The Path Of a Hunternin

Departure

It has been almost a week after the whole 'interaction' with Anko happened and now Naruto was seen slashing imaginary opponents with his now blazed katana. At first, he thought that the heat generated from the sword would hurt him rather profusely. However, Kyuubi assured him that when Naruto uses its chakra, the fire won't consume his body, simply because of how Kyuubi's control over the fire element is. Suffice to say, Naruto was impressed at know that Kyuubi was the true lord of fire. Furthermore, Naruto was quickly learning the Houka Yakushin (fire dash) kenjutsu style and thus being able to wield the Furiseirei (free spirit) with ease now. After all, he not only got accustomed to the weights on his body but the katana's weight as well.

"Naruto, now that your kenjutsu training is done; we'll improve your ninjutsu part. I know that you already learned all the fuuton jutsus and all of the katon jutsus that I told you so far. But since you're going to be pretty much alone out there, you'll need to save as much chakra as you could. Therefore, chakra control exercise is vital. Now, summon three hundred clones and divided them into two groups. One will practice tree walking and the other will go to the lake for water walking practice. You, on the other hand, will do a new exercise." – Said the fox to which Naruto nodded and turned to summon the two groups. After he divided them and set each group for their specific tasks, he turned to listen to the exercise that the fox would relate to him.

"Now, you'll be practicing meditation. The theory is simple, by closing your eyes and focus on your inside, you can manage to feel your chakra flowing through your chakra coils. The objective of this exercise is to be able to feel how much chakra you're using while on a technique or just channeling chakra to a specific part of your body. After this exercise, there is two high level katon jutsus that I will teach you. First one is a human one called Katon Karyuu Endan (Fire Style: Dragon Fire Missile Jutsu) and the other one is one of mine that I called Katon Makai no Kyouran (Fire Style: Hell's Fury Jutsu)." – Said Kyuubi to which Naruto sit and closed his eyes, true to Kyuubi's teachings so far.

Along the month period, Naruto was rather impressed by seeing this teacher side of the fox. While he was tough, actually more inclined to a slave-driver, Naruto was able to learn a lot from the kitsune, thus shortening the time needed for him to be able to take care of himself outside of Konoha. While he closed his eyes, he began what the fox said about, channeling chakra through specific parts of his body, thus trying to feel such a flow. After a while, Naruto had already tried every parts of his body in efforts of feeling the chakra flowing inside of him, but he wasn't lucky at all. So far, he couldn't see if he was channeling more or less of the chakra necessary and that was frustrating. Kyuubi once told him that this exercise was more to test his patience while channeling chakra, since it would get him to understand things more clearly, without being driven by negative emotions.

-With Anko-

Walking without a care in the world, among the streets of Konoha, Anko was heading towards her favorite restaurant in Konoha, the dango store. Along the way, she wondered how she would have survived without being able to taste such pleasure in life. While she was walking, however, she noticed someone familiar coming from the opposite side of her and sighed at the person's sad expression on her face. Anko kind of sympathized with Kurenai, not because she lost someone dear to her, but simply from pain in general. Kurenai was somewhat of a friend to Anko, since she was the few amongst the ones from their generation that never mistreated Anko because of what Orochimaru did to Konoha.

Deciding that a little comfort was in need, Anko approached the red-eyed jounin with a smile on her face. "Ohayo, Kurenai" – Shouted Anko, greeting to which the woman smiled and nodded in response. After a while of greetings, Anko offered an invitation to eat some dango to which Kurenai accepted. So right now, both of them, having already ordered their respective plates, settled down in a table. Kurenai was still looking down, clearly morning over her lover's death, while Anko was trying to come up with something for conversation purposes. "So, how is your team?" – Asked Anko, clearly throwing conversation away and even more clearly it was that Kurenai wasn't on the mood to be talking about team 8. "Sorry Anko, since it happened, I haven't seen them yet. Hokage-sama assigned a temporary replacement for me, so they are out on missions, other than that I don't know much." – Said Kurenai, without even bothering to look at Anko's face.