First blood

The next few weeks passed with little incident other than the dreadful missions.

Naruto had started begging for something more interesting after the third mission and so Yugao started them on the tree walking exercise. It took Naruto two days to get it down but it was definitely cool to walk upside down.

The money given them was however instrumental to getting started on the new dojo. Naruto had picked out a section of the first floor and started out moving everything out of the way.

Then he started to break up the floor and tear down the walls. Overall not too difficult with access to exploding tags and wind chakra. Putting in the new floor and walls that would withstand the weathering of Kunai and Shuriken was what took most money but overall he was happy with the result.

Naruto met up with his team and once again headed to the missions office. Yugao carried a different kind of smile, for once not an ominous one but it still made them wary.

"Team one requesting a c-rank mission."

Sarutobi looked a little surprised but figured he had figured that it would come soon anyways. Although he had suspected it would have been the Genin who would whine about getting one, they had done the required number of d-ranks after all even if they didn't know it yet.

"Hmm alright, we have a few different patrols, an escort mission and a few for delivering scrolls."

"Just give us a patrol somewhere within fire country."

The one they got was a month long travel that would take them through several small villages and a few of the samurai regiments. It was important after all to let the two major military divisions in touch with each other and to keep track of everything and the Shinobi village had the responsibility of making sure no groups of bandits started raiding within the country during peacetime. Asking the general population if anything was going on was simply the easiest way to keep track of them. The patrol leader then had to make the choice of either calling for backup or simply dealing with the bandits found. Generally patrols chose to deal with them unless there were more than a few low ranking missing ninja amongst the groups.

"Alright team go pack, we'll be leaving in an hour, meet me at the western gate."

Naruto ran towards Iruka's house and packed a backpack. He threw in a raincoat and some over layering for sleeping outside along with a sleeping bag and some clothes before leaving a small note saying he would be on a mission for a while.

He arrived with fifteen minutes to spare and so he repacked everything to make it fit better.

As they set out Yugao started them on tree jumping.

"Alright" she said, "this exercise is pretty much an extension of the one for tree climbing. Now you simply use chakra to fling yourself from one tree to another. Don't rely on chakra alone though or you will find yourself exhausted before long. And stay aware of your surroundings"

Naruto walked up the three in front of him and settled onto the top of a branch. Letting chakra flow from his muscles and burst out of soles he burst towards the next tree, only he overshot it and landed ten trees further off.

Kaede and Hiroki looked at him disbelievingly as they landed in a roll on the ground halfway to the nearest one.

It took them all a few hours before they got a feel for how much chakra was needed for different lengths but Yugao insisted that it would become second nature soon enough.

Three hours after they had set out they had to make halt as Kaede was exhausted having less chakra than Hiroki and far less than Naruto to sustain herself on.

Naruto had picked up a few fruits on the way when he figured that he could go far faster and for longer time than the two others he started taking breaks to gather food.

The three Genin looked at Yugao curiously as they ate together for the first time.

"So why the sudden willingness to let us do more than the distressfully dread and demeaning missions so far?" Hiroki asked with his ever accentuated eloquence.

Yugao just shrugged and took another bite of her apple.

"Alright, alright I was getting bored watching you do menial labor really." She finally relented when all three turned on the infamous puppy eyes.

Promptly the three students sighed and shook their heads and mumbled about themselves about her simply having to get away from Hayate before she throttled him for flirting with her.

Yugao feigned deafness and went back to eating.

They proceeded on their journey after half an hour of rest and were moving at speeds previously unattainable for the inexperienced Genin.

They came to a stop two hours later and started making ready for the night. They were only a mile away from the edge of the forest zone so Yugao figured that it would be a good place to camp without being in the open and still be able to get out of there tomorrow. Even Naruto was tired at this point so Yugao took the first watch and the Genin settled into sleep.

The week following all they saw was small villages and roads. Running was quite tedious in the long run as Naruto found but he enjoyed seeing new places.

They were on the road to a big settlement with Yugao in front and no one had been talking for a while.

Naruto noticed five weak chakra signatures up ahead but thought nothing of it. Being around civilians so much on this trip had somewhat dampened his paranoia.

This changed however as the men jumped out of their hiding places to surround them.

Before they could even speak Naruto drew a Kunai from his arm holder and threw it in a fluid motion at towards the head of the person behind him. Not pausing to see if his aim was true he drew his sword and beheaded the person next to him. Unknowingly he had cut the other man's battle roar short in his throat as the Kunai went into his open mouth and back of the brain.

As he scanned his surroundings as he had been taught he found the other bandits knocked out and tied up by his teammates.

"So I guess we have to drag them to town, so troublesome." Naruto muttered making Kaede giggle as his adrenaline levels went down and he started to process what had just happened.

Yugao sighed as she saw the dead low lives and picked up one of the bandits.

"Hiroki and Naruto take one each and we'll turn them over to the authorities."

Naruto grumbled and picked up the light one. "Let's go then, the dead can bury their dead." Naruto said sagely and started walking. This was what he had signed up for. To deal with those that dared to disturb the sanctity of Konoha.

Muhaha Naruto has killed. Hope to be out with more soon.