Part Three: There Can Be Only One

Hokage Tower

Hokage's Office

Three Days Later

Naruto stood at attention, more or less, before the Hokage's desk, decked out in full mission gear, which was considerably different than normal. He stood in his black ninja-style pants and black painted steel-toed boots to match with his Teacher's suggestion that the heavier footwear adds damage to kicks. A red t-shirt covered his torso, covering that was the dark orange armored vest Ero-sennin had gotten for him, as well as the orange and blue flame overcoat. His new Konoha headband, with a long black cloth wrapped around his forehead, keeping his long blond hair in check for the moment.

Running his fingers through the longer yellow mane, Naruto felt he should have gotten a haircut, but the past few weeks training with Macleod-san had eaten away at his time until he'd completely forgotten about it. It now hung to just below his neck, and the bangs would have covered his eyes if not for his headband. It had been suggested he wrap it up in a ponytail, like his Teacher did, or even Shikamaru, but the young Immortal felt that would be too girly. He'd just have to get a haircut after he got back from his mission. That is, if he got a mission. It's what he was here to find out about anyway.

"Uzumaki Naruto reporting for duty, Hokage-sama!" Naruto announced once he saw Tsunade's attention on him.

"I can see that," she observed with a rueful smile. "Macleod-san tells me that you're as ready as your going to get, without waiting another hundred years anyway."

Naruto grimaced, but said nothing. Tsunade raised an eyebrow at that, half expecting a childish explosion of hot temper and selfish pride, yet instead she got a young man calmly accepting criticism and maintaining his composure. She'd have to ask Colin how he did it.

"I trust Macleod-san's judgment, though I would like a demonstration of the results of your training with him. I'll have to set something up like that for later," she commented to herself. "In the meantime, there are three C-Rank missions currently available. One of which I'm sure you'll want to be a part of no matter what, but you'll have to sit around for an extra week first of all. Or I can let you do one of the other two missions beforehand, and if you complete it in time, you can join in on that mission."

Naruto's eyes lit up, and he asked, "Is it to head to Sound and retrieve Sasuke?"

Tsunade frowned, then shook her head. "Not quite. The mission I'm referring to has been proposed by Aburame Shino of Team 8. There is apparently a very rare species of insect, called the Bikochu, which has the ability to track whatever scent it is exposed to upon hatching to the very ends of the earth and back again. Shino has proposed to lead a team to go and retrieve this particular insect from its nesting ground, and if successful, expose it to Uchiha Sasuke's scent."

Naruto grinned with excitement. "Then definitely sign me up for that Baa-chan!" he exclaimed.

"So you do want to sit around for the next week, because that's the soonest Team 8 can leave on this mission, and you would also be taking orders from Shino, as the one with the most knowledge about the mission objective, he would be team leader," she informed him.

Naruto stopped and then took a deep breath to compose himself. "I apologize, Hokage-sama."

Tsunade nearly fell to the floor in shock! She did fall out of her chair!

"What are the other two missions that you have available, please?" he requested.

Taking a moment to get over the amazement of Uzumaki Naruto apologizing for being the slightest bit informal, the Hokage pulled out two folders from the stacks on her desk. Holding up one and then the other, she told him, "This one here is a standard retrieval mission. A cake walk by any shinobi's standards and one I feel confident can be handled solo. Even by a genin." She enjoyed Naruto's blush for a moment before continuing. "The other mission is an escort mission. The son of a very powerful nobleman needs a babysitter while going home from Konoha. Normally I would assign no less than two ninja to this, but we're short-handed as it is, and Colin tells me you can handle it."

Naruto nodded, thinking over what he knew about the missions. "If I may, Hokage-sama," he asked respectfully, "What item is it needing to be retrieved, and who is the nobleman's son?"

Tsunade grimaced herself, looking down and away for a minute before answering, "The noble son is named Kunihisa, and the retrieval mission is quite simply that you need to retrieve a treasure that is marked on the map here," she held up the folder for the mission.

Naruto nodded, then grinned and said proudly, "I'd be glad to take both missions Obaa-chan!"

Tsunade grinned and posed the question, "Are you sure you can handle it? And you'll still be back within a week for the mission with Team 8? You'll have to succeed with both missions. If you fail even one of them, then you cannot go on the Bikochu mission, you understand?"

"Sure," he laughed, scratching the back of his neck. "These should be easy anyway, right? I'll probably have them done by the end of today."

"It's a three-day journey to Kunihisa's home," she flatly informed him.

"Well, the retrieval mission anyway. And I'll be back in plenty of time for the mission to find the bug!"

Tsunade sighed, and with some mild reluctance, assigned both missions to Naruto, and put him on the list for the upcoming Bikochu Retrieval mission with Team 8. Then she handed both folders to him.

"You leave tomorrow morning at around 8 o'clock," she told him. "The retrieval mission is open-ended, except that you can't go on the Bikochu mission in a week without completing it, so..."

"I got it Baa-chan," he grinned and read both mission statements. He blinked once at seeing what 'treasure' needed to be recovered, then grinned even wider before creating a shadow clone and handing it off to him. "You know where that is, right?"

"Of course I do!" the clone exclaimed, also grinning. "I'm you, aren't I?"

"See if you can get it back here in an hour or less," Naruto challenged his clone.

"I'm going to start packing for the trip," Naruto indicated the escort mission. "Hey, and D-Ranks for today? Just to fill my time for the rest of today?"

Tsunade snorted, then shoved a surprisingly large stack on her desk at him.

"Do D-Ranks to your heart's content, Naruto-gaki," she laughed at him. Then stopped laughing when he created another clone and took the whole stack of D-Ranks with him and his clones when he left.

It wasn't until midway through the afternoon that the Hokage finally heard that Naruto and his clones really were doing every single D-Rank mission in the village for the day. There were a few complaints by some rather stupid people, but otherwise he actually did a good job, and on his own too! And if that weren't bad enough, that first clone of his really did return with the treasure box inside of an hour! Fifty-seven minutes and thirty-nine seconds to be precise, but it was still done!

"What exactly have you been teaching him?" Tsunade asked Colin when she saw him later in the day.

The Immortal hadn't really answered, just smiled and shrugged at her before tempting her with sake.

Hi No Kuni

En Route to Konoha

Four Days Later

Naruto was walking along with a smile on his face and a spring in his step. The brat was finally gone!

The mission hadn't been too difficult. If anything it was more tedious and stressful due to the client himself. The nobleman's son was the perfect stereotype of what he was. A rich kid born with a silver spoon in his mouth and no concept of the reasoning behind people doing things without money. He was also a brat.

There had also been some kind of issue with the kid having a whole team of servants and bodyguards following him around in the shadows, which really distracted Naruto most of the way there. He hadn't been sure if all the people he detected hiding all around them had been the kid's servants, or enemies looking to kidnap the son of a noble. Turns out it was both when the servants decided to ransom the kid for money and kill him anyway because they'd had more than enough of the brat themselves. Naruto had other reasons than money for protecting the kid, and thus had no problem smacking down the lot of them.

Anyway, now he was finally back home, and the brat was far far far away from him with assurances from the brat's father that he would never be hired to look out for his kid ever again. Naruto could only hope that would prove to be true in the future.

He'd been on the road on his own for a day or so now, and had camped out in the trees to rest, and had rations and packages of instant ramen to sustain him. The roads were surprisingly sparse, but then again he wasn't on one of the main roads that saw all the traffic. He'd occasionally take a few minutes to practice with his swords just to keep himself loose and in practice. He probably should have had a contingent of shadow clones patrolling and scouting for him, but with the mission over with and since he was on his way home, he'd decided to let his guard down and enjoy the journey and surrounding nature.

Suddenly and without warning he froze as the Buzz hit him, hard.

For a minute he'd thought it might be Colin, which confused him, until a figure stepped out from behind the trees and revealed a tall, dark-haired man with yellow-brown skin and the dressings of a foreign mercenary. He already had his sword out and was grinning at the young blond Immortal. The Buzz quit the moment Naruto's eyes met this strangers and Naruto knew that this stranger too was an Immortal.

Naruto grinned, and was about to wave in greeting. After all, the only Immortal he'd met so far was Colin, his Teacher, and despite being told over and over that Immortals fought and killed each other more often than congregate in some secret brotherhood, he could be forgiven for his naivety, provided that is he survived this first mistake.

"Heh, too easy!" the Immortal snarled and lunged forward to chop Naruto's head off.

Naruto, startled, froze for a second. A second too long as the Immortal's sword slashed and struck on-target at his neck. Instead of a typical decapitation, however, there was an explosion of smoke, and a sliced disk of wood separated from the log Naruto had switched places with. Three seconds after that, a hail of kunai and shuriken struck solidly with a meaty thunk into the man's back.

"What the…?" Naruto startled from behind the man as he fell. That kind of attack should never have hit, he realized with a sour turn in his stomach. He'd become so used to facing other ninja that he'd forgotten that a lot of his most basic "jutsu" could kill an ordinary person without much effort. Even when he'd tried the same trick on Colin, the older Immortal seemed to be a step ahead of him and either dodged, or managed to deflect the projectiles with his katana.

Now, suddenly, here was this idiot that lunged at him as soon as he saw him, and then just stood there after he used kawarimi and neither dodged nor deflected his counter-attack. Now he just lay there on the ground, dead. More confused than ever, as the few times he'd managed to 'kill' Colin, he'd been up on his feet and pulling out the weapons inside of a minute, Naruto waited five full minutes and the guy just lay there, not doing a thing.

Finally, bored more than anything else, Naruto retrieved his weapons from the Immortal's corpse, even taking the time to clean them, thoroughly. All together it took him fifteen minutes, and still the guy lay there, dead as a doornail. Shrugging, Naruto turned and resumed his journey back to Konoha.

Half an hour later, the Immortal revived, amazed to find himself still alive, and even more so when he saw that his quarry had moved on, staying on the same road with no signs of why he hadn't taken his head. It took him another three quarters of an hour to track him down again and attack the blond once more.

"That hurt you bastard!" he shouted the moment he was in range to lunge again.

Naruto didn't bother being subtle this time, forming a single shadow clone, and in the 1.5 seconds it took for the other Immortal to lunge forward while swinging his longsword, had formed a Rasengan and slammed it into the man's chest while he was still mid-air. Two hours later, he revived once more, and the sun was setting, and Naruto still had not taken his head.

In the middle of the night, which is around the time the unknown Immortal finally managed to track down Naruto once more, he stalked into the young Immortal ninja's campsite and held his sword at the ready, angry and wary of surprise attacks. Naruto was just sitting at the campfire, eating a package of instant ramen and was about halfway done with it by the time the man walked into his camp.

"Hey," he greeted, not even bothering to move from his position.

"You bastard!" the man screamed. "How dare you do that to me, twice and walk away like that?!"

"You know, most people would probably take the hint," Naruto said before draining the last of the soup.

"What hint might that be?"

"That I can apparently kill you any time I want to without even trying."

The foreign Immortal paused at that and looked down at himself and then at the 'easy mark' he'd attacked twice now, and had instead been killed and left to revive on his own each time.

"Uh... how old are you anyway?" the man asked, sounding far less sure than before.

"Why should I tell you that?" Naruto bluntly remarked. "I don't even know your name! Mine's Uzumaki Naruto, by the way. Nice to meet you."

"Akira, Sohara Akira," he said after a moment or two. "I am one hundred and fifty years old, and I have taken thirteen heads. How powerful are you that you can best me so easily?"

Naruto blinked, then shrugged and answered, "I'm 13 years old, 14 in a few months. I only turned Immortal a couple of months ago. Oh, and if the headband wasn't clue enough, I'm a ninja too."

"Nin-ja?" Akira repeated more slowly. Then he gulped and almost wet himself as he recalled some of the things he'd seen ninja do since arriving in the country. He'd tried to learn from the one or two willing to teach him, but he'd found it impossible to use this 'chakra' they went on and on about. The most he'd gotten out of it was an understanding of how ninjas did what they did.

Now, here was an Immortal, even a very young Immortal that could use chakra and do all those ninja tricks... and he hadn't even fought seriously. If anything, Akira would say that both times he'd been killed, they were from gut reactions, automatic responses from being attacked. It made the 150 year old Immortal very, very nervous just being near this kid.

Then something else struck the man as odd. "Wait, what do you mean your only thirteen years old?!"

Naruto just shrugged and grinned, not really answering.

Akira shook himself and almost convinced himself that he was seeing things and that he needed to get his head checked. It was impossible for an Immortal to use chakra. But this man before him not only used chakra, he was a full ninja and an experienced one from the looks of things. He also claimed that he was only thirteen years old, and had only been Immortal for a couple of months. But from what Akira had sensed each time he felt this man's 'Buzz', he had enough power behind him that he had to be at least one hundred years old! With a couple of heads under his belt to boot!

Then there was his attitude, carefree and unguarded, the signs of an experienced Immortal, but if he didn't know any better, he'd swear that he was just extremely naïve and a rookie to the Game. Finally, he just came to the (mistaken) conclusion that he was being had and this Immortal before him was just 'warning him off' and giving him a chance to keep his head. He almost took the hint and was about to run off when he looked over at the Immortal once again.

Dopey expression, trusting eyes, and an overall sense of wonder and optimism in his attitude.

There was no way this kid was an ancient Immortal!

"THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE!" Akira screamed, charging straight ahead, sword held high.

"Huh?" Naruto looked up and blinked at him. Then his eyes shifted as what Akira had said finally processed through his brain. Gone was the happy-go-lucky off-duty ninja that was glad to be going home. In his place was the trained-by-a-Macleod Immortal Ninja.

Akira blinked after it was over. Not that it was really over, he realized after the fact. If anything, it was only just beginning. Because in the eyeblink it took Akira, a decent warrior that was fast on his feet and just as quick with his blade, to take five running steps, Naruto had discarded his overcoat, pulled out two swords, a katana and a dao, and put them and himself in the perfect position to block and counter Akira's charge.

By the sixth step, Akira's sword was on the ground out of his hand, and he was soon to follow, with Naruto first kicking him in the solar plexus with a straight left kick, his legs weakened with a strike from the back of his katana to the knees, and then a high kick to the chin from his right leg. All completed in a single motion, and faster than the older Immortal could even follow!

In the end, the arrogant headhunter found himself flat on his back, disarmed, a pair of mismatched swords at his neck, and no clue as to how he got there.

For the longest time, the two of them stayed in that position, Akira flat on his back on the ground, with Naruto's swords at his throat, and Naruto standing over him, holding the swords there. Finally, Naruto broke the stalemate, moving back a step and removing the dao, while keeping the katana in position.

"I'm not going to kill you," he finally said, startling the man on the ground enough that he almost cut off his own head with the katana inches from his neck. "I understand about the Game and everything, but I think there's another way. If you promise not to attack me anymore, I'll let you go."

The defeated man snarled and growled back at him, "And what if I don't? What are you going to do then? Huh? You've already proven that you won't kill me!"

"Exactly," Naruto intoned, channeling a bit of Macleod-sensei's intensity when training to make himself sound more serious and threatening. "I won't, not can't. You, however, have proven over and over that you can't kill me. Even when my guard is down. Even when I let you close and you have the element of surprise. You can't even kill a newbie Immortal. Letting you go is no threat to me whatsoever. I suggest that you think about this long and hard."

Konoha

Hokage Tower

One Day Later

"You know, I knew it would take a lot to get the whole concept of the Game crammed into your skull. I accepted that," Colin Macleod was saying. Then he screamed at a sheepish grinning Naruto, "But I didn't think you were stupid enough to actually spar a headhunter trying to kill you and then bring him back to your home with you!!"

"Hey, he attacked a Konoha ninja," Naruto shrugged. "There's got to be, like, consequences to that sort of thing, right?"

Tsunade glared at the troublesome blond across from her desk, her hands folded before her face, hiding her expression. To everyone in the room, she looked royally pissed off and was about to explode. In actuality, she was just trying to get control of her smile before the giggles she was surpressing broke out. Jiraiya, standing next to her, behind her desk, finally replied, an unreadable expression on his own face, "Actually, yes, there are."

"See, I knew—" Naruto started to say, but Jiraiya interrupted by finishing his statement.

"Such people are usually put to death immediately, and then the ninja in question is investigated to make sure that it was necessary for the success of the mission. If, as in your case, the mission has already been completed, or the ninja is not on a mission when attacked, then it becomes a simple case of self-defense, where the one that attacked first is the one in the wrong."

"—it... Oh... uh, heh. Sorry, my bad," Naruto blushed, scratching the back of his neck in embarrassment.

"So, what do we do with our prisoner?" Tsunade asked, finally getting control over her expressions.

Colin shrugged in response.

"I'm not a headhunter unless the person's done something to piss me off or attacked me first," he said. "And I've never even heard of this Akira guy. Normally I'd say Naruto has to take his head, but he already proved that he can defend himself without taking the man's life. At least against this particular opponent. He also neutralized him quite effectively, and a regular Immortal can't stand up to even the weakest of your active ninja. He must be only a hundred or so years old, if that much. You could keep him imprisoned for all eternity, or take his head to see what you can learn from his body. Capturing his Quickening is... inadvisable. If you want Konoha to still be here after you try that is."

"Why can't we just let him go?" Naruto naively asked.

Nobody bothered to answer the extremely stupid question.

"We could always give him to Ibiki," Jiraiya coldly suggested. "That, or give him to the Yamanaka Clan for... reeducation. Then there's always the final option. Give him to Danzo. As payment for staying out of your hair, for good."

"I would rather not," Tsunade restrained a shiver of revulsion. "The mere thought of Danzo having access to an Immortal warrior, regardless that he can never be a ninja, terrifies me to the bone."

"OK, seriously, why can't we just let him go? I've proved that he can't hurt me, and he'd have to be crazy to try again after all this!" Naruto exclaimed.

"I'm pretty sure he proved how crazy he was in trying to kill you after the third time you accidentally killed him," Colin remarked. "Think about it for a minute Naruto. Letting him go is really not an option, no matter what else you, or he might say."

"For starters," Jiraiya stated, "he now knows the exact location of Konoha, your home village."

"He also knows your face, name, and at least three people that you know that are mortal, unlike yourself or Colin," Tsunade added to that.

"And he claimed to be a Headhunter," Colin finally said, "Which means he does anything and everything to win the Game, no matter what. If that means kidnapping your friends and holding them hostage, so be it. If that means leaking the exact location of Konoha to every single other ninja mercenary in the entire world, just so he can swoop in and take your head in the aftermath carnage, he'll do that too."

Naruto paled, his eyes going wide and his jaw dropping open.

"So," Colin finished up, "you see now why we can't let him go. And since you won't kill him, and I won't kill him, that makes figuring out what to do with him a great deal more difficult."

Naruto gulped, lowered his eyes and just nodded his head. He remained quiet for the rest of the debriefing, only speaking to answer direct questions, and after it was over, he quietly got up and left the room, never once say a word.

"Will he be OK?" Tsunade asked Colin.

The near-two-thousand-year-old Immortal just shrugged and answered, "Eventually. But it's best to keep an eye on him just the same. Just in case."

"I'll do it," Jiraiya volunteered, for once being quite serious about everything.

"Thank you," was all Tsunade could say, before returning to her office as the men went their own ways.

Just Outside Konoha's Gates

That Night

Two figures dropped to the ground from the trees just beyond the reach of the protective wall surrounding the hidden ninja village. One immediately dropped flat on the ground, like a sack of potatoes, and started struggling to get up. The other landed on his feet and stood at ease, waiting patiently for the other to get up.

The clouds shifted, and the nearly full moon shone down, illuminating the clearing between the trees. Naruto stood over a tied up and struggling Akira, a sheathed sword held in the blond's right hand. After a bit of struggling, and no small amount of help from a hidden knife on the older Immortal, Akira got out of his bindings and scrambled to his feet. Before he could say or do anything else, Naruto tossed him the sword. The sword was Akira's.

Naruto cast off his coat and stood ready with his katana, the dao strapped to his back in a simple harness.

"What is this?" Akira hissed at his tormentor.

"I've come to realize something," the young Immortal ninja told him, his voice somber and his gaze shadowed in the moonlight. "I told you the truth before. My Teacher only finished training me to be an Immortal not even two weeks ago. I was an ordinary genin only two months before that time. And while I've killed as a ninja, as a protector of my village before... I couldn't really understand killing in a duel."

Akira snorted derisively, "Then you're a fool."

"Yes, yes I was," Naruto agreed. "But no longer."

He looked up, his blue eyes shining with the emotions he felt, and his face taut with tension. "I, Uzumaki Naruto, challenge you, Sohara Akira to a duel. There Can Be Only One."

Akira smirked and threw off the sheath to his sword. "Looks like you're finally starting to get it. There Can Be Only One!"

The two saluted one another with their swords and then ran at each other, swords raised.

It was over that quickly.

Akira charged with a straight forward cavalry horizontal swing coming from his right hand side. Naruto came in low and fast, his blade in a two-handed grip, held by his right hip for a fast, upward moving slash. He also had superior reaction speed as he side-stepped Akira's swing, bypassing the blade, and only made his own cut after his opponent over-extended himself and was left wide open. Naruto watched as Akira's eyes went wide in open faced shock a bare instant before his blade severed the other Immortal's head from his body.

To an outside observer or the casual martial artist, it would be called flawless and perfect, an absolute work of art. To the trained observer and expert martial artist that specialized in kenjutsu and swordplay, it would be called efficient and satisfactory, if only barely. To Naruto, it was the worst thing that he had ever done, made worse by the knowledge that he would someday have to do it again and keep on doing it.

Akira's decapitated body took one final step, still moving with the last nerve impulses it had received and the momentum with which it had been moving. The head stayed stationary in the exact spot Naruto's blade had severed it for a heartbeat of time before gravity fully asserted itself and it fell to the ground and rolled around a bit before coming to a rest with the eyes and face pointed towards Naruto's own.

Then the Quickening started.

Naruto didn't even notice when the body began to glow with a ghostly energy, and he certainly wasn't paying attention as the wind picked up, too busy trying not to throw up from the action he had just committed. However, he could not ignore it when he felt the buzz start up again, only a hundred times more potent. So instead of a 'vibration' running throughout his body and chakra, it felt more like he was being struck by a thousand chakra-infused senbon needles all at once from head to toe. And thanks to his first C-Rank mission, he actually knew what that felt like beforehand.

He spun around and stared with wide-eyed fright as a mist of what looked like visible chakra flew through the air from Akira's dead body, heading straight for him. Naruto almost dodged it, trying to run away, but the mist went straight form him and it wasn't going to stop. When it hit, all thoughts of running fled the young Immortal's mind as his body was wracked with so much... raw sensation that his muscles locked up and it was all he could do just to remain on his feet!

The worst part of it, he thought in retrospect, was that he couldn't even define the sensation. It was like it was as much pleasure as it was pain. In fact, it was too much pleasure that it became pain, but at the same time it was an unbearable pain the became pleasure after a while. There was no way to define it except by what it was; the Quickening.

When the first bolt of energy struck, the raw sensation spiked in intensity, forcing a cry of shock and mixed pleasure/pain from Naruto's throat. Then the lightning started coming like fireworks on a celebration. A couple fires might have started in the trees, but not enough to start a forest fire. He never noticed however, as the bolts, starting off with just one or two strikes, started coming faster and faster, lasting longer and longer until it finally reached a high where it just never seemed to end!

Then Akira's body and head changed from their ghostly glow, to a very familiar red chakra glow, which colored the clearing in a bloody red light. This, Naruto did see, and he knew what it meant. Gritting his teeth, he shouted out loud as he raised his sword high above his head and concentrated his chakra on suppressing whatever rage and depression he might still be feeling. He could not allow the Fox, or whatever was left of it, any more influence on his life.

Almost as a consequence of this, a new round of lightning bolts struck between Naruto and his dead opponent's body. Where each bolt struck, the red chakra changed to electric-blue and then flashed a couple of times before vanishing into Naruto's barely standing form. The light show and wind did not die down until all of the red chakra had been converted to blue and absorbed into Naruto's body.

When it ultimately ended, Naruto collapsed to his knees, still holding onto his sword, and gasping for breath, covered in sweat. The body lay where it had fallen, and would remain so until someone moved it.

Getting to his feet, Naruto cleaned and put away his swords, and spent the rest of the night doing exactly that. By the morning, he was back in his bed, and ANBU were reporting that a prisoner was not in his cell to the Hokage and her advisers. After hearing exactly which prisoner was missing, Colin, Jiraiya and Tsunade exchanged grim nods and silent grins.

He was ready.

TBC...

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– Joshua "The Evil Guy"