted. She didn't really dislike the pink haired girl, but she was clearly playing catch up because she'd been slacking off in the academy.

"When you were holding off Kabuto, I saw that you were pretty good with seals, so I'm offering to train you in Fuinjutsu." Naruto said, making Tenten's head snap into his direction.

"I'd love that!" She hastily agreed. Fuinjutsu had interested her ever since the academy and being offered an opportunity to learn more was too good to pass up. She didn't even care about the fact that she'd been a Genin longer than the blond. He was clearly far more proficient in the art than her and she'd be a fool to turn the offer down.

Hinata and Neji were also looking quite surprised by this, as they hadn't thought that Naruto would offer to teach Tenten Fuinjutsu, but it only reaffirmed their reason for coming to him.

"Alright then, we'll work out a schedule for you tomorrow, meet me here at 7 in the morning." Naruto told the bun haired girl.

"You got it Naruto-sensei!" She said with a giggle and ran off in her excitement.

Naruto raised an eyebrow at being called sensei, before he shrugged with a smile. Teaching Tenten could wind up being fun, particularly the part where he told her about all the ways that she could blow herself out of existence if she screwed up.

"Now, what did you two want?" He said as he turned towards the two Hyuuga.

"Naruto nii-san, we have a request for you." Hinata said, doing her best to hide how nervous she was.

The blond raised an eyebrow at them in interest, before making a hand motion for her to go on.

Hinata fidgeted for a moment and Neji decided to speak up. "We wanted to ask your help with a Fuinjutsu problem Naruto-san."

"First of all," Naruto said with a raised finger. "Don't call me 'Naruto-san', I really don't like honorifics in most cases. Secondly, I'm guessing that this is about the caged bird seal." He finished, feeling fairly confident that his guess was right.

The two Hyuuga were surprised that he had figured it out already, but not too surprised. What other Fuinjutsu problem could they have anyway?

"Yes, Hinata-sama and..." He didn't manage to finish the sentence because his cousin was glaring at him in a way that most people would think she wasn't capable of. With a sigh, he corrected himself. "Hinata-chan and I have talked it over and decided to ask you if you think you would be able to remove it."

Hinata had been most insistent that he was never to call her 'Hinata-sama' outside of the Hyuuga compound unless it was absolutely necessary. She would always call him Neji nii-san and didn't want to be adressed as if she was his superior outside the compound. It couldn't be helped in the compound, because the main house would throw a hissy fit if they heard a branch member adressing the heiress as anything other than a superior.

"Well, I've already been examining it ever since our fight in the finals." Naruto informed them.

"Really?" Hinata said hopefully,hoping that maybe he already knew how to remove it.

"Yeah, I copied it from Neji's forehead during our fight, but unfortunately, I've made no headway."

"You mean it's too hard for you to remove?" Hinata asked sadly. She had known that this was a possibility, but she'd hoped that he could do it.

"That's not the problem." Naruto denied. "The problem is that the caged bird seal in it's finished form doesn't give me enough to work with." He explained, making them look towards the blond in confusion.

"What would you need then?" Neji asked.

"I would need to learn how to apply it myself before I can learn how to remove it. What I need are the notes for the creation of the seal, if I have that I'm sure that I can figure out a way to get rid of it. Without knowing everything that goes into the creation of the seal, I'd need to experiment, which would lead to a lot of dead Hyuuga before I found the right way to do it." He explained to them, making their faces go grim. Unlike Orochimaru's cursed seal, the caged bird seal wasn't a half baked piece of crap held together by luck and hope. It was the work of a seal master who had put a lot of time and effort into it's creation and it would need to be handled carefully.

Hinata and Neji looked at each other before nodding. They were sure that Naruto was not the kind of man that had any interest in creating branded slaves. His only interest was in his own strength.

And women, can't forget the women.

"Neji nii-san and I will do our best to find the notes for you." Hinata said to the blond, happy that he would be able to get rid of the seal that she hated so much.

Naruto grinned at her before he spoke again."Neji nii-san is it little sister? Does that mean that Neji will start calling me big brother too?"

Neji looked like a startled deer for a second before he got over his shock and spoke. "Absolutely not."

"Oh come on, I'll be a proper big brother Neji." The blond said and grabbed the Hyuuga in a headlock. "I'll even take you to a brothel for your 16th birthday." Neji choked in surprise and Hinata started burning with a fiery blush.

"No thanks!" He refused quickly and tried to escape.

"You sure? I know this one girl who can show you a whole other meaning of 'caged bird'." The blond kept offering.

"I don't even want to know what you're talking about!" Neji was quick to refuse, his composture starting to give way to slight panic.

Naruto let out a disappointed sigh and let the Hyuuga go. "You need to start thinking about girls more Neji. With all that pretty hair of yours, people will start thinking you're gay if you don't show any interest in females." Naruto told him sagely.

"I like girls just fine thank you." Neji was quick to assure.

There was a short moment of silence before Naruto spoke again. "You sure you don't want me to take you to a brothel?"

"NO! I mean YES! ARGH!"

Hinata quickly covered her mouth to cut of her giggle when a frazzled Neji looked her way.

XXXXXXXXXXXX

"So, tell me again why exactly you need a medic for this, because this looks more like a Fuinjutsu problem to me." Tsunade said as she peered at Anko's exposed shoulder.

Currently Anko, Kurenai, Naruto and Tsunade were in Anko and Kurenai's apartment, taking a look at the cursed seal on Anko's shoulder.

"Because I've already gone over the seal itself and there's simply no way that it should be capable of everything that it does. It's basically nothing more than a bunch of storage seals connected to a main array and designed to release when certain conditions are met." Naruto explained.

"Explain it to me then, because I've got no idea how I can help you here." Tsunade insisted.

"Fine. See this here?" Naruto said and pointed at a particular spot on the seal. "That storage seal contains something highly chakra reactive, but not raw chakra. It's also triggered by powerful negative emotions. Once that happens, this next seal is triggered." Naruto pointed to another seal a bit further in the array. "This one contains what I can only guess is Orochimaru's chakra given how corrupt it feels, which empowers that unknown something that I mentioned earlier. This seal right here," The blond said and pointed at another spot on the marking."holds a lot more of that unknown stuff, but it's inactive right now. I'm guessing that Orochimaru probably has to do something to activate that part of the seal and it no doubt gives a big power boost as well. Unfortunately, because it's driven by negative emotions, that stuff along with Orochimaru's corrupt chakra also tends to eat away at the sanity of whoever is using it.

The three women were looking highly impressed with the analysis so far, but Naruto wasn't quite finished. "What I need from you Tsunade, is to help me identify what that unknown crap is. The only thing I know about it is that Orochimaru injects it with a bite, it's reactive to powerful negative emotions like rage and hatred and it has an empowering effect. Either way, I haven't been able to find a safe way to remove it because Orochimaru's chakra tends to react rather strongly whenever anyone attempts to mess with the curse mark."

"Alright, I'll see if I can find a way to figure out what that stuff is." Tsunade agreed. This was going to be a challenge, but finding a way to remove Orochimaru's hickeys would certainly be a good thing.

"There's also one more thing that I feel I should mention." Naruto said with some hesitation, instantly catching the attention of all three women. Naruto was never hesitant.

"What is it?" Anko asked a bit nervously. She had a feeling that she wasn't going to like what the blond had to say.

"Orochimaru's chakra is acting far too intelligently to be just chakra. It can perceive threats and act on them. It can sense what cursed seal bearers are feeling." Naruto said grimly, to the dawning realisation of the three women.

There was silence for a moment longer as they waited for him to finish."I think that the crazy asshole has somehow managed to cut off a piece of his soul and place it into his cursed seals."

All three women looked at him wide eyed, before Anko suddenly grabbed at her shoulder, clawing at the mark on it. "Get this fucking thing off me, I don't care what it takes, just get it off!" She whispered harshly, unable to stand the fact that she was carrying around a piece of her traitorous sensei's soul.

"We will Anko, don't worry." Naruto reassured her while Kurenai just rubbed her back soothingly. "At the very least, it's not fully sentient, it's more like a basic awareness."

Anko wasn't looking very reassured by that, but seemed willing to believe that Naruto and Tsunade could find a way to remove the mark.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

A month later.

There was a nervous squirming sensation in Naruto's stomach.

This was entirely due to the fact that it was finally time for his date with Xanna. In spite of the fact that they had slept together many times and that he had known her for practically his entire life, he couldn't help feeling nervous. It was after all his first date.

More importantly, it was his first date with her and he desperately wanted things to go right. It was very important to him.

Despite the fact that he badly needed a break from working on removing Orochimaru's cursed seal, right now he was feeling even more stressed out.

Taking a deep breath and exhaling in an effort to calm himself down at least a little, he made his way outside his apartment, where he would wait for his date to show up.

He was currently wearing the clothing that he had commissioned over a month ago. The pants nothing more than a simple pair of black hakama. He didn't bother with the usual undershirt that was supposed to be worn and only wore a black haori to cover his chest. It was mostly closed so he was actually more covered than usual. The only thing that made the entire outfit special was the giant embroidery of the Kyuubi in full fox form on his back, nine tails spread wide and a grin on the vulpine snout. He had foregone his usual combat boots and was instead wearing sandals for a change.

When he had asked for this to be made, he had done it for several reasons. Mostly because he wanted to show his devotion to Xanna openly in the only way that he could as long as he was still vulnerable to so many enemies. Another was to show that he was proud to be associated with her. He also had his ponytail deliberately hanging down his chest, so that it wouldn't hide the image.

Lately though, he was glad for another reason. The villagers had already started being stupid, calling him things such as 'Honorable son of the Yondaime' and it annoyed him to no end. These were the same assholes that would have come to cheer if he was getting lynched not even 2 months ago and now they were kissing his ass as if their life depended on it. He was fine if they hated him, he would be more than happy to return the favor if they tried anything, but this hypocrisy pissed him off.

Maybe seeing a giant picture of the Kyuubi embroidered on his back would light a fire under their asses again and they'd stop pretending that they hadn't hated him for 17 years.

His thoughts were interrupted as Xanna made her way outside as well and he couldn't prevent himself from staring at her new look.

Before, she had always worn something that was a shade of red, clearly her favorite color. But she had decided to go with something a little different for their date.

She was dressed in a white silk kimono with wide sleeves that was tied with a deep crimson obi, also having red trim to accentuate it. The white kimono contrasted sharply with her dusky skin and the red highlights matched her hair. Unlike a traditional kimono, this one was shortened to knee length and had a deep neckline that exposed a great deal of cleavage. She was wearing very thin sandals which Naruto knew must be a bit irritating to her, as he had never seen her wear any kind of footwear before. There was also the fact that she was obviously not wearing a bra and Naruto guessed that she probably hadn't bothered with any panties either.

Naruto had no idea where she got her clothes, but he very much approved.

"You look radiant." She really did too. In the low light of the evening and dressed in white, she was nearly glowing.

"You aren't looking bad yourself." She commented with an amused tone, looking at the representation of herself on his back. It was very well done and she could appreciate the irony of it, and the clear symbolism that she was more important to him than the village brought a feeling of warmth to her heart.

Naruto frowned slightly in confusion. There was something off about her voice...

"Yes?" She asked him with a grin, having a good idea about what was confusing him.

"Your voice..." He trailed off, not sure how to explain what it was.

"I'm suppressing the chakra flow to my throat and voice box, otherwise any human other than you might find themselves acting like a drooling idiot." She explained.

"Oh." Naruto said in realisation." Why am I not affected?"

"Because you've been hearing it for your entire life, not to mention the strength of your own chakra works to counteract the effects."

"I see. Well then my lady, shall we?" He asked once her explanation was over and offered her his arm.

"Yes, lets." The demoness said as she grabbed hold of his arm and held it close to her, pressing it against her breast.

Naruto couldn't help the smile that refused to leave his face as they walked through the village arm in arm. Sex with Xanna was amazing, but he wanted her heart too and this would hopefully be a step towards that.

Both of them were quite amused at the looks that they were getting from the people around them. Some people looked like they were about to shout greetings out to the 'Honorable son of the Yondaime', before they caught sight of the image of the nine tailed fox on his back and their faces instantly soured.

There was the occasional woman that took an appreciative look at him or shot a jealous glare towards the crimson eyed beauty on his arm, but they were currently in the upscale part of the village, which meant that he was almost universally disliked there.

Xanna herself was attracting a great deal of male attention, most of which had no idea why a woman of such beauty and grace would associate herself with the much hated Kyuubi Jinchuuriki. Many of them came to the false conclusion that she was with him because of his status as a clan head and son of the Yondaime, especially as none of them had ever seen this exotic woman before. Her state of dress and clear lack of a bra made it easy for them to label her as a gold digger that was only after him for his clan name and the wealth that would no doubt come with it eventually.

Soon they made it to their destination, which was a very pricey restaurant. Naruto knew that Xanna technically didn't need to eat, but she still enjoyed it.

As soon as they entered, they were subjected to the staring of both the staff and the guests, but they paid it no mind as they walked towards an empty table and sat down, completely ignoring the fact that it was a reservation only type of restaurant and that they were supposed to wait for someone to show them to their table.

Within a minute of sitting down, there was a great deal of grumbling from the other guests, something to the effect of 'disrespectful' and similar words.

The owner hastily made his way towards the two of them, with every intention of telling them to leave. Usually he would have loved to have the son of the Yondaime as his guest, but the way that he was dressed, as well as the fact that he had barged in without a reservation and just taken a table as if he owned the place was upsetting all of his other guests. Not to mention that the man was quite agitated himself over these very offenses.

"I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you and your date to leave Uzumaki-sama." He said, barely able to keep his anger and resentment hidden when he spoke. It galled him that he had to be polite to someone who would mock his losses and the losses of the village in general by openly displaying an image of the Kyuubi on his clothes.

Xanna looked at the sniveling little worm that was trying to make them leave and the man froze as he was pinned by a slitted crimson gaze that gave him terrible flashbacks to that long ago night, when eyes just like those, except much bigger, were glaring balefully down at the village.

"I don't think you want to do that." Naruto said mildly, unknowingly preventing his date from causing the man to lose control of his bladder.

"Why wouldn't I want to do that? You're upsetting the rest of my guests." Due to the fact that he'd been shaken when he'd looked into Xanna's eyes, a slight sneer escaped his control.

"Because if you do, your wife might come into possession of some photographs of you and that cute waitress over there in some very compromising positions." Naruto said with a fanged grin, gesturing towards the pretty waitress halfway across the room and pulled out a single photo to prove that he did indeed have them.

The man instantly paled and took an instinctive step back as the crimson haired beauty also gave a similarly fanged grin, clearly amused by the threat. He knew that if his wife got hold of those photographs, she would divorce him and take everything he owned while she was at it.

"Wh-What do you want?" The man asked nervously, sweat beading on his forehead. He would just have to hope that the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki wouldn't make it a habit of blackmailing him with those photos

"You are going to serve us and you are going to like it. Also, for insulting my date with your presence, you are going to do it for free as a token of apology."

The man nodded hastily and scampered off, swallowing down his anger at his situation and his fear of losing everything if he irritated the blond any further.

"What an interesting way to handle that worm." Xanna laughed." Personally I would have just scared him into submission."

"Sometimes it's more fun being subtle." He answered with a grin.

The demoness raised an eyebrow at that and Naruto soon felt a foot sliding itself along his leg. He grinned and returned the favor, kicking off a game of footsy that they only briefly paused when a waitress came to collect their order.

Several of the other guests had quite obviously noticed what the two were doing and were appalled at the 'disgraceful' behavior.

The owner took note of this himself, but didn't dare do anything about it, for fear of having those photographs delivered to his wife if he tried to get them to stop.

The former Jinchuuriki and his Bijuu date spent two hours in the restaurant, slowly driving the owner insane as he saw his other guests leaving in a huff as their antics became ever more obvious. When they finally left, the man let out a giant relieved sigh and hoped that they never came back.

"Well, that was certainly amusing." Xanna said with a grin. Messing with mortals was so much more fun when you had someone to share the experience with. "Perhaps we should come back and do it again sometime."

Naruto returned her grin, but more out of the fact that she had enjoyed herself and that she wanted to do it again rather than the fact that they had been slowly driving the owner insane.

"Oh, I don't think we'll be able to come back here. At least not anytime soon." The blond commented.

"Why is that?" She asked curiously.

"Because I told him that he would serve us and like it. I'm pretty sure I caught him not liking it several times, so I'm going to be sending those pictures to his wife." He said with a smirk.

The demoness burst out into delighted laughter. "Naruto, that is absolutely vicious, but you did warn him, so he has only himself to blame." Truly he was one of a kind. She could already begin to feel herself becoming aroused at the mere thought that he could be that vicious to someone who had wronged him in the past. As a demon, Xanna didn't really believe in 'forgive and forget' in most cases.

It had become shockingly easy for him to inspire such lust in her, something that had never happened to her before. Never before had anyone, human or demon, drawn her towards them like this. She found herself wanting him more and more, to the point that barely a night passed anymore that she didn't go to sleep in his arms.

She allowed Naruto to lead her somewhere else, curious to see what else he had planned.

A group of men, somewhere in their mid twenties and clearly from rich families looked to be arguing about something a good distance away. Naruto paid them no mind and they were too far for him to hear. Xanna however heard them perfectly well. They were discussing the possibility of approaching them and convincing her to go with them instead. She was disappointed when they decided not to because of Naruto's size and reputation. The resulting beating would have no doubt been amusing.

Naruto led her out of the village proper until they reached a river. It was in fact the same river that went through his private training ground, just a little bit further upstream. He had spent quite a while preparing the place and he hoped that she would like it.

"What is this?" She asked curiously, allowing her voice to revert to it's natural state now that they were away from the village. The reason for the question was the steam rising from the river, which really shouldn't be happening.

Naruto smiled at hearing her voice being back to normal. He definitely liked it better this way.

"This, my dear, is a private hot spring that I made for us." He said with a grin. "I thought that we could go for a soak."

It had taken him a great deal of work to create a circular pit in the middle of the river and then layer it with smooth rocks so that it would be comfortable. Not to mention that it had been a bitch and a half to figure out how to apply the heating seals underwater without the water destroying them. But once he had finally managed it, there was a constant stream of hot water passing slowly through the pit. Well there was whenever he supplied enough chakra to the seals, which he had sent a clone to do before coming here.

It was probably playing merry hell with the life cycle of the fish further downstream, but Naruto wasn't too concerned about that.

They quickly stripped and got into the heated water, sitting on the stones that served as seats. As soon as they sat down though, Naruto frowned and drew Xanna to sit in his lap. She didn't protest at all and quickly got comfortable on him, while Naruto wrapped his arms around her and they both let out content sighs.

After spending a few minutes just lazing around together until Naruto broke the silence. "There sure are a lot of stars out tonight."

"This is nothing compared to what you can see from the middle of the desert at night."

"Must be a beautiful sight." Naruto commented.

"It is."

"I'm sure it's not as beautiful as you." He said with a grin and placed a kiss on her neck.

"Naruto, that was so terribly corny." She said dryly, causing him to laugh.

"Maybe, but it's still true."

They lapsed into silence again, just enjoying the closeness and the hot water before Naruto's curiosity over something got the better of him.

"I've been meaning to ask you this." He began, making her look back at him briefly in interest. "Have you ever met any of the legendary shinobi of the past. You know, like the Shodai Hokage or something?"

"Well, I actually did meet Senju Hashirama briefly."

"Could you tell me about it?" Naruto asked with interest. He was sure that this would be interesting.

"I suppose. I actually met him because of his rival Uchiha Madara." Naruto detected the clear hostility in her tone when mentioning the man and was curious as to what the man had done to deserve it. Aside from the usual Uchiha arrogance the entire clan seemed to be cursed with.

"The fool had somehow evolved his Sharingan to a level far beyond what other Uchiha ever accomplish and came to believe that it would allow him to place me under his control. He sought me out with the intention of enslaving me and using me to fight against his rival." Naruto tightened his arms around her, hearing the rage in her voice at the insult of what the man had attempted. Truth be told he was quite pissed at the Uchiha himself for daring to think that he could just walk up to Xanna with his pink eye and enslave her.

The demoness calmed down quickly enough and continued speaking. "Obviously he failed and it made him quite angry. The idiot was of the opinion that the Bijuu were nothing but beasts and should obey the heir of the Sage of Six Paths as he styled himself, or at least that's what I was able to gather from his ranting. I have no idea how he even learned that the Uchiha were descended from the sage, but it had clearly gone to his head. He fled before I could fry him for his insolence, promising that he would get me in the end, though nothing ever came of it."

"Sounds like he had a few screws loose." Naruto commented, easily able to imagine a powerful Uchiha like Madara was said to be thinking that the world should bow to him just because he was an Uchiha.

"No doubt. I heard that the maggot died fighting Hashirama before I could show him the price of the insult that he'd given me. He thought that his malevolent Doujutsu was capable of overpowering me? Feh, the only Doujutsu that poses any threat at all to me is the Rinnegan and it has long since passed from this world." Xanna finished with a snort.

"So how did that lead to you meeting the Shodai?" Naruto asked curiously, rubbing her legs soothingly.

"I was curious about the man that killed Madara, so I went to him in human form. Konoha had already been created by then and Hashirama had been married to Uzumaki Mito. They were in the process of attempting to establish peace with the other four shinobi villages that had sprung up around the Elemental Nations." The demoness said, noting Naruto's interest in hearing that the Shodai had married an Uzumaki woman.

"It was amusing to watch them for a little while, because I knew that they would fail in the end. Human nature made certain that there was always going to be a greedy, self serving idiot somewhere that was willing to risk causing a war for personal gain. I was right of course, since it wasn't even a few years later that the first great shinobi war started."

"You know what you need?" Naruto asked after a few moments of silence.

"What?" She asked curiously.

"A splash." He said, confusing her for a second before he tossed her into the deeper water, making her give an uncharacteristic surprised yelp before she was submerged.

She rose from under the water with crimson hair plastered all over her face in a rather undignified fashion, making Naruto grin at her.

"You've just made a terrible mistake Naruto." The demoness said slowly, with a menacing grin splitting her face wider with every word.

The blond was starting to feel worried that he had actually offended her. He wasn't given any time to actually think though, as the demoness grabbed him and dunked him underwater. Despite appearances, she was a good deal stronger than him, so it was easy for her to do.

Naruto got his head over the water's surface, sputtering but also laughing at the same time.

"You know of course, that this means war." He said faux grimly and splashed some water at her, which she returned with gusto.

They spent the next several minutes splashing water at each other and laughing most of the time. Naruto started cheating after the first minute and used his water element to throw large amounts of water in her direction. Xanna retaliated by manifesting her tails and and using all nine of them splash him, occasionally also grabbing at his legs and pulling him under.

Xanna could hardly believe that she was acting so childishly and how fun it was. It made no sense to her, but this was the most fun she'd had in centuries. She was a millenia old demon, the most powerful of all demons, but right now she'd rather keep splashing water at a human than blow something up. Of course, that human happened to be Naruto, which was no doubt the entire reason she was even doing this. She would never have agreed to going along with this date idea if it wasn't him asking. If anyone else had dunked her or splashed water on her, she'd kill them. But because it was Naruto, she had enjoyed herself on this date and she was having fun playing in the water like a child. It was amazing what kind of influence he had on her already and she knew that it was growing stronger with every day.

To Naruto, Xanna had never looked more beautiful. He loved the carefree laugh that he had heard so rarely before and he loved the way that he eyes seemed to sparkle now that she was having a good time. Those predatory crimson eyes that could give off such a sense of power and danger were now showing only happiness and laughter. More than anything he wanted to see her happy like this as much as possible.

Their play time was ended when Naruto couldn't contain himself anymore and caught her lips in a kiss, which she returned eagerly. He pushed her towards one of the walls until her back hit it and then pressed into her as he kept up the kiss. Her hands roamed all over him, while Naruto's moved down to her legs and gripped her thighs, lifting her out of the water easily.

He lifted her upwards until she was sitting on the edge of the small pool and Naruto wasted no time in dragging his tongue over her leg, rapidly making his way inward. Since he was still inside the pool and Xanna was sitting on the edge, he was in the perfect position to have a taste of her nether lips, which he did eagerly.

She gave a small gasp as she felt his tongue being dragged over the sensitive bundle of nerves over her entrance before it retreated to lightly lick inside of her. She grasped at his hair as he continued to move his tongue over all the right places, making her breathing deepen because of the building pleasure. The occasional poke of fangs on her sensitive flesh only excited her further. When he inserted a finger inside her, but kept lavishing attention on her clitoris with his tongue at the same time, she knew that she wouldn't last much longer. With a gasping moan she came and pulled his head closer. He eagerly licked up the trickle of her release with long strokes of his tongue.

As soon as he was done and she let go of his hair, he lifted himself up from the pool and pushed her to lie on her back a bit further away from the edge. He set himself down on top of her and kissed her again, lining himself up and entering her at the same time, making both of them groan in pleasure into each other's mouth.

He made sure to press his chest into her firm breasts even as he kept thrusting into her and kissing her. It didn't take him long at all before he was releasing inside her. He moved his lips to her neck and planted light kisses along it while she ran her hands along his back.

"I love you." Naruto said into her ear.

Xanna's eyes widened slightly as she felt a tightness in her chest at hearing those words. Clearly things had progressed a good deal further than she had expected them to.

She didn't answer, aside from holding him tighter and giving him another kiss.

She needed to think on what this meant and she was honestly not feeling very clearheaded right now. It certainly wasn't the first time that he had said those words, but it was the first time that it had affected her so strongly.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

2 weeks later in the Hokage's private training field.

"Alright Anko, we think that we're finally ready to remove the curse mark." Tsunade said to the snake summoner.

Naruto and Kurenai were also present. Naruto because he was going to be doing part of the work and Kurenai as moral support for Anko.

There was also one other person present. An unconscious man that was tied to a stone slab. Not very long ago he had been a bandit, part of a group of bandits actually. He had been taken prisoner by leaf shinobi as someone who might have important information, but had turned out to know nothing. He had however been a confirmed murderer and rapist and had been slated for execution when Tsunade had called off his execution and brought him to this training field instead.

He wasn't the first one to be brought here either, he was in fact the third. The previous two had died in their attempts to remove the curse mark.

Orochimaru's cursed seal was a shoddily made piece of crap, but it was a dangerous piece of crap.

Without a word, Naruto began the procedure, this time feeling fairly confident that it would work. He placed a Yin seal on his chest and absorbed the chakra from it. Right away he started focusing on every terrible memory he could dredge up, calling up his chakra at the same time. The chakra emanating from him darkened visibly as his anger and hate tainted it. When he felt that it had become corrupt enough, he directed it into another prepared seal and locked it inside.

The next several minutes he had to spend purging the left over Yin chakra out of his body and getting his emotional balance back so that his chakra returned to it's usual uncorrupted state. When he had an excess of Yin chakra running through his chakra network, it was easy to infuse his will into it, but it unbalanced him to corrupt his own chakra like that. It also took some effort to not get another disconnect from his body like had happened the first time that he'd used Yin chakra.

"Ready?" Tsunade asked once it looked like Naruto had gotten himself back to normal. She always hated seeing him do that, his chakra felt far too much like Orochimaru's when he did it.

When he nodded, Tsunade stabbed a syringe into the unconscious bandit's shoulder and pressed down on the plunger. It had taken some doing, but she had managed to extract a sample of the unknown substance from Anko and identified it as an enzyme of some sort. It was crucial to the working of the curse mark and very difficult to create artificially.

Naruto slapped the seal holding the corrupt chakra on top of the man's shoulder before the uncontrolled enzymes killed him. Anko pressed her shoulder against the man right after. The position was awkward, but there was no helping that. She grimaced in pain when she felt her curse mark reacting to the combination of enzymes and dark emotions that the seal was slowly leaking along with Naruto's corrupted chakra. The pain kept getting steadily worse, making Anko grit her teeth together and stubbornly kept her shoulder pressed against the unconscious bandit.

"It's working! Just a little longer Anko." The words encouraged her and she ignored the pain. A little pain was worth getting rid of the damned mark.

Soon after, she felt someone pull her away and she slumped against a chest that didn't have breasts, so she figured that it must be Naruto's.

"Is it gone?" She asked tiredly.

"It's gone." Naruto confirmed. "it's moved over to that guy."

Anko turned her head and did indeed see the curse mark sitting on the unconscious body of the bandit. Well he'd be a dead bandit soon, since someone without an active chakra network couldn't survive having a curse mark being placed on them and the best part was that the piece of Orochimaru's soul was going to die with him. She felt Kurenai hugging her from behind and sighed contently.

It had taken a lot of research and work, but they had managed to find a way to trick the curse mark into migrating. Since Orochimaru's soul fragment was drawn to darker emotions, it would naturally be drawn towards a corrupt chakra that was full of hatred. By injecting the enzymes into the bandit, it would also register him as a bearer of the curse mark and move to activate them.

Honestly if Orochimaru wasn't so sloppy with his Fuinjutsu he could have made the curse mark harder to remove as well as giving it a higher than 1 in 10 chances of survival when applied. With what he had learned from this, Naruto estimated that he could make a similar curse mark, but give it about 6 in 10 chances of survival, not that he had any interest in hacking off pieces of his soul to do it. For a man obsessed with immortality, Orochimaru had some dangerous hobbies.

Tsunade hadn't felt comfortable using bandits as guinea pigs for this, but they were scum of the earth that had been slated for execution anyway, so it wasn't as if they would have lived long and productive lives.

"Thank you." Anko mumbled and dragged Naruto's head closer for a kiss.

"You should be careful there Anko, wouldn't want Kurenai to think you were cheating on her." Naruto teased once the kiss was over.

Kurenai shrugged and dragged Naruto in for a kiss as well. "Thank you for getting that mark off her."

"See blondie, Nai-chan is all up for another threesome." Anko said with a tired grin as she was transferred into Kurenai's arms.

"I never said anything about a threesome, I was just thanking him for helping you." Kurenai protested with a red face.

"You didn't say that you don't want a threesome either." Anko teased.

Kurenai tried to glare, but it wasn't very effective with the way that she was blushing. Truth be told she wasn't entirely opposed to the idea of Naruto joining in again.

What the hell have Naruto and Anko done to me? I didn't used to be like this! She protested inside her own mind ineffectually. The fact of the matter was that she was happy being in a relationship with Anko, but her attraction to the blond hadn't diminished in the slightest. Considering the fact that he had just gotten Orochimaru's disgusting seal off Anko, he was looking more desirable than ever. Not to mention that he had also helped her by giving her a Yin release seal, which would allow her to take her Genjutsu to the next level. If he would by chance want to join in on the relationship she wouldn't put up much of a protest.

Kurenai could only sigh at her own thoughts. A few months ago, she would have put any man that dared suggest such a thing to her in a very disturbing Genjutsu. But then Naruto takes a stroll through her life and she ends up in a lesbian relationship with her best friend, with vague hopes of adding Naruto to it.

The annoyed clearing of a throat reminded them that they had been ignoring their Hokage.

They all turned towards the rather irritated and slightly embarrassed looking woman and offered sheepish grins. Well, Anko and Kurenai did, Naruto just looked amused.

"If you're all quite done, I want Anko to stay overnight in the hospital for observation." The buxom Hokage said, earning a despondent groan from the snake summoner.

"Other than that, all I have to say is that this was a great success and we can do the same thing for Uchiha Sasuke in a few days." Tsunade said and they all made their way to the hospital.

XXXXXXXXXXXX

Several days later

Naruto was awoken from his comfortable sleep cuddled with Xanna by loud knocking on his door.

Groaning with irritation, he made his way to the door and opened it to find a harried looking Shikamaru there.

"Naruto! Get dressed quick, I need you for a mission!" Shikamaru said hurriedly, which was seriously out of character for him.

"Naruto, whats going on? Come back to bed." Xanna's voice drifted through the bedroom door, just barely remembering to suppress the chakra in her throat and voice box.

Shikamaru froze as the most beautiful woman that he had ever seen walked out of Naruto's bedroom, completely naked except for the sheet she was clutching to herself.

"What mission is so damn important they you're waking me up this early?" Naruto grumbled irritably.

"Sasuke has abandoned the village and there are no higher ranked ninja available to go after him, so Hokage-sama told me to gather as many capable Genin as I can to retrieve him." Shikamaru explained in a rush, shaking himself from his daze.

"That inconsiderate little shit! I swear I'm going to fucking kill him when I get my hands on him. Making me get out of bed at this hour and more importantly interrupting my cuddle time just because he can't handle the fact that he's not the baddest ass in the world." Naruto ranted to himself.

"Umm, we don't know why he left the village Naruto." Shikamaru pointed out.

"Of course we know why he left! He left because he's a goddamn retard that thinks leaving the village is going to make him more powerful. I bet the stupid bastard jacks of to the thought of being powerful enough to kill his brother. He's so predictable that any moron with more than two brain cells could convince him to spread his ass wide open if they told him that it would make him more powerful."

Shikamaru was getting seriously uncomfortable at the torrent of colorful verbal abuse that Naruto was throwing at his missing teammate. He made a note to himself to avoid waking Naruto up too early ever again.

The blond went into the bedroom to get his clothes, since he hadn't even bothered getting dressed to open the door. A fact that Shikamaru had been ignoring with absolute focus.

"So, the Uchiha shows his true colors." The redhead commented idly, drawing Shikamaru's eyes to her. He had also been trying very hard not to look at her, not willing to risk pissing off an already irritable Naruto by staring at his woman.

"Errr..." Was all that the Nara managed to get out, his vast intellect failing him for once. He wanted to instinctively say something in Sasuke's defence, but some part of his brain absolutely refused to argue with an incredibly beautiful naked woman.

"You will make sure that Naruto comes back to me unharmed?" She asked, smiling at Shikamaru in a way that displayed many sharp teeth. It didn't look like a friendly expression.

Despite the fact that it was a question and said in a questioning tone, Shikamaru got the distinct impression that it was not in fact a question, but more of a demand. He didn't know why, but when this woman looked at him with those slitted crimson eyes, he felt more like one of his family deer than a shinobi.

A bead of sweat rolled down the side of his face. I wonder if all redheads are this troublesome? Or is this one special?

"Ah, yes of course. I'll do my best to make sure that everyone comes back home safe." Shikamaru rushed to say when he saw her eyes narrow a fraction.

"I don't care about any others, only Naruto is important." She said with finality and Shikamaru had the distinct impression that he had just been brushed aside as if he was trash. Under normal circumstances he would have been insulted, but right now he was much too unnerved to be upset.

Before any further thought could be put into it, Naruto came out of the bedroom wearing his usual outfit, but carrying the Kusanagi as well, which surprised Shikamaru slightly, as he hadn't known that Naruto had picked up Kenjutsu as well.

The blond stopped in the doorway and gave Xanna a deep kiss, making Shikamaru shift uncomfortably.

"I'll be back soon." Naruto said to her, before giving her another kiss.

"Well, lets get this over with and catch that moron." Naruto said to the Nara heir and they left the apartment.