Chapter 43 (Patreon)

Naruto’s success with the Summoning Jutsu convinced Jiraiya of his talent, and he began putting even more care into his training.

He wanted Naruto to learn how to draw out the Nine-Tails’ chakra and use its power, just as other jinchūriki did. Naruto firmly rejected the idea, however, insisting that he couldn’t draw out that chakra.

Jiraiya had to set it aside for the time being. With the Chūnin Exam finals only a month away, preparing Naruto for his match came first. The boy already had enormous chakra reserves of his own, anyway.

For the next stage of his training, Jiraiya taught him a variety of Wind Style jutsu instead of the Rasengan.

As he had explained before, Naruto should make the most of his chakra reserves by unleashing powerful ninjutsu without constantly worrying about the cost.

Naruto agreed. He had already been fighting that way, and Kisame Hoshigaki—the Tailless Tailed Beast—was the kind of shinobi he wanted to emulate.

That enormous sphere of water was terrifying.

Still, Naruto wanted a fighting style of his own. What if he could produce seemingly endless winds, on the scale of the typhoons in disaster movies?

A storm like that should be able to contend with Kisame’s water sphere, shouldn’t it?

For the next month, he created thirty shadow clones every day to practice B-rank Wind Style ninjutsu. Another twenty trained in taijutsu under Might Guy, while Naruto himself worked on his physical conditioning.

The taijutsu lessons focused on movements, techniques, and ways to apply force. Those were things shadow clones could learn. When they dispersed, their memories and experience returned to Naruto, and a little practice with his real body let him put those lessons to use himself.

By the end of the month, he had learned ten common B-rank and A-rank Wind Style jutsu, bringing all of them to the Proficient level.

To increase the power of his attacks, he also upgraded Wind Style: Hurricane and Wind Style: Gale Palm from Proficient to Advanced.

Two Skill Upgrade Scrolls cost him 200 points, leaving him with 48.

Reaching the Advanced level did more than strengthen the techniques. It also let him form their hand seals much faster, even using just one hand.

“Naruto, your talent is incredible!”

Jiraiya watched in amazement as Naruto formed the seals with one hand and unleashed a powerful hurricane in less than a second.

Only the Child of Prophecy could progress like this, he thought.

Naruto’s taijutsu had improved greatly as well, though his physical conditioning still lagged behind his grasp of the techniques. He couldn’t bring out their full power yet.

…

Throughout Naruto’s month of training, his double in the guise of a masked woman with red hair had been busy too.

It combined an Explosion Release clay clone with a shadow clone. The double possessed his god-level Explosion Release kekkei genkai, along with the abilities of his Uzumaki Sage Body. Its chakra reserves were immense.

It spent its days and nights preparing explosive clay. The day before the finals, it buried countless clay animals around the arena and in the areas where Konoha’s shinobi were most likely to intercept an attack from Sunagakure and Otogakure.

It had also prepared a trap on the high rooftop where Orochimaru and the Third Hokage would fight if events followed the original story.

Now Naruto only had to wait for the Konoha Crush to begin.

The thought brought a quiet chuckle.

…

The day of the third exam had arrived.

The daimyō of the Land of Fire, dignitaries from other countries, and Konoha’s villagers filled the stands.

Outside the village, large groups of elite shinobi from Sunagakure and Otogakure lay in ambush.

One of Naruto’s shadow clones found Hinata and led her to a training ground.

“N-Naruto-kun, shouldn’t you be at the exam? It’s about to start!”

Her cheeks were flushed as she looked up at him. She wanted to pull her small hand free of his, yet she couldn’t seem to muster the strength.

“I’m a shadow clone,” Naruto replied. “I wanted to talk to you. Once the exam is over, I’ll have another important decision to make about my life.”

He led her to sit down in the training ground and looked toward the distant arena, his voice calm.

That wasn’t his only reason for bringing her here. He also wanted to keep her away from the danger that was about to unfold.

Hinata was such a sweet, endearing girl. Naruto couldn’t bear the thought of her getting hurt, especially through his own actions.

While his shadow clone stayed with Hinata, the real Naruto was already standing in the arena.

Beside him were Gaara, Neji Hyūga, Shikamaru, Temari, Shino Aburame, and Kankurō.

The crowd watched them, the stands alive with noise. Sasuke and Kakashi still hadn’t arrived. Apparently, neither was particularly concerned about being on time.

Genma Shiranui stood before the contestants with his usual senbon between his teeth. Eventually, he had no choice but to announce the start.

“The rules are the same as in the preliminaries. There are no restrictions. A match ends when one of you surrenders, loses consciousness, or dies.”

“First match: Naruto Uzumaki versus Neji Hyūga. The rest of you, head to the waiting area.”

As Genma announced the pairing, conversations broke out across the stands.

Most of Konoha’s villagers knew Naruto.

He was now an official shinobi, and after the two bombings, hardly anyone dared insult him openly. That didn’t mean they believed he was strong.

To many of them, he was still the little troublemaker who painted over the faces on the Hokage Rock.

Neji, meanwhile, was a talented member of Konoha’s Hyūga clan and the top graduate of his year. Plenty of spectators thought Naruto’s defeat was already certain.

They were only waiting to see him humiliated.

“Begin!”

Genma stepped aside, watching the two with a neutral expression.

Naruto stood opposite Neji and smiled as he met those pale eyes.

“I told you I’d beat you and shut you up about fate. And I haven’t forgotten what you did to Hinata in the preliminaries. I’m settling both right here.”

Neji looked at him with disdain.

“Don’t worry. I’ll make sure you face reality. I want to see how you look when that confidence turns to panic.”

“Then let’s stop talking and fight!”

With a thought, Naruto created fifty shadow clones around himself. They spread out, gradually surrounding Neji.

Every Naruto began forming the same hand seals in perfect unison.

Even Rock Lee admitted that Neji’s taijutsu was better than his. Naruto had no intention of challenging Neji at close range simply because he had spent a month studying taijutsu and possessed Phantom Step.

Right now, he was better off using his enormous chakra reserves to overwhelm an enemy with ninjutsu. He didn’t need to rely on Phantom Step to trade blows up close.

Neji immediately recognized his plan and lunged at one of the shadow clones in front of him.

But his Byakugan couldn’t distinguish the real Naruto from the clones, and Naruto needed less than a second to finish his hand seals.

For all Neji’s skill in taijutsu, he only managed to dispel two shadow clones in that brief instant.

The remaining forty-nine Narutos unleashed their Wind Style jutsu together. In front of each of them, a hurricane took shape, rapidly growing as it swept toward Neji.

Forty-nine hurricanes!

Neji’s expression hardened. His Byakugan scanned the incoming winds, searching from side to side until he spotted a gap where the attack was weakest.

He darted toward it, intending to circle behind the Narutos and destroy the shadow clones one at a time.

But would he get the chance?