Naruto: Rise of the Uzumaki by X009

Chapter 3

"Why am I not surprised?" Naruto ground out as he leaned back against the wooden pole, staring at the sky above.

Here he was with Sasuke and Sakura at the Third Training Ground. The place where Team Seven had officially formed. And the place where Kakashi-sensei had told them they'd be meeting today.

As per usual, it was well over an hour past when he said they'd meet, and the man was nowhere in sight.

"How is this fair!? He tells us to meet him and keeps us waiting every day!" Sakura yelled in frustration. Sasuke meanwhile remained silent as he leaned against one of the three logs sticking up from the ground.

Naruto was glad to see that a night at home seemed to have done Sakura some good. She seemed to be back to her energetic old self for the most part. He'd been worrying about her.

"I wish he didn't have us meet in different places every time. Then I could set something up to get back at him for leaving us hanging," Naruto growled, crossing his arms before he grinned at Sakura. "Say, think he'd agree if we invited him for ramen or something? I bet I could come up with something good if I put my mind to it."

"I wouldn't try it," Sakura answered back. "After seeing what he's like in the field... I get the feeling he was just humoring us with that eraser thing. I doubt he'd really fall for something like that..."

Naruto clicked his tongue. "Yeah, you're probably right..."

"Ugh, next time I'm bringing a book or something," Sakura growled, hands on her hips as she began to tap her foot.

"Well, isn't that a coincidence? I happen to have brought a few books for you." Kakashi's voice rang out, causing the genin to look to the river behind them. Kakashi appeared in a burst of smoke, giving them his eye smile and a wave. "Sorry I'm late; I had to help a kid find his lost pet."

"Your excuses suck, sensei." Naruto deadpanned while Sakura raised a trembling fist in the silver-haired man's direction. Then what he said clicked, and she was caught flatfooted.

"Wait, you've got a book for me?" She asked, looking at him in confusion.

"Among other things," Kakashi replied as his sole visible eye roamed over his students. "I feel I may have taken a bit too much of a laissez-faire approach to training you..." His gaze settled on Naruto. "In all honestly, I should have taught you the tree climbing exercise, and more, quite a bit before we took that mission to Wave." He then eye-smiled again and pulled out a small sheet of paper, holding it between two fingers. "So, from here on out, we'll be taking fewer missions and doing more training."

"Um, Kakashi-sensei? What's that?" Sakura asked, clearly as lost as he was on what a sheet of paper would do for them.

"Oh, this? This is known as Chakra Induction Paper." Kakashi told them. "It's used to test one's elemental affinity. While you can learn how to use any element, everyone has one they have a natural inclination for. That one will be more powerful and easier for them to use. All you have to do is channel your chakra into this paper." And at that moment, the paper suddenly crinkled in his hand. "And voila. How it reacts tells you the holder's affinity. Mine's lightning, so the paper wrinkles. With the water element, it gets wet. Fire, it burns to ash. Earth it turns to dirt, and with wind, it'll split in two."

"Cool! So you're going to use that to figure out what kind of jutsu to teach us!?" Naruto asked excitedly. That more than made up for him being late.

"That's right." Kakashi nodded. "Oh, incidentally. A little tidbit you might want to know. You need to have mastered a minimum of two elements to qualify to become a jonin. A bit far off, but it's something to keep in mind if you don't want to stop at chunin. Now, let's get started."