• Published 30th Apr 2012
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Friendship Contract - Demeristraz



A contractless summoning lands Naruto with quite possibly the strangest/coolest summon's ever seen.

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Promoting Positive Thinking

Jiraiya could only shake his head in exasperation as his apprentice and former teammate stepped outside of the bar. They were treating the situation like a bunch of school children having a fight in the schoolyard. His musings were interrupted as a purple unicorn appeared with a 'poof' in the bar. "Huh, looks like it's a little inaccurate." She commented idly.

"How did you get here without being summoned?" Jiraiya asked, raising an eyebrow at her sudden appearance.

"Oh, Pinkie finally perfected a permanent sealing array, using Naruto's stored chakra, to allow ponies to be summoned directly to him." She said with a smile, recognizing the man as Naruto's teacher."Now where is he? I've made several important discoveries I'd like to share with him."

"He's outside, fighting a very drunk and angry Sanin." Jiraiya deadpanned.

"Perhaps I should go get backup." Twilight said, hearing a crash from outside. "Or at least Fluttershy to patch him up. Be right back."

The pony disappeared in a poof of smoke, and Jiraiya stepped outside to see how the beat down was progressing. As expected Naruto had been knocked through a wall, likely by a single finger flick. He was still conscious and raring to go, mostly by virtue of his Chakra Armor trick soaking the brunt of the bone-crushing force. Shaking off the rubble the blonde leapt skyward, landing on a cloud and sending down clones to fight.

"And I'm back, I brought Fluttershy, why exactly are they fighting?" Twilight asked, coming out of the bar with her friend.

"Go ask Shizune if you want to know, I don't feel like explaining." Jiraiya said, gesturing at the worried looking woman. Fluttershy nodded and went to do exactly that.

"Meanwhile, what sort of discoveries have you made?" Jiraiya said, his interests peaked after learning exactly how smart the unicorn was.

"Oh! Well I've been running some tests on some of Naruto's chakra, comparing it to Magical energy in both unicorns and pegasi and earth ponies, trying to come up with some common ground to it." Twilight said, both her and Jiraiya wincing as several clones were destroyed in rather painful ways.

"And I've come up with some interesting results. It says in the books I've read that chakra is equal parts mental and physical energy yes?" She asked, receiving a nod from the Toad Sage. "Well I ran his chakra through a device used to measure magical ability, and got a positive reading. Also I compared the Chakra Circulatory System to the Unicorn Internal Leyline System, which is the system that supposedly conducts magical energy through our bodies. They are both very similar, and have similar effects on our bodies if blocked. There's been research to suggest that everypony has the system, but only unicorns, with our horns, are able to direct our magic externally."

Jiraiya coughed, interrupting her train of thought and getting her back on track. "So anyways, this put me on the theory that Unicorn magic is simply raw manipulated mental energy, but back when Naruto was a child I had him attempt to do several simple spells and he couldn't. Which means either the fact that molding chakra mixes both physical and mental energies prevents ninja from doing 'magic', or more likely a horn is needed to directly manipulate mental energy without molding it and directing it like ninja do."

"So all unicorns have mental energy? That's certainly an interesting finding." Jiraiya said, his apprentice had now begun throwing wind coated shuriken from the clouds down at his former teammate, to no real effect.

"Not only that, this project has been going on for a while now, under Celestia's guidance, and we've finally hit results. By following the books Naruto had from his academy days, we've managed to get unicorns to produce enough physical energy to mold actual chakra. You're looking at the first unicorn to graduate from the Equestria Ninja Academy." Twilight said proudly.

"That's great, but unicorns already had magic, is having chakra such a big deal?" Jiraiya asked.

"It doesn't stop there, since the theory is every pony has Leylines, or Chakra pathways, we dug a bit deeper, and found earth ponies naturally produce an abundance of physical energy. It took a lot of effort to get them to learn to properly mold it with mental energy, but when we did their natural abilities soared. Turns out your First Hokage isn't the only one who can grow trees with chakra." Twilight grinned. Jiraiya was dumbstruck.

"Next you're going to tell me the pegasi are natural sages." Jiraiya said, looking skeptical.

"I'm not sure about that, but the pegasi in the program are a weird sort of quirk. They seemed to have neither an abundance of physical or mental energy, but when we got them producing chakra their weather manipulation went crazy. Dash is still working on controlling it and it's been weeks since she got the hang of it." Twilight said.

"Wait, weeks? How long have you been sitting on this?" The Sanin asked, no longer really paying attention to the fight.

"Like I said the study has been going on since around the time Naruto showed up. We only started getting results in the past month or two. There were a lot of ponies in the program, and a lot really didn't get the hang of it, me and my friends are the first generation of chakra using ponies, so a lot of what we come up with is breaking new ground. As you can imagine doing techniques without hands for seals is quite difficult." Twilight said shrugging. "Some of the effects still can't be explained, like how pegasi normally make clouds, it definitely isn't physical or mental energy, and adding chakra to the mix makes it go haywire."

"Well Naruto will be psyched to hear it, you and your friends still sound like you have years of training ahead of you though." Jiraiya said, his apprentice had apparently had enough, and was now on the ground, beginning to form a blue ball of energy in his hand.

Tsunade seemed taken off guard by the partially formed Rasengan, and Naruto used the opportunity to rush at her. He stopped however, when a loud voice cut through the night.

"Enough! Enough of this pointless fighting!" A yellow pegasus pony flew between the combatants. "How dare you!" She rounded on Tsunade, having heard the whole story from her apprentice. "You are supposed to be a medic! The best medic to ever live! And you go around drinking and gambling and running away from your responsibilities?" She yelled, approaching the stunned blonde woman, who wondered if someone had spiked her drink.

"You sit here drinking and mocking the man who trained you. The leader of the village who raised you. How dare you mock that old man and everything he worked for, while he lays on his death bed and you don't lift a finger. How dare you betray the village that your family built like that. How dare you disrespect the village and the dream that your family died for, and turn your back on the things your precious people once loved most of all!" Tsunade was beginning to sweat, whatever this creature was, looking her in the eyes she found all of her responses, all of her excuses crumble away like the trash they were, and yet she could not look away.

"The Third Hokage wants to finally retire, as is his right after working so hard for so long. You should feel honored that despite everything you've done, and all the people you turned you back on, as a ninja and as a medic, the man who trained you still respects you enough to offer you that position." Fluttershy continued in a softer tone, as Tsunade began to tremble. "You know you'd make a great Hokage, even just by following the ideals of Dan and Nawaki."

"H-how..." Tsunade stuttered.

"I told her. I told her everything. She wanted to know why you were fighting, I had to start from the beginning for her to really understand why." Shizune said stepping forward. "I believe in you too, you'd make a great Hokage, and I really think you need to stop running."

"I can't... Even if I wanted to I still freeze up at the sight of blood." Tsunade said.

"We can help, you have friends who can help, people who look up to you who can help." Shizune said, moving to embrace her teacher, who had fallen to her knees. "We'll take it one step at a time, but I know you can get past this."

The group eventually left the street as the civilians came out of their buildings to see what the commotion was about. At their hotel Shizune put her mentor to bed, while Jiraiya and Twilight filled Naruto in on their recent development.

"So the six of you can all use chakra now?" Naruto asked bewildered.

"It's been a long time coming, don't act like this just happened over night." Twilight said.

"But it is sudden to me, how come I didn't know this was going on?" Naruto complained.

"Celestia had it considered classified, we didn't want to get your hopes up. It's not like we're just suddenly developing new powers to keep up with the plot of some bad novel." Twilight said.

"Yeah, that would be kind of lame." Naruto admitted. "What can you do so far?"

"Personally? Not much at the moment, despite having a lot of mental energy, or magic, my physical side is lacking, so my actual chakra capacity is low. I'm working on the standard things to improve it, but at the moment I'm focusing on learning more useful magic."

"Fluttershy is determined to learn to be a medic, and her control at the moment is quite good. Applejack is having a riot being able to grow pre-existing plants, but it's nothing combat worthy at the moment. Rainbow Dash is having trouble with her control, any cloud she makes using chakra goes haywire and blasts anything nearby with lightning. Pinkie is being Pinkie, sticking to ceilings and charging her own seals now, she was actually one of the quickest to learn to mold chakra. And Rarity is in the same boat as me for the most part, her fine control using telekinesis is still better than mine, but her chakra capacity is nearly nonexistent." Twilight listed off.

Naruto sat back and sighed. It was a huge step forward, just at the moment it wasn't combat ready. Still they were the first generation of ponies to use chakra, he wasn't sure if changing Equestria like that was a good thing, but he somehow knew it would be important one day.

The group went to bed, they'd be returning to the village tomorrow.

O~O~O~O~O

Tsunade left her hotel room at dawn the next morning, she had a massive headache from her well deserved hangover, but the words from last night echoed through her mind. Whatever that flying pony had done, it made a hell of a therapy technique. "Where are you going?" came a voice from down the hall. She turned to see the blonde from last night, Naruto, sitting in the hallway watching her.

"You held your own pretty well last night, for a brat. Of course I was drunk, and holding back. Still, no doubt you'll be made chuunin when you get back home." She said, walking over and sitting next to the boy.

"It'll probably be you giving me the vest." Naruto commented.

"I'm not sure I'm ready for this sort of thing. Becoming Hokage is a huge responsibility. " Tsunade admitted. "I've been running away from even minor responsibility for years now."

"Well it's not like you'll have to do it for long. You're just holding it until I'm ready." Naruto said with a grin.

"You're really serious about becoming Hokage huh?"

"Absolutely, it's been my dream for as long as I can remember." Naruto admitted.

"I've heard about how a lot of the village treats you. You sure you want to put your life on the line for them?"

"They're good people, they don't understand that I'm not the Kyuubi, but they will, if I continue protecting them. Things will get better, I'll make sure of it." Naruto said, making Tsunade smile at his resolve.

"That technique you tried last night, the Rasengan. Show it to me." She said, watching the boy hold out his hand. With a look of pure concentration a spinning ball appeared, it lacked control, wobbling a bit and bulging out occasionally, but it was nearly stable. "Not bad, think you'll have it down by the time you get back to Konoha?"

"Three days? No sweat." Naruto bragged.

"Alright then, show me it mastered at the gates of Konoha, and I'll give you my necklace." Tsunade said, standing and heading back to her room.

"You never answered my question, where are you going?" Naruto asked again.

"Home." Was Tsunade's response.

O~O~O~O~O

The trip back to the village was blessedly uneventful. Naruto took the opportunity to summon his companions for the trip, and each showed off their budding ninja abilities.

Applejack shocked Tsunade by planting an apple seed, and then growing it to the size of a sapling before pausing to catch her breath.

Fluttershy impressed the Sanin with her desire to learn medical skills, and got her to agree to begin teaching her the basics once they hit the village.

Rarity declined to come, stating she was hard at work designing Naruto's new chuunin outfit.

Twilight did a standard demonstration of the 'clone' and 'transformation' technique, first copying herself twice, and then changing herself into 'the Great and Powerful Trixie' to everyone's amusement.

Rainbow Dash's demonstration left the most concrete impression. She flew up about 10 feet and generated a cloud. Unlike most pegasus-made clouds this one was quite dark, and once she finished she flew for cover. As everyone present watched, it seemed to grow brighter, and begin to hum. As the humming reached a crescendo the entire thing burst, scattering the cloud and sending bolts of energy in every direction.

Pinkie Pie's own unique 'style' seemed to rely heavily on exploding tags of all sorts, from smoke to flash to confetti. She planned on incorporating more 'offensive' seals as she gained more chakra.

Once her demonstration was finished she got into a large discussion on summoning seals with Jiraiya, including theoretical seals used to bring people to a dimension temporarily, as well as seals to send someone back to their original plane of existence.

"Yeah, what you're talking about is theoretically possible. You mean like me bringing the brat to Toad Mountain right?" Getting a nod from the pink pony. "It takes a good deal of chakra, and you need to know the key to your world."

"Key?" Pinkie asked.

"It's the symbol at the center of the summoning contract, you need to take that and draw it in the middle of this array." He trailed off, seeing Pinkie pull the scroll out of her saddlebags. "Why do you have that?"

"Who else would Celestia trust with keeping it secret?" Pinkie asked.

"Right well... what you need to do..."

Soon enough the troupe had reached the walls of Konoha, and Naruto proudly held aloft a fully controlled Rasengan. Tsunade smiled at the boy, who reminded her so much of her little brother, and knelt down to place her necklace around his neck. She desperately prayed it wouldn't bring him the same luck it had her family, and sealed those prayers with a kiss to his forehead.

"Ready to take your place up there on the mountain?" Jiraiya joked as she took her first steps in the village in ages.

"I'm just holding the hat until the brat is ready. I'll be retiring before you know it." She said, returning his grin. Despite everything, it felt good to be home.

O~O~O~O~O

The Third Hokage's operation went without a hitch, the wound from Orochimaru's sword had been healed long ago, and only the poison remained. Without the fear of blood to hold her back, Tsunade's legendary control made removing most of the poison a rather simple matter. Both Sakura and Fluttershy were invited to watch, and spoke highly of their new role model for weeks later.

Naruto's first stop upon arriving home was to check on Kakashi and Sasuke. The former had recovered from the exhaustion and trauma caused by Itachi's technique, and the latter had a minor cast that would be on for a few more days, due to the accelerated healing done by medics at the hospital.

"Have you checked the shrine Itachi mentioned?" Naruto asked, as they sat by the pond in the Uchiha district, throwing stones like the good old days.

"I decided I'd wait till you got back." Sasuke said, tossing a stone that skipped eleven times.

"Moral support?" Naruto joked.

"Clones for trap checking." Sasuke deadpanned.

"Touché, shall we go now?" Naruto chuckled, and the two rose to investigate the shrine.

The shrine itself was rather plain, and apparently served no purpose other than to hide a secret room under apparently. Under one of the floor mats they found a set of stairs downwards. Beneath was a wall with strange writing on it. Sasuke turned on his sharingan as a hunch and began to read.

"The Uchiha clan is the best, blah blah blah, the Senju clan can't break reality like us, yadda yadda yadda, whoever designed this bloodline couldn't make up their mind..." Sasuke read.

"Really? Your clan has a secret wall devoted to bragging?" Naruto asked.

"Hold on, here's the good bit, to achieve the reality breaking power of the Mangekyo Sharingan, an Uchiha must first..." Sasuke paused to make sure he was reading correctly. "Kill his best friend."

"Dude... That sucks." Naruto was at a loss for words.

"Apparently using the Mangekyo Sharingan makes you go blind eventually too." Sasuke said.

"Yeah, I've heard that one before about doing other naughty stuff." Naruto snorted, causing Sasuke to punch him in the arm.

"Seriously, I wish I didn't know this stuff." Sasuke said. "What if I go nuts from the seal and try and kill you?"

"You know it's bound to happen at least once, but don't worry, I'll knock some sense into you when it does." Naruto shrugged. "You'd do the same for me."

O~O~O~O~O

It turned out Karin wasn't punished for going awol, to everyone's relief. Naruto caught up with her and Anko at a tea shop a day after he returned. Her probation had ended, and the psychotic special jounin had volunteered to take over the Uzumaki's training. "At the moment I'm trying to improve the range on my ability to sense people." She said, sipping her tea.

"That's a really useful ability, you'd make a great tracking ninja." Naruto commented.

"That's what everyone keeps saying, but Anko is also teaching me interrogation techniques. I want to see if I can use my chakra sense to detect lies." She added.

"Well keep at it, I was just going to go see how Tsunade is holding up." Naruto said, leaving the two to their tea and dango, and continuing on to the hospital.

What he saw when he arrived at her office was not what he was expecting. "Please please please please please~!" Came the voice of Sakura, as well as the much quieter one of Fluttershy, as both pink haired females bowed before a very irritated Tsunade.

"Hey grandma! What are they doing here?" Naruto asked, casually strolling into the room.

"I was hoping you could tell me? They're your teammate and summon. And don't call me that brat, I don't like feeling old." She replied, wishing she had a drink to help deal with the craziness of the situation.

"We'd like to be your apprentices... that is um... if you don't mind." Fluttershy said still looking at the floor.

"I already have an apprentice, I don't need two more." Tsunade grumbled.

"But Shizune has been with you for years! Surely she's advanced enough that you can accept new ones as well." Sakura countered.

"But um... whatever you want to do is fine." Fluttershy added.

"Fine fine, I'll train you both, be at the Hokage's office bright and early a week from tomorrow." Tsunade said.

"Why a week?" Sakura asked.

"Because new chuunin get a week off to celebrate." The Sanin said with a smile.

O~O~O~O~O

At long last the time arrived for the hat to pass to Tsunade. The entire village and both Celestia and Luna were in attendance. The ceremony was short and sweet, the Third himself was there to pass the hat to his beloved student, and as he expressed exactly how proud he was of her for coming home, she nearly broke down in tears. Sarutobi also took time during the ceremony to pass the monkey summoning contract to his grandson, Konohamaru accepted it with an unusual amount of grace and respect.

Once the formalities of passing the hat were finished, it was Tsunade's turn to announce the promotions from the latest chuunin exams.

"The exams themselves were cut short this year due to the invasion, but it is due not only to exam performance, but to action in defense of the village that I award the following promotions.

To Sasuke Uchiha, who faced great danger in defense of his village, and who's efforts aided in preventing the Ichibi from wreaking havoc on our village. I award you the merit promotion of the rank of chuunin.

To Lee Rock, who despite not making it to the finals, displayed great skill, strength, and willingness to sacrifice in the face of overwhelming odds for the sake of the village. His actions aboard the Ixion prevented great loss of life and livelihood in the merchant district, as well as support to the ninja fighting on the ground. I award you the merit promotion of the rank of chuunin.

To Sakura Haruno, who displayed great strength and bravery, and also aided the Ixion in defense of the merchant district and support of our ground troops. I award you the merit promotion of the rank of chuunin.

To Shikamaru Nara, who's display of tactical genius both within the exam and during the invasion lead to many victories against strong opponents and superior numbers. I award you the rank of chuunin.

Last, but certainly not least, to Naruto Uzumaki. You personally, along with teammate Sasuke Uchiha, confronted the Jinchuuriki of the Ichibi in defense of the village despite knowing the danger. You delayed him, where teams of skilled ninja would likely have died. Your summons aided in the Third's fight against Orochimaru, and likely saved his life. They aided in the defense of the entire village from the airship Ixion. They aided in the eventual defeat of the Ichibi, a monument to which can still be seen behind me. You put up one heck of a fight in the defense of our village, and I wish I had been there to see it. Naruto Uzumaki I award you the merit promotion of the rank of chuunin."

To his surprise much of the village behind him cheered at the declaration, as the former genin marched forward to collect their vests. The five new chuunin turned to wave at the crowd, and Naruto's face suddenly sported a grin. From behind the cloud cover the Ixion swooped into view. "I'll see you in a week Tsunade." He called, as the cannons aboard the ship fired and the five chuunin found themselves teleported to the deck.

"Are you pondering what I'm pondering Pinkie?" He called, seeing the pony standing within a massive array of seals.

"I think so Naruto, but how would a button even produce warm blueberry muffins on demand?" Came her response. The blonde boy facepalmed.

"Fire it up! You're all invited on a week-long celebratory cruise of Equestria!" He yelled, Pinkie grinned and placed her hooves on the battery seal beneath her. For a moment the entire ship glowed with massive seals, and then with a poof the ship was gone, ninja and all.