CHUNIN EXAMS-8

 NARUTO POV:

"What do you mean you're not training us?" Sakura and Naruto said together, outraged.

"I mean what I said" Kakashi-sensei sighed. "I'm gonna be teaching Sasuke for this one month, mainly to make sure the curse mark doesn't act up. There are teachers set up for one-to-one mentorships for you two as well."

That mollified the two a bit, but Naruto was still very much irritated.

"And who exactly are these two?" Naruto asked with a twitch in his eye. Call him cocky if you want, but there were very few people in the village who could actually teach him something he wouldn't be able to get on his own.

"Well Sakura gets Yamato, but your instructor is a surprise" he said with an eye smile to Naruto "Go to training ground 1 to do your normal training, the mystery man has been told to find you there"

With that, he disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

Naruto cursed under his breath, and kicked the ground in his anger.

"I bet we don't see either of those jerks till the finals too" he muttered.

Sakura patted him on the back in sympathy "look on the bright side Naruto, you get to train with someone completely new."

"Yeah but I don't even know is this guy's even any good yet" Naruto snapped "no bright side to being ditched like this dattebayo!"

He sighed after that.

"Sorry" he said, looking down at the ground " not like its your fault"

She smiled and pulled him in a one-armed hug "hey, we're friends right? You can always yell about shit to me. I'm used to hearing loud yelling after spending all these years being in the same class as Ino and the Sasuke-fan club"

There was a sudden spike in their vicinity and they both turned to see Yamato-sensei Shunshin-ing into the corridor.

"Time to begin" he said to Sakura before turning to Naruto.

"I was confused too when I was made aware that you have a different trainer, but dont worry. I checked who it was and you'll definitely get stronger"

Some tension seemed to leave Naruto's shoulders, but he was still miffed.

"Thanks sensei" he said with a nod.

With that, both of them went down the corridor team 7 had come through while Naruto left for the exit, wondering what exactly the two were going to do back in the forest of death.

"Not too shabby Gaki!"

Naruto was a blur as he turned, Kubikiribōchō at the neck of…

A weird old man with a huge scroll?

"Whoa there" the man said with a chuckle as he tapped the tip with two fingers, and Naruto could only drop the weapon as it became too heavy to hold.

"Wha-?" Naruto sputtered as he tried to pick it up. "The heck did you do Ero-sennin?"

"Its Jiriya-sensei brat! Show some respect!" Jiraiya the Toad sage declared as he did a kabuki dance.

"Ero-sensei it is" Naruto said "Also fix my damn sword"

The man face faulted, before getting back up and picking the sword up easily with his left hand as he muttered about disrespectful gakis.

Naruto took the sword carefully in case it was still super heavy, but it felt normal so he went back to his swinging drills as his teacher sat down nearby.

"What are you even doing here" Naruto asked once he was done and planted the sword into the ground " you'd usually be doing your 'research' around now"

Naruto had met Jiraiya about a week and a half ago.

As promised, the self-proclaimed super-pervert had come out of nowhere during Naruto's training in training ground 1.

Naruto had almost immediately concluded many things, one of them being that this guy wouldn't be able to teach him shit.

A spar with the man had immediately rid him of that thought.

The other conclusions were still right though.

Anyway, it wasn't training as much as some tips and guidance along with the occasional spar with Jiraiya's shadow clone, but Naruto didn't really mind.

He had a bunch of strong jutsu and his Taijutsu had been developed by the literal best Taijutsu user in Fire country, maybe even in the Elemental Nations.

And so, his current regime was having a clone for each jutsu he already had refining what he already knew.

15 clones stood nearby, each performing the second stage for developing earth style ( Moulding a boulder into a small dense rock using only chakra)

He had wanted to put out 15 clones for each element, but Jiraiya had explicitly stated that if his clones did too many different things and dispelled Naruto would need a day to just sort out his jumbled brain.

It had been a long process, trying to figure out which element he wanted to use next.

Water, while versatile, just wasn't what he needed right now.

Fire would go great with his wind, but its raw and brutal nature meant that Naruto would need a lot more than a month to gain acceptable control.

Lightning was like the opposite to his wind, so there was no doubt that it'd end up taking too long.

Earth would be his best bet, what with its defensive nature that perfectly complimented wind's offensive nature and the fact that he'd be able to boost offensive earth jutsu with his wind and defensive with his anti-chakra.

"I wanted to get you started on something" the man declared " Your skills are already top notch, but this will be a trump card for you."

"What exactly would that be dattebayo?"

"that would be telling my dear student" the man said with a grin before producing a water balloon of all things.

"Try popping this with just your chakra, like this."

The water balloon had multiple ripples across the surface before it exploded in a burst of water.

The man pulled out a bag of deflated water balloons and handed it to the blonde.

"No need to change regiment for your clones. You should do this exercise on your own kid. Trust me, you'll be glad."

Naruto pondered for a second before channeling his chakra through a balloon after filling it.

After a certain point, the surface of the balloon started to pulse, but that was it.

'His had a bunch of ripples, like there were a bunch of spinning disks inside it.'

"Quick question" he said as he realized what that meant "Am I supposed to be spinning my chakra?"

"Oho?" Jiraiya said with a grin as he pulled some scrolls out of his bag "you caught on quick!"

With a grin, Naruto started to slowly swirl his chakra before speeding it up.

It still didn't look quite right, So Naruto tried adding a bunch of different angles of spinning.

As expected, the balloon burst, just like Jiraiya's had.

"I'm done ero-sennin."

Jiraiya, who had been poring over some notes he had made while doing his 'research' looked up so fast it looked like he broke his neck.

"What??"

Naruto picked up one of his pre-filled water balloons and did the exercise again, this time popping it in less than 5 seconds.

Naruto tilted his head to the side in confusion when he saw Jiraiya's dumbstruck face.

"Uh, is that good or bad?"

"This" the man said with a grin " is very very good kid"