Ten Steps to Victory

...Make sure that you bathe every day…

Jiraiya's onsen turned out to be in the Land of Hot Water. Naruto had a general idea of where Hot Water was, somewhere north of Konoha. Northeast, he discovered, once he nagged Jiraiya into buying a map for him.

The Academy taught geography, of course, how else would they know where to go for their missions? But it wasn’t like Naruto memorized every town in Fire. He couldn’t even see the board! Having a colorful map in hand opened the world up to him. Roads and rivers, towns and cities, mountains and oceans. There was so much to explore, and he had barely seen any of it. They’d been circling Fire for about a year before Jiraiya finally forced the kyuubi issue. It would be nice to see something other than trees. An ocean or something.

Naruto was a little disappointed to discover that crossing the border from Fire into Hot Water had happened without him even noticing. Jiraiya had to tell him, which was embarrassing, but how was he supposed to know? They were in a forest, and then they were still in a forest. Maybe it was dumb to think a place called Hot Springs would have hot springs everywhere, it wasn’t like Fire was literally on fire. Still, Naruto felt there should be something to distinguish it.

“I thought you said you knew an onsen nearby,” Naruto said after they had been traveling for a few hours. “Near the town we were staying in.” They had finally left the forest and were now on a wide plain with woody, resinous shrubs. There was a promising mountain range in the distance with shiny peaks which Naruto hoped indicated snow. 

“The town you were staying in,” Jiraiya muttered. “I changed my mind.” He looked into the distance. “I know a better one.”

Naruto listened with one ear as Jiraiya rambled about something—women, probably, his research was a recurring topic—wondering why Jiraiya had suddenly changed his mind. He seemed to do a lot of things just because, without explanation. For example, when he punched Naruto in the stomach when he was learning how to walk on water.

Between training and proofreading Jiraiya’s latest manuscript, there wasn’t much for Naruto to do except think. He had thought a lot about what he could have done differently with Sasuke. At first, he thought he had just been too weak to stop him from leaving. Sasuke was a better shinobi, he always had been, and the first few months of his trip with Jiraiya had been spent working on all the basic skills he had never mastered. With varying success, given he hadn’t been able to see shit. But he could only replay their fights so many times. If he had won, had succeeded in beating Sasuke badly enough that he physically couldn’t leave, what was there to stop Sasuke from trying again after he recovered? What would happen to him if he did? Maybe it wasn’t that Naruto wasn’t strong enough, or good enough. Maybe he wasn’t important enough. Maybe Sasuke cared more about his mission to kill his brother, more than Naruto, than Team 7, than Konoha, even more than his own life. 

It hurt too much to think about, and Naruto had spent so much time dwelling on it there was nothing new he could think. So he would pick over the few times he had seen Orochimaru, the things he had said, the fights Naruto had been in. And he remembered that, in the Forest of Death, when he was being strangled by Orochimaru’s tongue—disgusting!—Orochimaru had done some kind of technique and slammed his fingers into Naruto’s stomach. He remembered all of his chakra suddenly going away, and after that only darkness. And it was funny how, after Jiraiya punched him in exactly the same place, he suddenly could do the water walking thing. 

Would it have been that hard to tell Naruto Orochimaru did something weird to you and I’m going to undo it? It was exasperating. He would ask questions, he would get non-answers. 

“Hey, Ero-sennin,” Naruto said. The man was still talking about assets or something, so Naruto repeated himself. “Ero-sennin!”

“What,” Jiraiya said flatly, shooting Naruto a dirty look.

“Do you know who my parents are?”

“Sorry kid, no idea.”

Naruto almost missed a step. He did not expect a straight up lie!

“You shouldn’t worry about pointless things like that,” Jiraiya continued. “There are a lot of orphans like you. My parents died in the First War.” He looked down at Naruto and gave him a grin. “Yondaime was an orphan, and he became Hokage. So you can do it too!”

Naruto smiled up at him, though he felt gross inside. “Yeah!”

He was dismayed with Jiraiya's lie, yet Naruto was strangely comforted by his dad being an orphan too. It was sad, but nevertheless filled Naruto with determination. If his dad could be a powerful shinobi, so could he. He was Yondaime's son!

Naruto sighed in relief as he sank into the hot spring. He was a little ashamed to have neglected his parents' second rule, or the second part of the first rule…he had it written down somewhere. But the second part of the first rule was to bathe every day. It wasn't exactly practical while on a mission, or when traveling through the wilderness, so Naruto reframed it as taking one every day when he could.

He also had to wash his clothes. The ryokan staff would take care of that during their stay, since Jiraiya had gone all out and found a really nice place. Naruto's clothes were pretty messed up, and were getting too small for him, so he'd have to talk to the old man about buying new ones. Or just take money when Jiraiya was drunk, which he was well on the way to being.

Naruto frowned. His glasses were fogging up. He tried wiping off the lenses which only made it worse, and Jiraiya started laughing at him. He grumbled and took them off completely. Everything went out of focus, like he was in his own little world. He couldn't see, but it wasn't like he hadn't gotten used to that without even realizing. Still, the fog thing would become an issue. Naruto wondered how other bespectacled ninja dealt with it. 

There was Udon, but he was just a kid and more of Konohamaru's friend. The closet pervert Ebisu, which, no. Naruto wasn't going to ask him for advice. Then that traitorous piece of shit Kabuto. Naruto wouldn't put it past the creep to be wearing fake glasses, that sounded like something he would do. And then there was Shino. His entire family wore sunglasses!

Naruto smiled to himself. That was it! He'd send a letter to Shino about it. There had to be some way to deal with fog or water getting on his lenses. A jutsu?

"What are you so happy about?" Jiraiya asked. 

Naruto squinted in his general direction. "Who's a good toad to send a letter with?"

"Oh?" Jiraiya said. "Sending one to your cute little girlfriend? Sakura, right?"

Naruto blushed. "It's not like that! It's to a guy. A guy!"

"Eh," Jiraiya said. "Boring. Use Gamaden."

Wrapped up in a warm yukata, Naruto sat at the table in his room and began composing a letter.

Shino! he wrote, carefully moving his brush. He had to practice writing with brushes now, even though it was way harder than using a pen or pencil, and his handwriting sucked. It needed to be better for fuinjutsu, so he grimly pressed on.

It's been a while! How are you? How are your bugs? I can't say much about what I'm doing, it's supposed to be a secret. But I'm training hard every day. You better be too!

Anyway, I was wondering if there's some kind of jutsu you use to keep your glasses clean? Don't they get hard to see out of when you take a bath? Or when it rains? What do  I  you do? I need to know, it’s driving me crazy!

Say ‘hi’ to everyone for me.

Naruto bit the end of his brush. He and Jiraiya were mostly out of contact with the village, so that it was harder for enemies to track them down or something. But using the toads should be fine, they were summons and could always go back to Mount Myoboku if they were followed. Naruto knew Jiraiya sent letters to Tsunade sometimes, or his publisher. Still, maybe it wasn’t a good idea for people to know he was writing Shino…

Actually, don’t say anything! This is a…S-rank mission! You’re a pretty quiet guy, so I’m sure it’ll be fine.

Thanks!

Uzumaki Naruto

Naruto and Jiraiya had moved on from the ryokan and had traveled closer to the mountains that formed the border between Hot Springs and Frost. Naruto had taken to badgering Jiraiya for facts about all the places they were seeing. When he became Hokage, Naruto knew he would have to deal with other countries and other villages. The more he knew, the better he would be at his job, which is why he didn’t put up that much of a fuss when he had to take off his hitai-ate. It was kind of falling apart anyway, along with the rest of his clothes. While it was okay to travel around Fire openly as a Konoha shinobi, it could get you attacked in other places. Like near Frost, since a few years ago there was an alliance meeting between Shimogakure and Konoha, and the Shimo-nin killed off the Konoha-nin, and were in turn killed by ANBU. Things had gotten a lot worse between the two villages since, so it was better to go around as an old man and a kid rather than Jiraiya of the Sannin and Uzumaki Naruto of the Leaf. 

Naruto strongly suspected part of it was because Jiraiya wanted to hit up every hot spring in the country, and the best ones were near the mountains. There was always a better onsen according to Jiraiya, which Naruto was convinced was just an excuse to go around to see them all.

When they stopped to camp for the night, Naruto was happily surprised to see Gamaden hop up to the fire.

"Next time just summon me back," the little blue toad said, but not in a mean way.

"Got it!" Naruto said, taking the proffered scroll. "Thank you, Gamaden!"

The toad gave him a wan smile, put his webbed hands together, then poofed back to Mount Myoboku.

"What's that?" Jiraiya asked, not looking up from his notebook. Jiraiya was always writing something, usually working on his next Icha Icha. Naruto thought he might start writing too, if only to get more practice in. He wasn't sure what he'd write about. He didn't want to write down his thoughts. They weren't always nice, and sometimes were really embarrassing, and he was worried someone (Jiraiya) would read them all and use them as blackmail. He might start writing about their travels, then he could remember it all and tell Sasuke when he saw his friend again. 

And tell everyone else, of course. Obviously. It wasn't like he thought about Sasuke all the time!

"It's from Shino," Naruto said, opening the scroll. He raised his eyebrows. It was a letter, and there was a little storage seal included.

Naruto,

Indeed, it has been a while. As it is winter, my kikaichu are lethargic, though I have learned several methods to stimulate their reproductive cycle…

Naruto groaned as he read the novel Shino had written about his bugs. It was interesting, sure, but get to the point!

…water, dust, and other material may be expelled from lenses via a simple application of chakra to the surface. This requires precise chakra control as to not damage the glasses or injure yourself. As I recall, you had some difficulties with chakra control. As such, I have included a lubricant one may apply to said lenses to repel debris. The instructions for use are as follows…

Naruto read the instructions eagerly, placing his hand on the storage seal. A little jar appeared. Naruto held it up, thinking how familiar it looked. Had someone given him something like this before? 

Shaking his head, he finished reading the letter. 

Our comrades frequently speculate as to your whereabouts. Hokage-sama assures us you are in good hands, so I remain unconcerned. I see you have embraced discretion, which I and others feared would never manifest. It is wise to keep our communications a ‘secret,’ and I shall endeavor to hold your missive in confidence. 

Until we meet again. 

Aburame Shino

“I can’t even understand half the shit he said,” Naruto said, rolling the scroll back up. “Weird guy, but pretty nice.”

“Oh?” Jiraiya said, looking up. “The Aburame, huh? Good luck, kid. Those nuts are hard to crack. Or should I say carapaces?” Then he started cackling to himself.

Naruto looked at Jiraiya like he was crazy. To be fair, Jiraiya probably was. Either way, Naruto had no idea what the old pervert was talking about, so he ignored him and began treating his glasses.