16 Naruto : Chapter 16

Team seven was present at their training ground at six like Kakashi had asked. When five minutes past six Kakashi hadn't appeared, Naruto started jogging around the training ground.

"Naruto you idiot, what are you doing?" Sakura yelled.

Naruto just shot a senbon at her to shut her up. It hit and she wasn't fast enough to pull it out before the poison started working. Sakura stood again paralysed in the spot she had been. Naruto kept running. After ten laps, he started stretching.

Just when he wanted to start with strength exercises Kakashi appeared in a cloud of smoke. Sakura was freed from the paralysing poison and wanted to hit Naruto.

"Sakura stop it. Sasuke, report what happened." Kakashi ordered.

"At five past six, Naruto started running around the field, Sakura shouted at him what he was doing, Naruto hit her with one of his senbons that are coated in a paralysing poison again and he continued his exercises. He just finished stretching and Sakura got over the effect of the poison when you appeared." Sasuke said.

"I see. Sakura, what reason did you have for shouting at Naruto?" Kakashi asked.

"He is just trying to make himself look better than Sasuke. And he should have waited for you to tell us what we should do." She accused Naruto.

"Naruto, what do you have to say?" Kakashi asked.

"I have sensitive hearing and warned her several times now that I won't take her screeching anymore. She is a kunoichi and should behave like that if she doesn't want to be killed on a mission. And the poison just paralyses her for some minutes.

This type had duration of ten minutes. I was doing general warm-up exercises to use the time until you came efficiently. Nothing more than running and stretching.

I would have continued with push-ups if you hadn't appeared." Naruto said.

"I see. Sakura, work on your attitude. There is no reason to yell at your team-mate for doing a warm-up to breach time. There are some reasons I won't be on time sometimes, so I expect you to do something useful while I take care of other things.

You are considered adults since you became ninja, so behave like that. You can't expect that everything will be told to you.

I don't care what you do while you wait for me, as long as it helps with your development as a ninja. But while waiting for physical training to begin, warming up is the most logical choice. Naruto, please refrain from paralysing your team-mates, you can never know what will happen.

If there would have been an attack, she wouldn't have been able to defend herself and you and Sasuke would have had to cover her until your poison wore off." Kakashi said sternly.

In his head he cursed the mess the civilian council had left for him to clear up. He would really like to introduce them to his thousand years of death technique, especially Sakura's mother.

"Understood, sensei." Naruto said, accepting Kakashi's reasons even if in the village the probability of an attack was pretty slim. He thought Kakashi was capable of faking an attack just to get his point across.

"Good, now the first thing we will work on is your stamina. Our team has a focus on combat. Therefore you will have to be able to last in a fight. We will start with running fifteen laps around the training ground. I will take your time to see where you stand in your training.

Today I will mainly get an impression of your physical abilities before we will work on some formations for missions. Ready, set, go." Kakashi said and the three started.

Soon it was obvious that Naruto was way better trained than the other two, even if Sasuke did a good job for a rookie. Sakura was panting after three rounds already. Naruto finished with two rounds on Sasuke.

The proud Uchiha didn't like the lead Naruto had and increased his speed for the last two rounds. Then he sat down next to Naruto waiting for Sakura to finish.

"I would advise you to do some stretching while you wait." Naruto said to Sasuke.

Sasuke's first instinct was to tell Naruto off, but the blond was already doing his own exercises again. He had to admit it would be a good filling of time and from what Kakashi had told them just a bit earlier he expected them to fill spare time during training efficiently.

So he started with the stretching. Finally five rounds after Sasuke had finished his laps, Sakura was done. She fell on her knees panting.

"Hm, we really need to work on your stamina Sakura. A graduate like you should be able to easily run fifteen laps for warming up. Get to stretching for five minutes, then we will do the next exercise." Kakashi said, shaking his head.

He looked at Naruto and Sasuke who were doing strength exercises.

"Good performance you two. Sasuke, Naruto; how many repetitions of your exercises are you doing at the moment?" He asked.

"Fifty of each, Kakashi sensei." Sasuke answered, glad he had taken Naruto's advice. Perhaps the blond really knew what he did.

"Hundred of each, Kakashi sensei." Naruto said.

"Good. That's a good level for your current levels. Sasuke, we will work over the next months to get you to the same level Naruto is right now. For a fresh graduate you are doing really well.

Don't try to overdo it too fast just to catch up with Naruto. He has trained harder and more than you in the past, that is all there is to it. If you keep up your work like you do at the moment, you will get there soon enough." Kakashi said.

Sasuke didn't understand it. How could Naruto have trained more than him? He trained three hours each day after the academy. How would Naruto be able to top that? But Kakashi seemed to see his potential, so he must have done something right, just what had Naruto done better than him? And how did he hide it?

"I trained from six every morning to nine in the evening. I sent a shadow clone to the theoretical lessons in the academy to take my place after I learned that jutsu. That's the time advantage I had on you." Naruto said seeing Sasuke's look.

"What?" Sasuke asked.

"You wondered how I managed to train more than you. That's the answer." Naruto said and changed his exercise.

Sasuke really wondered about his team-mate. He didn't hide his dislike for both him and Sakura, but he still gave him useful information. He didn't understand.

Kakashi watched the exchange. He was glad that Naruto at least talked to Sasuke professionally. He had no illusions that the boys could ever become friends. It would need a miracle to achieve that.

But a healthy working attitude would be enough for him. Perhaps Naruto knew that too. They were worse than him and Obito had been. And they had more emotional scars from the past than him and Obito had had. And Sakura was nothing like Rin, who had moderated between them.

...

Sakura was finished with her stretching exercises. Kakashi knew she wouldn't keep up if he didn't give her a short break, so he decided he would hold a short quiz about optimising their training.

"Good, now that you are all warmed up, we will have a few things cleared before we start with the next part. Who can tell me what is the most important thing for a ninja to do besides training right to get strong?" He asked.

Sakura raised her hand.

"We aren't at the academy. You don't need to raise your hand anymore, Sakura." Kakashi informed her.

"Oh, okay, Kakashi sensei. The most important thing is learning about theory. Politics, geography, strategy and the like." She answered.

"That's good to know but not the most important thing." Kakashi said.

Sakura was shocked, that had always been the most important thing at the academy. The academics.

"A balanced diet." Sasuke answered.

"Correct, why?" Kakashi asked.

"Our bodies need certain nutrients to give us the energy for training and to build up muscles. With too little food or the wrong kind of food we are hindering our development. We need carbohydrates, fats and proteins, vitamins and water to have our bodies work properly." Naruto continued.

"Exactly. So what would be the worst thing for a ninja to do?" He asked.

"Dieting." Sasuke answered.

"But how would one keep their figure if they don't diet?" Sakura protested. She was on a diet after all to impress Sasuke with her figure.

The male members of the team looked at her as if she was stupid.

"Ninjas don't need to diet because we work out all the time. We burn so much energy over the day that we need to eat a lot more than civilians. Where a normal working civilian would do well to keep his figure with about two thousand calories a ninja needs at least three thousand five hundred with my understanding of normal training.

You don't have to fear becoming fat with our training, I can guarantee that." Kakashi said. "Additionally you hurt yourself if you diet at your age."

Sakura needed some time to process that.

"Kakashi sensei, are we going to learn how to hunt and fish? The academy mentioned that on longer missions ninjas should know how to properly get at least proteins. But we were never taught how to hunt or fish." Sasuke asked.

"Yes, that will be part of our training, Sasuke. You will also learn about all the edible plants in Fire Country and the neighbour countries." Kakashi answered.

"Okay, enough of a break. Next I will test your speed. You will go over to the other side of the field and then sprint back to the posts here." Kakashi ordered and made a shadow clone to accompany them to give the start signals.

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