The Cycle of Hatred: A Naruto Insert

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"Who are we waiting on?" I asked.

Tenten straightened, finishing her stretch, and adjusted her grey tank top and red jogging bottoms. She'd only grown leaner since I'd seen her—but somehow, her arms looked bigger.

She snorted. "My sensei's cool and hip rival, supposedly."

"His cool and hip rival?" I repeated. "Kakashi-sensei?"

She shrugged.

Lee and Gai paced down the street, completely in sync as they warmed up. Choji sat against a small staircase, following them with his eyes. He made space for me to sit beside him without a word, resting his chin in his palm.

I broke the silence first. "According to Tenten, Kakashi-sensei is exercising with us today."

"Really?" Choji blinked. "We've been doing this for months and it's just been us. Do you think the rest of Team 7 are coming too?

If Sasuke reached out to his teammates since we'd talked last week? Maybe. They must have been eager to improve off the back of a mission like theirs and that drive would serve them well enough in their training.

Besides, I was looking forward to seeing Kakashi again.

"I hope so," I replied, smiling, "I think it'd be nice for them to join. Maybe we'll be able to grab Hinata to join if there are more peopl—"

My answer was cut short by a massive plume of smoke sprouting in front of us. Gai and Lee halted just in front of it, no sign of tension in their shoulders, and when the smoke cleared, Team 7 gathered in all their early morning glory. Sakura was stifling a yawn, I couldn't see much of Shino on account of his glasses, but Sasuke looked like death—albeit a bit better than a few days ago—but it was obvious that he wasn't getting enough sleep.

"Kakashi!" Gai flew towards his friend, extending his fist out. "You're looking to be in better spirits, my friend!"

"I've been worse, but I've also been better."

Gai nodded enthusiastically.

"Hello, I'm Rock Lee!" He bowed at a perfect ninety-degree angle, stiff as a chalkboard. "Kakashi-sensei, I've heard much of your exploits from, Gai-sensei!"

"Gai, I didn't know you had a disciple." Kakashi hummed amusedly. "He's even wearing one of your jumpsuits."

"Were it up to me, my entire team would be wearing them." He shook his head sadly. "They say one's teacher is like their second parent. Only Lee takes that message to heart."

Sasuke caught Choji and I staring and offered me a stiff nod. I returned it, managing not to smile at his awkwardness—I had no idea what would set him off at this point and we'd only just made progress.

"Alright!" Gai clapped his hands, gathering everyone's scattered attention with a bright, flashing grin. "Let's start with two laps around the village, everyone. We have some newcomers today so we won't go as hard as usual, but we'll keep a youthful pace!"

He took off immediately, followed by Lee.

Tenten rolled her eyes. "Won't go as hard as usual my ass."

Choji chuckled, jogging beside her, and I looked up back at Team 7 for a moment before following them. The morning air was brisk as we settled into our rhythm, each step part of the chorus of determination.

Team 7 lagged initially, but soon they found their stride, the initial lethargy peeling away like old skin. Sakura shook off her grogginess and kept pace with Shino. Sasuke kept his eyes trained on me as I slowly widened the gap, while Shino's movements were precise, almost mechanical in their regularity, as though each step had been predetermined.

We didn't exchange words, just fell into step with each other as we rounded the first corner. Gai and Lee were already a green blur ahead, charging forward with their boundless energy, always setting the pace—but it was Tenten who drew my attention, not them.

She refused to let them get too far ahead, always pushing herself to close that gap. She always tried to close the gap over the last few months even if she could never reach them. Her muscled arms rippled with each step and, as we caught up to her, I noticed the taut set of her jaw.

"Hey," I huffed out. "Reckon you'll get 'em this time?"

She stuck her chin up. "I'll damn well make sure I do!"

Choji picked up his pace with a chuckle and the two of us ran after him, running side by side for a long moment. We rounded the corner and abandoned moderation to sprint. Tenten exploded forward, followed by Choji. I ran after them, carefully controlling my steps, and pulling ahead when they began to flag.

But neither of them gave up and I could hear the thud of their shoes against the ground, slowly growing distant to my ears. The village passed by in a blur as we ran and the early-morning sun cast long shadows across the ground, growing longer with each stride.

By the time we completed the second lap, sweat had soaked through our clothes, and our breaths came heavy and deep—there was something else, too: a quiet sense of accomplishment that didn't need to be voiced.

Choji and Tenten, despite the obvious strain, wore a small, satisfied smile and Team 7 lay on the ground, wheezing; Sakura had the absolute worst of it, but there was an uncharacteristic glee in her eyes while Sasuke was struggling to stay on his feet, taking deep lungfuls of air.

I caught his eye and gave him a slow nod. He huffed, wiping the sweat off his face with his shirt and nodded back.

"Excellent work, everyone!" Gai proclaimed, his voice full of enthusiasm. "You've all shown the true spirit of youth today!"

Kakashi, who had maintained an effortless pace with his genin, gave us a lazy thumbs-up. "Not bad for an early morning run," he said, his eye crinkling in what I assumed was a smile.

We gathered in a loose circle, catching our breath and stretching out sore muscles. Despite the fatigue, there was a lightness in the air, a sense of connection that hadn't been there before. Gai and Lee would call it the spirit of youth or something, not that I'd argue against it.

Team Gai left for the allotted 8 AM genin training after giving us their farewells, leaving Choji and me alone with Team 7.

"You guys go on ahead too," said Kakashi, looking at his genin. "I just need to do a few things, but I won't be late."

Sakura pursed her lips. "...We all know that's a lie."

"W-What?" He stumbled, clutching his forehead. "Have I really inspired so little trust in you guys?"

"Sensei, you've been late 172 times since you took us on as your genin," said Shino.

"That's quite a lot." Kakashi nodded to himself. "Okay, I promise I won't be late this time. Head to Training Ground 3. I'll be there in twenty minutes or so, 'kay?"

Sakura frowned, but Sasuke started to walk away, so she reluctantly stopped herself from replying and gave him one last glare.

Shino stuck his hands into the pockets of his trench coat. "I'll hold you to that promise, sensei."

"Of course," he replied, right eye crinkling, and then waited until they were far away enough before speaking. "So, Naruto… how are things going?"

His eye flicked over to Choji.

"He knows, Kakashi," I said. "So do Asuma and Hinata."

Kakashi blinked. "As in… everything?"

I nodded.

"Okay, then, I guess he can come with us."

"How come the two of you are so familiar?" Choji asked.

Kakashi looked at him. "His father was my Jonin Sensei."

"...His father—oh!" His eyes widened. "Right, I get it. So, where are we headed?"

"Since you promised you wouldn't be late, a nearby park should be fine, right?" I asked Kakashi.

He shrugged. "I planned on being late regardless."

"That's mean," said Choji. "I'm glad Asuma's not like that."

I snorted. "Me too."

"Hey," Kakashi sighed, "you kids are what's mean. What happened to having a sense of humour, huh?"

Instead of deigning that with a response, I started walking and Choji followed me.

The park was quiet this early in the morning, the soft rustle of leaves underfoot the only sound between us. We weaved through several winding paths, past the playground and the small pond, until we reached the secluded clearing on the far side. The open space was perfect—surrounded by trees thick enough to act as cover.

I stepped into the centre, testing the ground beneath my feet, and searched for a proper target. Kakashi leaned back against a tree to my right and Choji sat next to him in the grass, not bothering to hide the curiosity on his face.

"Since you seem so confident, I'm assuming you've made some progress?" Kakashi asked.

I shrugged. "Yeah, I've made some progress. It's only been a couple of weeks, but I'm satisfied with what I've got so far."

"Go on, then. Let's see it." He waved his hand, tucking away the Icha Icha novel into his flak jacket.

I lifted my palm, unable to hold back my smile as the Rasengan bloomed, bright blue light spilling between my fingers and lighting up deadened bark.

"Woah," I heard Choji say. "What is that?"

"This," I replied, "is the Rasengan."

"As in…the Fourth Hokage's signature jutsu?"

"The same." Kakashi chuckled. "It took four years for Minato-sensei to develop it and you learned it in fourteen days."

"Oh, I'm not done yet."

"What do you mean?" he asked, but I didn't reply.

Allowing the chakra to gradually disperse, I watched the Rasengan slowly dwindle before its blue light faded and even let the dregs of gathered chakra fade before I reined in my focus.

"So, there are three principles that lead to a perfect Rasengan," I began, lowering my right hand. "First is rotation, where you take advantage of the momentum to cycle a ton of chakra in rings like so." I held up my hand to show the wide vortex around my hand. "Next comes power, which means using more chakra and spinning it even faster."

Kakashi nodded. "After that comes containment, where you squeeze that chakra into shape."

"But…" I smiled, the still-spinning vortex in my hand spinning faster than it ever had before. The blue chakra turned pale, still blue, but only barely and a piercing whine filled the clearing. "If you take advantage of the rotational momentum and inject some wind chakra into the regular chakra—in other words, use nature transformation—and then contain it…"

I trailed off, gritting my teeth. Just this step alone required more focus than I was used to. Wind chakra was hard to control in the first place; something about it refused to be limited. It was much easier to direct it than control it, but that's exactly what I needed to do. Using the spinning momentum was difficult, but manageable, even if any slip in my focus would cut me up badly.

Packing in the vortex, I forcefully compressed it into a ball—or as close to a ball as possible. The white-ish ball was unstable and surrounded by a revolving gust crown, trails of sharp wind chakra seeping out of the ball at random as it revolved above my palm.

"Wind-Release: Rasengan," I grimaced, not trusting myself to smile without losing control.

Pivoting on my foot, I slammed the jutsu into the tree behind me, watching it effortlessly shred the bark before exploding, sending the tree's upper half toppling to the ground and grinding a smooth, sloping hole through the top of the stump. Hissing, I pulled my arm back, revealing raw and torn skin along the insides of my fingers.

Choji rushed to me but I shook my head. "This is pretty tame considering what it did to me when I first tried this—and I was dialling back on it too."

"The bandages…"

"They were from this, yeah," I confirmed with a nod. "It's near completion… I can feel it."

"Closer to completing it than I was, anyway," said Kakashi, ruffling my hair.

I smiled. "Your notes were super useful, by the way."

"I'd hope so," he said, huffing. "While we're at it, is there anything else you want to unveil while we're here? No further evolution to show?"

"Unfortunately not." I sighed, running my uninjured hand through my hair. "This is all I've got."

At least, until I could use senjutsu chakra to stabilise this thing somehow… but for all I knew, that was years away from now and if I was still getting injured using it, Wind-Release: Rasengan wasn't in a truly usable state.

I was gritting my teeth at the thought until Kakashi snorted.

"'All I've got,' he says." The jonin rolled his eyes. "Listen, you've made more progress in two weeks than I had in the months it took to create the Chidori."

"But I've been perfecting my chakra manipulation for years," I shot back. "If anything, the Rasengan and its principles fit right in with my enhancement seeing that rotational force will up the power even more."

"Nonetheless, you've got down an A-rank jutsu in two weeks—and right on time too."

"Right in time for what?" Choji asked.

Kakashi made a show of blinking his left eye theatrically slowly. "...Oh, would you look at the time? I really should be going, you two. My genin are waiting for me. No way do I want to be late again and upset Sakura…"

"Hey," I glared at him more for the shite deflection than anything else. "no way am I buying that."

He raised his hands. "I'll see you guys around—get to training safely!"

I moved to grab him but he blurred, disappearing from view and just barely kicking up shards of bark from the tree I'd demolished. Gritting my teeth, I slammed my fist into the stump, using whatever leftover chakra I had to blow a hole through it, much to Choji's amusement.

He snorted. "Do you want to go look for him?"

"Yeah, right." I scoffed, shaking the wood shavings off my knuckles. "We won't find him if he doesn't want us to. Let's head to training instead. Otherwise, we'll be late and Asuma won't let us live it down."

"What do you think he was talking about?" Choji asked as we escaped the park at breakneck speeds.

I shrugged despite the thoughts broiling in my mind. The village was bustling with life recently, cleaning up the streets, stalls and shops hiking up the prices for virtually everything.

We were getting ready for something and it didn't take a genius to put two and two together. In retrospect it was obvious, but I'd fallen down a rabbit hole these past few weeks with the Rasengan that consumed every waking moment and, now that Choji knew, I'd continue to hone it during training time too.

…Not that I'd get much of that anymore with the Chunin Exams rolling around.

Hinata and Asuma stood against a pair of training logs in our usual meeting place, their conversation halting when they saw us.

"What took you so long?" Hinata asked. "Your early morning training with Team 3 usually wraps up earlier than mine does."

I ignored the urge to scratch at my scabbing hands. "We had to wait for Team 7 to arrive."

"Kakashi's out of the hospital?" asked Asuma.

Choji nodded, looking at me for a long moment.

"Oh," I said, realising why he was staring, "you can tell them. They already know about everything anyway."

"Naruto's learned the Rasengan," he blurted.

Asuma leaned back. "Is that it? I sort of guessed something like this would happen at some point. It's pretty well-known that Kakashi was the Fourth's student. Either he or my old man would have taught him sooner or later."

I slumped my shoulders, slightly disappointed at his lack of reaction, even if it was made better by Hinata's slack-jawed face.

"Come on then," he said, smirking. "Let's see it."

Chakra gathered in my hand, spinning rapidly. A small sphere formed, glowing with a soft, blue light. It pulsed, alive with energy. Wisps of chakra swirled inside, a contained storm of power and the air around it buzzed with a perfect, lethal beauty.

Asuma released an impressed whistle.

Hinata peered at it using her Byakugan with a gasp. "I-It's… i-it's pure shape manipulation."

"Pretty cool, eh?" I chuckled, dispelling the jutsu by cutting off the chakra flow and letting the dregs dissipate. "So, what are we doing today?"

"I've got some news that might just top the Rasengan," said Asuma, with all the confidence of a seasoned gambler holding a royal flush and a smirk too wide for comfort.

Choji took the bait. "I doubt it…"

"Try me."

His confidence pulled our attention over to him and he revelled in it for a few moments, stretching out the tension until it was unbearable.

Hinata stamped her foot. "Come on, sensei!"

"Alright, alright." He raised his hands. "I've entered you three into the Chunin Exams."

Choji's jaw dropped, his usual laid-back expression replaced with wide-eyed surprise. Hinata froze, her breath catching as her Byakugan faded, the veins around her eyes smoothing out. She bit her lip, a mix of nerves and determination flickering across her face.

Asuma's words settled over us, the weight of them pressing down like a sudden storm. The Rasengan, for all its power, was almost insignificant compared to this. If I could at least become a chunin, I'd be one step closer to getting my hands on jutsu no jonin could ever give me and using my father's Flying Raijin technique to absolutely fuck Obito over wouldn't be a pipe dream.

Surely my father wouldn't be shortsighted enough to not write down his notes and ideas for upgrades and modifications to a legendary jutsu, right?

The Chunin Exams were an opportunity… but they also posed an incredible danger. Gaara, Orochimaru, and I could only wonder who else awaited us there with my teammates none the wiser. Choji scratched the back of his head, his usual appetite forgotten, while Hinata shifted slightly, her resolve hardening as she processed the news.

The playful energy from moments ago was gone, replaced with an understanding of what lay ahead. Asuma held out three forms emblazoned with the Leaf Village seal at the very top.

"You can sign these, but there's no pressure from me." Asuma's stare was serious and unflinching. "I recommended you three because I think you're ready, but if you're not one-hundred percent in, don't sign these. I don't mind letting you guys polish up your skills for another six months and enter the January exams."

I looked at my teammates in silence—whatever they chose, we'd still be dealing with an invasion.

Hinata pulled the forms out of his hands, conjuring a pen from within her hoodie. "I'm going to enter because I agree with Asuma-sensei. We're ready."

"Me too," said Choji, nodding twice. "We can do it."

They turned to me in unison and I smiled. "You think I can say no after that? Give me one of the damn forms."

Asuma handed over his pen and I scanned over its contents, seeing the words but not truly reading them. In the end, I was entering the exams not to avert some kind of crisis—it was way too late for that—but I could use this crisis as a stepping stone to prepare and hopefully thwart subsequent ones.

No, I wanted something completely different from the Chunin Exams.

I needed an accurate assessment of how strong I was now, if only to see how far I had to go and if that meant writing my name on the dotted line of no return, then I'd do it. All my classmates were stronger than my memories told me they otherwise would have been, so hopefully, the examinees should fare as better yardsticks of how far I had to go. Gaara and his siblings in particular.

One by one, we returned the forms to Asuma, signed and dated, brimming with determination and a hunger to get things started there and then.

I breathed out, long and slow, looking around with fresh eyes. "...What now?"

"Now?" Choji asked with a challenging grin on his face. "Now I'm thinking Hinata and I fight you at the same time."

"Are you serious?" I asked.

Hinata smirked. "Why? Are you afraid that you'll lose, Naruto?"

"...Don't stand there and take it, Naruto!" Asuma bellowed, and when I looked up, he was sitting on a trunk, looking down at us with endless amusement. "Fire back!"

I chuckled. "Choji, you were there when I explained that the Rasengan only improved my chakra enhancement. Are you sure it's a good idea to test it out for yourself?"

"Eh, you won't hurt me too badly so close to the exam," Choji replied. "Asuma-sensei, when is it?"

"Two days from now," our teacher replied. "Room 301 of the Academy, funnily. Make sure you're there by 8 AM sharp, otherwise, you'll have missed the boat."

"There we have it. We can make it a challenging spar without going all-out… especially if it's Choji and I against you." Hinata's eyes gleamed with challenge. "Besides, how are you going to use your chakra enhancement, let alone the Rasengan if you can't mould chakra?"

I cracked my knuckles, springing back to put some space between us while I cycled chakra around my body. Luckily, I was still warmed up from the earlier demonstrations, which only turned this battle in my favour. Hinata and Choji were stronger than a lot of people our age—stronger than many of the ninja we'd come across in the Chunin Exams—but if I wanted to thrive, I had to be stronger.

Bulging veins slithered across Hinata's face, eyes sharpening to deadly focus and Choji shrugged off his Haori and scarf, dressed in his grey tank top and cargo pants, and his regular-sized hands clad in thick, spiked, stone gauntlets.

I raised an eyebrow. "Since when could you do that?"

"You're not the only one who practises in their spare time," he replied, raising his fists. "But enough of this. Are we gonna chat, or fight?"

Hinata giggled, stepping into her usual stance.

"Okay, you two," I breathed out, already gathering wind chakra before my hands even left my sides, "bring it."