A Growing Affection

Chapter 63: Jonin Trials, Day 2

"Fuuton: Rasenshuriken!" the clone holding the disc declared loudly, despite the small cuts on his arm.

"Odama Raiton Rasengan!" the four clones supporting the five-foot electrified purple sphere announced.

After  their teacher had finished glancing around, the clones all vanished and  the original Uzumaki cleared his throat for the Jonin's attention. He  dropped his left hand, and stared intently at his right. Kakashi raised  an eyebrow in curiosity. A single, two-inch diameter Rasengan formed  above Naruto's pointer finger, and four more perfect globes followed in  succession, middle, ring, pinky, and finally thumb. He darted towards in  chunk of stone lying on the ground and stabbed his hand into the rock.  Once his fingers drilled past its surface, the core of the chunk of  granite exploded, covering Naruto in dust and dirt.

"Five Points Rasengan," the blonde stated proudly, brushing himself off.

"So, did you and Hinata plan this in advance?" the proctor asked carefully.

"Huh?" Naruto frowned in confusion, "No, why?"

"She also started off with using Shadow Clones to perform the Rasengan and its variants," the Jonin explained.

"Really?" Naruto smirked, "Great minds I guess. So how did Hinata do?"

"I can't really tell you that," Kakashi frowned at the Chunin.

"Come  on, tell me something," he pleaded, "It's not like it's gonna help me.  Like how many food pills did she take? She bought a whole bag 'cause she  was worried her chakra would run out."

"Three," he admitted after  a second, "two during the test, and one afterwards. I was surprised by  how much she was able to do before recharging. At this point, I'd say  she probably has more chakra than I do."

"Good for you, Hinata,"  Naruto said under his breath, then added at his normal volume, "But  given how hard Gramma Tsunade pushed us, it's not much of a surprise."

"And  speaking of that," Naruto took one of the small brown pills from his  pack, and swallowed it, "I could still go a while longer, but better  safe than sorry, considering what happens sometimes when I run out of  chakra..."

Kakashi nodded sagely, having no desire to encounter the Kyubi without Yamato or Hinata around.

"Well,  that first display was three A-Rank techniques, and five S-Rank  techniques," the examiner said evenly, "And two different elements. A  fairly strong start, can you continue at that pace?"

"Just you watch me, sensei," Naruto roared, re-energized by the food pill, "How about another S-Rank technique?"

The  Jonin waved his hand in supplication, and Naruto took out a kunai. The  younger man quickly and deeply slashed both of his palms, allowing his  blood to spill messily over the earth. Once he had enough fluid, he  stopped consciously holding back his healing powers, and as the wounds  on his hands closed, he began to sign.

"Ninja Art: Blood Clone Jutsu!" he incanted, and the red liquid quickly changed into four copies of the teen.

"Wanna  see how tough they are, sensei?" Naruto asked, with two of clone  cracking their knuckles. But Kakashi just shook his head.

"You already had the Taijutsu test," the Copy Ninja said blandly.

"Come on, Kakashi-sensei," Naruto complained, "how can you evaluate my jutsu if you don't see how strong my clones are?"

"Fine,  hold still," the elder shinobi capitulated. Without waiting for any  acknowledgement, Hatake darted forward, burying his fist in one Blood  Clone's stomach. The copy folded in pain, and the Jonin sprang to the  right, his foot colliding with a second duplicate's face. A large bruise  appeared, but it just as quickly faded. And the first clone had  recovered by the time the Copy Ninja had returned to his starting  position.