Naruto: Wolf of the Hidden Leaf

When I woke up the next day, it was already four in the afternoon. The bandage I used on my hand was on my table, and my hand was healed almost fully. I sensed my mom healing my injury in the middle of my sleep. Due to my familiarity with her chakra signature, I ignored it. It was nice of her to care for me like this. Umbra was sleeping on the side of the room. I didn't try to wake him; he deserved the rest.

Even though my chakra control has become on par with or even better than my mom's, I was still inferior to her in terms of medical ninjutsu. Mainly because I did not have as much extensive knowledge about human anatomy as she had.

I really needed to find some time and study. No matter where you are, studying and hard work are some of the true constants.

Those who are powerful are not just talented; rather, talents who work hard are the ones who can truly shine.

Unless you are an Uchiha of course, then you just need to kill your best friend or watch them die in a very gruesome manner. In return you'll get cheat-like powers. Pretty simple, really.

All kidding aside, as I focused on my chakra reserves, I found that it had increased. Not in an overwhelming level, but in quite a substantial amount.

This was another beauty of chakra. Chakra reserves increase when your physical and mental capabilities are pushed to the limit. And one of the best ways to increase it is by experiencing battles, especially high-stakes battles.

Even though the battle I had last night didn't push me to the limit, it was quite enlightening, actually. Raizo was a strong opponent. A very strong opponent, that I shouldn't be able to defeat under normal circumstances.

I was pretty sure I hadn't even seen half of Raizo's arsenal. The only things he used in the fight were his lightning sword and weird hands made of earth. Considering how good his kenjutsu was, I would be pretty confident in saying that he was good at taijutsu too.

I wasn't sure of his other ninjutsu abilities. But I was sure that those two were not the only cards he could play. Otherwise, he wouldn't become a jōnin at all.

But the main reason he lost was because I had way too many one-shot abilities with me. My genjutsu is way too strong to be properly defended against by anyone without a Dojutsu. My chakra control is extremely good, so one punch from my fist can mean broken limbs. And Rasengan by itself is able to take down someone of Jonin level or below. Also, if Umbra manages to bite down on your neck, then you're most probably going to die.

If I can connect any of these, then I have effectively won the fight. Although it sounded totally overpowered, it actually wasn't.

Every one-shot ability I had had some pretty glaring weaknesses.

Casting genjutsu required the enemy to fulfil some conditions for both auditory and vision-based genjutsu. I wasn't skilled enough to just cast a genjutsu on someone by pointing my finger at them. Not yet at-least. I still needed to perform the hand signs.

And the next two one-shots had the same problem. Both of them required me to get up close and personal. Also, if my enemy is just faster than me, then I'm in for a beating.

This was why I had to get creative while fighting Raizo. I had to plan for multiple contingencies just so that I could take him by surprise.

While I prided myself on being a pretty good strategist, sometimes this particular side of me just wants to fight 'honourably'.

I knew in my heart that fighting with strategy was not cheating in any sense and that outsmarting your opponent is one of the main aspects of winning a fight. And yet...

Whatever. I'm not going down that rabbit hole. Sometimes overthinking does more harm than good.

After freshening myself up, I decided to go and visit Daigo. I didn't know the boy particularly very well yet, but as a teammate, it was the normal thing to do. Besides, he was actually pretty good as an ally. His super-expansion was actually much more massive than I had ever expected.

The moon was already out when I reached the hospital. After talking to the scary clerk for about two minutes and proving to her that I wasn't just some random creep, I was allowed to know of his room number.

Room 331.

As I entered the room, I found Daigo sitting up halfway through and eating like ten different types of food while Sayuri was sitting on a chair beside his bed and drinking some sort of juice.

She was covered in bandages on her left arm and her index finger. She was injured yesterday, and I forgot to heal her before I left.

Shit. That was a bad job for the team healer. I needed to keep these things in mind the next time we go on missions.

Seeing me enter, Sayuri waved at me, and Daigo tried to say 'Hi' with a mouthful of food. In response, I waved back.

"Hey, guy. How're you doing?"

"Fine, I guess," Sayuri said with a sigh. "Yesterday was exhausting."

"Tell me about it. I just lay down on my bed after coming back and woke up like thirty minutes ago. I don't think I've ever been this tired."

Wanting to add something, Daigo spoke up with his mouth full of food. Which just resulted in him making some gibberish sound that made no sense at all.

"Don't try to speak while eating." Sayrui said in an admonishing tone, "Better yet, don't speak at all. The only reason you are conscious right now is because of the shot your father gave you. Otherwise, you would be knocked out right now.*

Daigo replied again with some more gibberish, which just made me laugh. He wasn't listening to what Sayuri was saying at all.

"Where's Reiga sensei?" I asked as I stopped laughing for a bit.

"He went to the village hidden in hot water to find out why there were ninjas from the village in a blood cult. Also, he went to get compensation for the trouble they had caused to the leaf."

"Are we going to get some money?" I asked in a more enthusiastic tone than usual.

The Inuzuka family was quite well off, and due to my connection with Elder Kazi, I didn't exactly have any shortage of money. But, still...

Money is money. And having more money can never be a bad thing.

"Ha! Keep dreaming! We are never getting a dime more than our allocated salary." Sayuri said in a disappointed tone.

"Oh, come on! What they give us is barely enough to buy all the ninja tools we need."

"I know, right? I asked Reiga sensei about it once. He said that we're going to get crappy pay like this till we pass the Chunin exam. After becoming a chunin, you can actually get some bonus for doing a mission well."

"I've decided." I said, pretending to declare something revolutionary, "We need to sit for the Chunin exam next time."

"Yeah. We were already planning on doing that. You might still be a rookie, but we've been genins for quite some time now. We're not going to be rookies anymore after this Chunin exam ends. And we definitely don't want to be one of those teams who stay geniuses for more than a year."

"Will we be strong enough by then?"

"We have to be." Sayuri said, "And even if we aren't, Reiga-sensei is most probably going to throw us in the Forest of Death himself just because he was annoyed."

"What? Really? Can he really do that?"

"Legally, he can't. But he'll absolutely do it regardless of consequence. He has clearly said multiple times how much he hates babysitting a bunch of kids."

I kind of had an idea about how Reiga was a person, and it was quite refreshing to see that I wasn't that far off in my assumption.

Daigo had finally finished his twelve-course meal, and he was back to his previous size. As he could speak freely now, he spoke while massaging his belly.

"Can you guys please leave? It's not nice to gather in a sick person's room and gossip. It's harmful for the body."

"Seriously?" Sayrui said with an angered face, "We came all this way just to meet with you, and you're just blowing us off!"

"You guys came to see me... without bringing any food. What was even the point of coming then?"

"I brought you juice."

"That is even worse. Who brings someone green-apple juice? What am I? Five?" Daigo looked at me and added, "No offence, Rei."

Hearing Daigo say no offence somehow felt more offensive to me. Can this be considered ageism or something? But before I could reply, Sayuri spoke up. This time louder.

"Green apple juice is good for your digestion. You might be okay with having gas, but I sure as hell will never be associated with a shitty diet like yours. This is why I hate boys my age. Little brothers are much better."

"Can you please stop obsessing about having little brothers and eating healthy..."

As those two continued on with their bickering, I felt sort of happy. I haven't exactly had the best of luck when making friends in this life.

But seeing these two talk and fight with each other so comfortably made me think that I too might make some friends.

Some real friends.