Pushing Through the LImit Chapter 31: Communication

I laid on my back with shattered rock laying below me as I stared at the tree leaves above me. It had only been half a week since I had been confined to Konoha.

Anko and Shizune had finished raiding the remainder of Orochimaru’s bases with my clones and much to my disappointment, they hadn’t found many more interesting things.

I had hoped that they might find Suigetsu in one of Orochimaru’s bases, but it seemed that by the time I killed Orochimaru, Suigetsu had yet to be abducted.

It was unfortunate, I really wanted to learn the hydrification technique. Piercing wounds didn’t really affect me anymore as my healing ability took care of them, but there were a few spots that I was in no rush to test that out on, my brain being the first one that came to mind.

Not all was bad though. I could honestly say that I was making some good headway with the Hiraishin. It was an incredibly complex technique, there was no doubt about that, but through the use of my clones, I was beginning to design my own seal for its use.

After I complete the marker, I would need to master two more things before I could use the Hiraishin to its full potential in combat, the ability to place markers with a single touch and the speed at which I could use it.

That however left me with plenty of free time. Time I used to get some physical training in, along with another kind of training that I’d really been looking forward to.

“Alright, Naruto-chan. That’s enough of a break,” Fukasaku said, clapping his hands.

Pa had learned about my bet with Jiraiya and decided that if I was to gain the title of toad sage, I would in fact need to be a sage, so we were training the very basics of Senjutsu. The art of sitting extremely still.

Getting up with a grunt, I grabbed a stone slab and climbed up one of the three stone pillars that I’d formed using Earth style Chakra. Ordinarily, I would need to be reverse summoned to Mt. Myoboku to begin sage training, but I managed to convince Pa otherwise.

I wasn’t allowed to leave Konoha until the tension with Kumo had abated and I had someone else that would really benefit from Pa’s training, but he hadn’t signed the toad summoning contract.

Balancing my stone slab on the pillar, I glanced over at Jugo and felt my eye twitch slightly. He sat perfectly balanced, looking very much at peace with the world, his body an image of stillness. He’d taken to the exercise extremely well and only had to attempt it twice before he became perfectly balanced.

Initially, it took quite a bit of effort to convince Tsunade for Jugo to be temporarily released, but, so long as someone was around that could keep him from going on a murderous rampage, she was alright with it.

Jugo had a lot of potential that I was not going to leave untapped. Mastering his Kekkei Genkai meant mastering the ability to shape shift along with becoming a Sage. Given time and proper training, I fully believed that Jugo could become a Shinobi that would be able to fight on the same level as Kage, something that would become invaluable when the Akatsuki started to move.

Jumping onto my own slab, I had to account for the shifting of the slab and leaned from side to side in an attempt to keep myself from falling off. Ordinarily, I would have just made a large group of clones learn this for me, but my clones were currently studying the Hiraishin and I didn’t want to stunt their progress with needless memories.

No, I’d handle this by myself and once my clones were finished with the Hiraishin, I’d put them to work mastering the art of sitting still… assuming I haven’t mastered this on my own by then.

“You need to sit still, Naruto-chan. If you keep moving like that, you’ll keep moving the slab and fall off.”

“I’m trying to,” I grunted. I needed to find the perfect balance first, otherwise I’d just keep falling off.

Pa sighed from his spot on the third pillar. “Look at your friend over there. He’s not trying to keep his balance, he just does it. Sitting still is difficult because your instincts tell you to move. You need to silence those instincts and balance will find you!”

Silence my instincts?! Glancing at Jugo, I observed how he was sitting. There was no effort in his stillness, none whatsoever. He just sat there, at peace with the world. His Kekkei Genkai allows him to absorb Natural Energy passively and that leads to him having violent outbursts. He’s constantly fighting against his instincts.

When I sit on my slab, my instincts are constantly screaming at me to adjust my position and if I don’t, I’ll fall. It was a feedback loop. If I fall, then I need to start the exercise over again, so I try not to fall by adjusting my weight, thus moving and then I end up falling.

That’s going to end right now. I straightened my body and stopped adjusting my weight.

The stone slab stilled for several seconds before it slipped off the pillar and fell to the ground. I caught myself by grabbing onto the pillar. So long as the feedback loop was broken, I could always start again and make progress, no matter how small it is.

“That’s better lad,” Pa nodded. “Now go fetch another slab and try again.”

Nodding, I went to fetch another one and this time, when I balanced it on the pillar and sat down, I only focused on sitting still. With my awareness now almost entirely focused on my body, I became aware of the numerous small twitches my muscles made. With each small twitch, I felt the slab shift become a little unbalanced, but I didn’t focus on that, only on keeping myself from moving.

Once I mastered this, I should be able to begin sensing Natural Energy and then I could begin attempting to absorb it and mix it with my Chakra, creating Sage Chakra.

My eyes snapped open as I felt something wrap around me and I found myself being suspended midair by Pa’s tongue several meters off the ground.

“What?!”

“Much better, lad,” Pa said, his voice muffled. Dropping me to the ground, he jumped and landed on my shoulder. “That was the longest you’ve kept your balance up there, but it seems that you became distracted. You need to focus all your attention on keeping still or your body will begin to move again.”

“Right, sorry.”

“Don’t apologize lad, that was the best you’ve done yet. Give it a few more weeks and you’ll soon find yourself a master at staying still, then we can move onto the more interesting things.”

“Let’s see if I can master it in one,” I said, grabbing another slab. I was determined to master quickly, but I wasn’t in too much of a rush, sage mode would be a great addition, but the name of the game right now was mastering the Hiraishin. Moving towards the pillar, I was about to continue my training, before a whistle interrupted me.

“So this is where you’ve been training?” A male voice asked. “Although, I have to say that I don’t quite understand the point of this exercise, other than practicing your balance.”

“I suppose it would look like that to those who don’t know what this really is, but then again, only a hand full of Shinobi in the world would be able to recognize what’s happening here,” I hummed. Placing the stone slab back on the ground I turned to greet my visitor. “What can I do for you, Kakashi-sensei?”

“Nothing much,” Kakashi hummed as he walked into the clearing. “As it turns out, due to the tension with Kumo, a large portion of Shinobi have been called back to Konoha in order to reinforce our borders for the coming conflict. I’ve found myself with some free time and decided to check in with my students… and, well, former student as well. Sasuke and Sakura are currently at our old training grounds if you would like to catch up.”

I nodded in understanding, before turning to Fukasaku. “Hey Pa, I’ve got to talk to my sensei about something, so I’m going to take a break. Do you mind making sure that Jugo’s alright?”

“Go ahead,” Pa waved me off. “Just don’t take too long. Ma is expecting me back sometime this afternoon.”

“Thanks,” I said and turned to Kakashi. “Let’s go.”

Kakashi nodded and we jumped into the tree line.

“So, that’s your new teacher?” Kakashi asked with his eyebrow raised.

“Yep,” I replied easily. “He might not look like much, but he’s actually one of the elders of the toad clan. Back when Jiraiya-sensei and I went to fetch Tsunade, he helped me fight off Uchiha Itachi and Hoshigaki Kisame.”

“You fought those two?!”

“I’ve fought a lot of people, but Pa did help with those two,” I nodded. “They were really strong too. Itachi was capable of evading me while I was using a three tailed Chakra cloak and Kisame has a sword that shaves into a person and absorbs their Chakra,” I explained. “But somehow, I feel this isn’t the topic that you actually want to talk about.”

Kakashi remained silent for several moments. “You would be right. As… interesting as it is, hearing about your past fights, it’s not what I want to talk about… You’re angry at me.”

I blinked at that. “No I’m not.”

“Our last meeting says differently.”

The one where Kakashi found out that I’d been made a Jonin and Anko had been antagonistic?

“I was frustrated with you, not angry,” I admitted. “Back then, when you found out that I’d been promoted to a position higher than Chunin, you wanted to push against it because you felt that I wasn’t ready… I understand that, I really do, but you’ve also seen how I’ve changed since the exams, how I’ve matured… It’s incredibly frustrating, there were so many points in my life when I would have loved to have someone that would tell me off for doing something stupid or biting off more than I could chew... I was alone for so long and now you want to involve yourself in my life when I’m finally making some decent progress… It’s just so frustrating.”

Kakashi let out a pained sigh. “If I had met you when you were younger, it’s likely that I wouldn’t have been a positive influence on you. I was a mess after Minato-sensei died. I threw myself into so many missions that they all just blur together now… I know that it’s a poor excuse, especially with the childhood you had, but I truly believe you were better off without me.”

I understood how he felt, but there was still a part of me that wanted to argue against Kakashi point, a part that said that it didn’t matter because I had already been exposed anger, hate and having Kakashi in my life back then would have at least staved off the loneliness.

“What changed your mind?”

“Team 7 did,” Kakashi admitte. “When I saw the members of the team, I knew that I would have to lead it. The son of my sensei and the last surviving member of Obito’s clan… I couldn’t trust the safety of you and Sasuke in some subpar Jonin’s hands. Perhaps if it had been Gai, but he already had a team at the time.”

Kakashi took a breath and then continued. “It didn’t take long for the three of you to grow on me and I found myself becoming a better person. I did my best to protect the three of you, but in doing so I neglected your training. Some Sensei I’ve turned out to be.”

“It’s never too late to be the person you’ve always wanted to be,” I said comfortingly. “No one can change the past, but the future… that’s something anyone can decide.”

“The man I wanted to be is the man who helped guide you and team 7. The man who watched the three of you grow into exceptional Shinobi, but it seems that I’ve lost that chance with you. You’ve found better teachers. You’ve been promoted and now I’m not needed.” Kakashi let out a small chuckle. “It’s too late for me to do anything there.”

It was true that I’d become powerful without Kakashi’s help. I’d learned how to mold the Chakra of the five basic elements from Jiraiya, I’d learned some toad style techniques from Pa and I was currently learning Senjutsu and the Hiraishin. All of that on top of being a perfect Jinchuriki. Kakashi was right in the regards that I didn’t really need him to grow stronger, however.

“You know… I’ve mastered the five basic elements, but I really don’t have many Jutsu that take advantage of that. Kakashi, do you know anyone that’s mastered… I don’t know… a thousand Jutsu and would be willing to part with a few?”

For a few moments, all I could hear was the sound of air rushing past us as we jumped from tree to tree, before Kakashi responded. “I think I might know a person that could help you there.”

“That would be great,” I smiled. “I mean, even though I’m now a Jonin, I’ve still got a long way to go. There are still a ton of things for me to learn.”

Kakashi and I soon found ourselves entering training ground 7 and I was greeted to the sight of Sasuke and Sakura exercising, they were just running laps around the field, Sasuke looked mildly tired, but Sakura on the other hand looked exhausted.

“Alright you two, that’s enough for now,” Kakashi announced as we landed in the clearing. “I’ve brought a surprise for you two, the missing third member of our team.”

The duo stopped, but while Sasuke was capable of walking up to us without an issue, Sakura stumbled over, puffing and panting as she fought for control over her breath.

“Long time no see,” I hummed. I’d seen them around a few times, but it’ been a while since we were all together like this as team 7.

“It’s good to see you again, Naruto,” Sasuke said simply.

“Yeah, good,” Sakura breathed heavily.

 “Great,” Kakashi clapped his hands together. “Sasuke, Naruto, why don’t you two start with a spar while Sakura here rests for a bit. I would like to get an idea of how strong you currently are.”

Sasuke nodded and I shrugged. I doubt the match will take too long. We moved to stand opposite each other while Kakashi and Sakura moved back.

“Oh, and, neither of you are allowed to use Jutsu,” Kakashi cheerfully added and then paused for a few moments. “And Naruto, don’t use the Kyuubi’s Chakra.”

So Sasuke was still allowed to use his Sharingan while I had to hold back. That should be fine... in fact, it might just be perfect. There was something that I wanted to test when fighting someone that has a Sharingan.

“Got it,” I shot a thumbs up to Kakashi.

“You better not hold back, Naruto,” Sasuke said smirking.

“I didn’t plan on it,” I replied easily. “Just don’t get too pissed off when you lose, alright.”

“I wouldn’t count on it. I’ve grown a lot stronger since our last fight.”

The spar was started and Sasuke raced towards me with blistering speed, his fist cocked back, ready to unleash a heavy blow. Once upon a time, I would have been completely overwhelmed by Sasuke’s speed, but now, with all the training I’d done… It wasn’t anything special.

Using what I’d been learning from Pa, I stood as still as I possibly could and waited for the proper moment. Sasuke’s Sharingan was spinning madly, searching for any movement for him to counter, but I made no such movement.

Sasuke launched his fist towards my face and I waited. Just as his punch was about to land, I reacted. At his current distance and speed, Sasuke would no longer be capable of reacting in time, his body wasn’t fast enough.

I caught his fist and ducked down, pulling his arm along with me. Sasuke flipped over forwards and my hand caught his neck and pushed him to the ground. The fight was over in less than a second through the use of one decisive move.

Sasuke wheezed as the air was knocked out of him.

“That’s an interesting fighting style that you’ve got there, quite effective against the Sharingan’s ability to read your moves. I don’t think you’ll be a very good sparring partner for Sasuke,” Kakashi commented idly. “You’re too strong for them.”

“Well I wasn’t made Jonin for nothing,” I replied. Standing up, I offered Sasuke a hand. My best guess… Kakashi thought that I’d been made Jonin on my ability to properly use Kurama’s Chakra and my Ninjutsu.

Sasuke coughed lightly as I pulled him up.

“How… do you keep… getting stronger?” Sasuke asked between his coughs.

“Training, Sasuke, I’ve been training,” I explained. “It’s not just enough to train harder either, I’ve been training smarter too.”

“How do you train smarter?” Sasuke asked.

“It’s simple, you just need to figure out how to gain the most from your training,” I replied. “When I’m training my body, I push myself to exhaustion and then use the Kyuubi’s Chakra to heal my muscles which reinvigorates me, making me stronger and ready to continue my training. I use my shadow clones to train mental skills and Chakra usage.”

“So it’s not something that I could do as well?”

“Well you could probably learn Medical Ninjutsu and use that to heal your muscles, making your body stronger faster… and medics need good control over their Chakra, so it would double as a form of training for Chakra control as well.”

“Medical Ninjutsu,” Sasuke said with interest, before nodding. “I’ll look into it.”

“It’s all well and good that you want to learn something new, Sasuke, but Medial Ninjutsu can take years to learn and even longer to master,” Kakashi explained.

“Unless you’re capable of mastering the technique with your Sharingan,” I interjected.

Sasuke needed to grow strong for the moment when we inevitable confronted Danzo and for when the Akatsuki made their move. He didn’t have Orochimaru to help speed up his training. If using medical Ninjutsu the wrong way could give him an edge, then that was something that he should train with.

Kakashi glanced between us, before letting out a sigh. “I can see that you’re interested in learning this, Sasuke, but even using Sharingan to speed up your training, it would still take you a while to master the use of Medical Ninjutsu. We could be at war with Kumo next month, so it would be better to focus on refining the skills that you already have.”

Everything came back to the tension between Konoha and Kumo. I understood where Kakashi was coming from. From his perspective, it was better to focus on what you had now than to learn something new that could take months or even years to properly master.

“Then maybe they could learn it in their downtime. You never know, one of them might just be a genius when it comes to Medical Ninjutsu. If used properly, it could probably speed up their physical training by a large degree,” I finished. I didn’t really know if Sasuke would be a good Medical Shinobi, but I did know that Sakura had the potential to be great one, all she needed was the drive to learn it. “And besides, having a medic on the team would be extremely helpful.”

“Is that why you said that I should go learn at the hospital during the Chunin exams?” Sakura asked. “You wanted me to be our teams medic.”

“Pretty much,” I shrugged. “You’ve got a great mastery of your Chakra, so you could probably become a great medic if you applied yourself. It would really help having someone that could heal us in the event where we’re severely injured.”

“I suppose that I won’t be able to dissuade either of you,” Kakashi sighed. “We can go to the hospital later on and see if either of you has the aptitude for Medical Ninjutsu. However, I will say this, it would be better for the two of you to spend your time refining what you already know. Some basic first aid could come in handy, but if you’re unable to learn Medical Ninjutsu within the month, you should drop it for the time being and focus on other skills.”

“Alright,” Sakura cheered.

“When is later?” Sasuke asked, cutting straight to the heart of the matter.

“After we’re done training here for the day,” Kakashi hummed. “And speaking of training,” He turned to me. “From your… brief spar with Sasuke, I can see that you’re at the very least as fast as a Jonin and your Taijutsu style seems… unique. You said that you’ve mastered the five basic elements. Should we give that a test?”

“I’m game,” I said. This should be a good opportunity for me to see where I stood when it came to using purely Ninjutsu.

“Glad to hear it,” Kakashi smiled under his mask. Walking towards the river that cut through the training ground, he clapped his hands together and placed them on the ground, forming two stone circles several meters apart right next to the water. “Seeing as this is going to be a Ninjutsu only spar, we are going to need a few rules. Those stone circles are where we’re going to be standing, whoever leaves the circle first is the loser. You may use any Jutsu that you deem fit in your attempt to win, but nothing else, so no using the Kyuubi’s Chakra.”

“That’s a little unfair for me,” I commented. “The Kyuubi is one of my natural advantages, much like your Sharingan.”

“I suppose that’s true,” Kakashi hummed. “I’ll tell you what, whoever uses their natural advantage will be the loser of this little match.”

“I can agree with that,” I said. Stepping into my circle, I briefly took note of my surroundings and found Sasuke and Sakura watching with interest, Sasuke’s Sharingan spinning slowly.

Kakashi stepped into his own stone circle. “Then let’s begin,” And with that, his hands blurred through multiple hand seals.

My eyes widened as I rushed through my own hand seals and prepared a Toad Oil Bullet.

“Water style: Water dragon Jutsu,” Kakashi announced lazily as the rivers water twisted and rose up into a large roaring water dragon that charged towards me.

I spat the toad oil bullet at it, pushing the water dragon back and then shot another one at it, but this one I lit on fire by using a small fire style jutsu. The oil burned and mixed with the water, quickly breaking the water dragon down to its original liquid form.

 I turned my focus back to Kakashi and found he’d just finished flashing through more hand seals. He exhaled a massive fireball that raced towards my position.

Placing my hands on the ground, I forced pure earth style Chakra into it and formed a large ramp in front of me. The fireball hit it and was redirected upwards. Kakashi was now entirely blocked from my view. There was a crackling noise and I quickly realized he was using a lightning style Jutsu.

Two could play at that game. A chirping sound filled the training ground as I charged up a Chidori. Kakashi’s lightning style Jutsu blasted through my stone ramp and I swatted it away with my Chidori, instantly overpowering it.

“So you used a Chidori to overpower that lightning style technique,” Kakashi spoke up for the first time since our spar had started. “Not bad, but it is a waste of Chakra.”

“I’ve got more than enough Chakra,” I replied, letting the Chidori fade.

The river bent and a large wave rushed towards me, however I was ready for it this time. I stuck myself to the ground using Chakra and launched a Wind Style Bullet, blasting the wave apart. I was just about to launch another one at Kakashi, but my world turned upside down and I found myself lying on my back outside of the ring.

“What?!”

“It would seem this is my win,” Kakashi said as he walked out of his ring. “Do you know why you lost?”

The stone ring had been overturned with an earth style technique. I was still technically standing on it, but at the same time I was out of bounds. I let the Chakra holding my feet to the ground fade and stood up. “I lost because I’m unused to fighting while standing in a single area.” If I’d had more room to move around, the match would have lasted longer.

“I suppose that’s one of the reasons why you lost,” Kakashi replied. “But it’s not the only reason. During our spar you let me take the initiative and you never counter attacked… not only that, you were relying on the use of brute force to counter my Jutsu instead of using the elements natural weakness against it. Water is weak to earth, but you used oil, fire and wind instead. Fire is weak to water, lightning weak to wind. If you master that, you would have been able to make it into a battle of attrition and beaten me.”

I knew that, but I hadn’t been able to react to the elements that were thrown at me properly. I’d mostly reacted on instinct and simply thrown any Jutsu I could to cancel out Kakashi’s. I didn’t have the right instinct just yet. “Can we go again?”

“Give me a minute to rest and then we can have one more spar,” Kakashi said.

“Alright,” I nodded. One more spar suited me just fine. I still needed to get back to my training ground. Pa probably wouldn’t like it if I kept him waiting and Jugo would need to go back to his cell soon. “We can continue this tomorrow as well, right?”

“Well I do need to train Sasuke and Sakura, but yes. So long as I’m in Konoha, I’m going to be making sure that all of you are ready for what’s coming. We can have another spar tomorrow.”

…PTL…

“So, what did you need me for?” I asked Tsunade, having been summoned to her office.

It’d been two weeks since I had been confined to Konoha and I had to say, I was making some real progress with my training. I’d become much more comfortable with using elemental Chakra and while I hadn’t quite beaten Kakashi in a spar, I was getting pretty close. I had also been extremely successful with the Hiraishin, it wouldn’t be much longer before I would be capable of training with it.

Tsunade flicked a scroll towards me and I snatched it out of the air and opened it in one fluid movement… Not that it helped much, the entire thing was written in some form of code. “What’s this about?”

“It’s a message from the Raikage,” Tsunade replied, a tinge of amusement in her voice. “He’s calling for a meeting with me in the land of Iron and we’re invited.”

The Land of Iron… the place where the five Kage summit was held? It was neutral ground, although there were a few skirmishes on their boarder throughout the past century. The Samurai did their best to keep themselves out of the Shinobi wars.

“When are we expected?”

“The meeting will officially take place by the end of the week,” Tsunade replied. “But it would be best if we get there a day before. Ay is a… temperamental man, if we’re late or even if they arrive before us, it could cause… issues.”

In other words, he might actually end up declaring a war over us not being there on time so it was best that we avoid that situation entirely by being there a full day earlier.

“Damnit, I probably won’t have the Hiraishin ready by then,” I cursed. “Is there anything that I should know… going into this meeting? Should I act in a specific way? Is there a dress code or anything like that?”

“No,” Tsunade shook her head. “No, nothing like that, this is simply a meeting between two Kage. Officially, you and Bee are only there because it was the two of you that caused the incident. Unofficially, you’re there to confirm what you told Bee. I’ll go through what we’re going to be telling the Raikage with you, but all you really need to do is act professionally and not cause a scene.”

I let out a breath that I didn’t know I was holding. I was really glad that I had Tsunade on my side and that she was the Hokage, because I really don’t know how I would have handled this all on my own.

“Nervous?”

“A little,” I replied. “I’m mostly just glad that things are finally moving forward. I’ll be glad to finally put this tension between Konoha and Kumo behind us so we can focus on other things.”

“And I’ll be glad to have the village relax a little,” Tsunade hummed, leaning on her elbow. “Although, having things go back to normal does mean that I’m going to have to start managing the pettier aspects of being a Hokage, like reading through the D-rank mission reports.”

“You haven’t been doing those things now?”

“Nope,” She shook her head. “During times of crisis, those aspects of a Hokage’s job are suspended so I can focus on the more important details. Once the crisis is resolved, I’ll have to start handling those things again. It’s such a shame that the only time where there isn’t an abundance of paperwork is when it looks like we’re going to war.”

“Well, at least you can have your clones do the paperwork for you,” I hummed, glad that things were finally moving again.