The next morning came quite fast considering the near-death experience team 7 endured the day before.

The cliff climbing nearly killed Sakura and if Sasuke hadn't caught the pinkette, she most likely would have fallen to her demise or at least broken a few bones. After that rather traumatic experience, the kids set out to do their two laps around Konoha lake, only making it about halfway through the first lap before collapsing against each other.

Kakashi, who was watching, had no trouble motivating them with his fellow ninken hounds, who seemed to favor growling and biting. To say the least, each genin had at least one bite mark on their ankles.

Eventually finishing their two laps and barely making it out alive, Sasuke offered his teammates stay at his compound, stating there was more than enough room and since none of them could make it past his apartment, it was the only option.

Kakashi was nice enough to help carry them to Sasuke's house but swiftly left after, letting Sasuke deal with the two who had already dropped to the ground in exhaustion.

Sasuke was the first to wake in the early morning, the sun had yet to rise and the two he now called friends were sleeping soundly next to him on futons. Well, Sakura was sleeping soundly. Naruto's snoring had woken the Uchiha up which caused an annoying headache for the poor raven-haired boy.

Sasuke carefully stepped around his sleeping comrades, 'accidentally' kicking Naruto in the stomach and headed toward the kitchen area. The boy had lost his parents at an early age but everything that had been taught before their deaths stuck to him. For example. Always take care of your guests.

Before cooking, he made sure to get dressed in appropriate clothing since only a pair of track pants covered him, imagine if Sakura saw him now...Sasuke twisted his face just thinking about it before throwing on a plain black t-shirt and heading back to the kitchen.

Sasuke mumbled incoherent words to himself while making breakfast for himself and his teammates. If any of his fangirls caught him doing this... He shivered.

After washing the dishes and placing the warm miso noodles on the table, he strode to his bedroom, where the other two collapsed before he could situate them in the guest bedrooms. Shaking Sakura awake, she gave a small yawn and tried stretching her muscles, only to spas out a bit from the tightness of it. Sasuke shook his head at her, implying to stop and take it easy before pointing to the kitchen and mouthing food. She quickly caught on and smiled brightly at the raven haired boy who she just noticed, was wearing a plain black shirt which fit him extremely nicely. Sakura made her way out the room with a dribble of drool on the corner of her mouth, from the food or from Sasuke, she'll never know. Perhaps just from the deep sleep, she was in.

Sasuke stared at the girl, wondering what was wrong with her before shaking it off and moving on to wake up the dobe.

"Dobe" he whispered, slightly shaking the blonde, who simply shrugged the hand of his shoulder and turned around.

Sasuke deadpanned at his reaction and shook him a bit rougher, yet still no answer. Was the boy dead? No, his chest was moving and he still had the body function to push Sasuke away.

Breathing out, Sasuke stood up and smirked. Running to the bathroom, he grabbed a bucket and filled it with ice cold water.

Tiptoeing back to his room and peeking at Naruto's peaceful face, he broke out into a Cheshire grin before tilting the bucket of water over the blondes head.

The water hit its target and not a moment later Naruto yelped loudly, scrambling to sit up, panic plastered on his face.

Sasuke tried holding in his laughter but failed as soon as Naruto's confused and panic-stricken face looked up at him.

Sasuke doubled over with laughter as Naruto openly glared at his teammate, Sakura running in to find the source of water splashing and laughter. She, too, tried to hold in her laughter but failed all the same as Naruto tried getting up, only to slip and fall on his behind.

Naruto shivered from the cold but that didn't stop him from glaring between the two genin as they kept laughing. Though, he felt himself join in with the laughter shortly after. The trio were still snickering when they walked into the kitchen, finding a meal waiting for them. After Naruto changed his clothes and both guests said thank you for the meal, they dug in. Sitting in a comfortable silence, none of them had ever experienced.

After finishing up breakfast and stretching their muscles a bit, Sakura even loosened them up as well with some basic medical jutsu.

Team 7 set out to the training grounds, taking a shortcut through the woods as they were almost late as it is.

The trio swiftly arrived at the destination and did their usual climb up the cliff, their, now, usual routine of working as a team and helping each other was starting to become easier.

At the top Kakashi was already waiting for them, ready to begin training.

"Naruto, you've sent two clones to the library, correct?" Kakashi inquired, leaning against a shadowy tree.

"Hai, I've learned a lot from just one sitting, it's all really interesting to take in, I'm slowly becoming familiar with the feeling when my clones disappear too" the blonde explained in an excited voice.

"That's good" Kakashi smiled "but you need to learn not to react in the slightest when your clones come back to you, one blink could cost you your life" Kakashi advised.

Naruto nodded his head, taking in the advice.

"Alright, you three will spar together for now" Kakashi announced and said begin.

The trio turned to each other and smiled. The genin took part in a friendly spar but still giving it their all. An hour had passed when Kakashi sensei halted their battle, in good time too as Naruto was about to accidentally cut Sakura's abdomen and Sasuke nearly sliced off the blonde's ankle before Kakashi simply stepped on Sasuke's kunai and grabbed Naruto's wrist before kicking a, still fighting, Sakura away.

He gave them a few minutes to catch their breath and continued on with the training.

"Sakura, you'll be training with my clone again but I'll also be teaching you more of the basics of medical ninjutsu" Sakura was excited and eager to learn, dashing over to the Kakashi clone her sensei had made and started her training.

"Sasuke, you and Naruto will be sparring again today, every lesson you'll do this until Naruto's taijutsu is up to par with yours and after we will move on to something else." Kakashi explained. Sasuke felt annoyed at this, wanting to start his training as soon as possible but he supposed this would up his taijutsu in the meantime as well.

"Before you go" Kakashi halted the boys as they started walking over to their spot. "Put these on" in his hand were 20kg weights. "It'll be hard at first but you'll get used to it, take it slow though, you could tear a muscle if you're not careful" Kakashi explained to the boys who seemed content with the weights, Sasuke felt this, in a way, made up for only training his taijutsu in the beginning of the lessons.

The boys set out to do their routine training while Kakashi watched all three of his charges.

Sakura, as stated before, was being taught the basics of Medical Ninjutsu and was surprisingly taking it up quickly. Her breathing was labored as the genin struggled to heal the small cuts on herself from the day before. Kakashi's clone stood nearby, giving pointers on what she could do and what she was doing wrong.

Naruto and Sasuke battled against the other, being merciless in their attacks but was noticeably slower than before because of the weights. The jounin wondered about the comradeship with the boys, they seemed to get along for the most part but when an opportunity presented itself to harm the other, neither seemed to hesitate.

Their view on this reminded Kakashi of his days in the Anbu where he had to do things that would be seen as unspeakable and dishonorable to the regular shinobi of the leaf.

Suddenly a screech sounded from above, the masked man looked up to see a hawk circling twice, signifying his presence at the Hokage's office.

Kakashi created another clone to look out for the boys and teleported to the Sandaimes' office.
"You called?" He quizzed, lazily glancing around the room, finding him to be the only other person there apart from the Hokage himself.

The old man took a puff from his pipe and settled in his chair for a minute before addressing the jounin in front of him.

"You've been harsh on those kids" the older man stated.

Kakashi shrugged his shoulders "They're hardly genin. The academy is only teaching kids civilian standard education, it seems" he replied carefully and respectfully.

"Kakashi. Iruka has done the best he can. I disagree with saying those kids are civilian standard, they passed your test didn't they?" The sandaime questioned puffing in his pipe.

"Barely. They know next to no Ninjutsu, Genjutsu and their Taijutsu is child's play" The masked man muttered, looking out the window.

The Hokage breathed out "Kakashi, this is why you are their teacher. You will teach them the best you can but is there really need to be so harsh? In many cases, they could've died"

"That is the life of a shinobi. In many cases, if I do not prepare them for battle, they will have much worse deaths. Besides, I was watching them and would've caught them if they did fall"

"And what of your discipline?" The old man grunted.

Kakashi narrowed his eyes "What I do with them is for their own good. I'm teaching these kids, if you didn't want me being so harsh then you should have found them a different teacher. You know I would teach them to be the best" Kakashi explained, as respectfully as he could when frustrated.

The old man stared at him for a while, puffing on his pipe before breathing out, defeated "Very well Kakashi, I support your training, but you have a responsibility - make those kids legends. I'll not have them go through that training if it doesn't benefit them and this village" The Third ordered.

"Hai" the silver-haired man obeyed, bowed and left.

It was a wonder how many times Kakashi could've been arrested or even executed for talking to the Hokage like that, but the man was compassionate, something Kakashi lacked. He wouldn't take it easier on his training but perhaps help them more and be nicer. If that was possible.

Arriving back at the training grounds, the Sensei of Team 7 found the trio still going hard at their training. It's been almost two hours since he left and they haven't stopped by the looks of it, he was slightly impressed.

"Bring it in" Kakashi called out after dispersing his clone that was watching over the boys.
They swiftly closed in on their sensei, waiting for new instructions.

He pulled out three strips of paper "Pour your chakra into this to see your elemental affinity" Said the man as he handed the paper to each genin.

He watched as they poured some chakra into it.

Sasuke's rippled, Naruto's split in half and Sakura's turned to dust.

This was perfect, Sasuke had the lighting element, Naruto had air and Sakura had earth. A surprising affinity for the girl but that's what made it perfect.

"Alright, Sakura, I'll work with you. I'm going to teach you bunshin no jutsu created as an earth clone" Sakura beamed at the news.

"Naruto, you'll create two more clones, one is to go to the Hokage's reception and learn more about the Hokage and what he does as the leader of this village, the other will work on your chakra control. You will be learning Futon: Sensougouheki (Wind style: Rumbling wind wall)" Kakashi explained while creating a clone and showing Naruto the way to perform the task. The blonde could hardly contain his excitement but narrowed his eyes and tried his best to focus and memorize the hand signs shown to him.

Sasuke watched his teammates as they began their progression toward the next level. "Sasuke" Said person turned and faced his sensei. Ready to learn all he can.

"You can already use your clans jutsu using fire style but that is not your affinity, lighting is your affinity and if you want you can either continue working on fire or move on to lighting and progress with fire in a later stage" Kakashi questioned, leaving the choice up to him.

Sasuke thought for a moment before deciding "I want to learn the lighting release" He said with determination.

"Alright. You'll be learning Raiton no jutsu: Shottogan (Lightning Release: Lightning Shotgun). Good luck." Kakashi stated and made a clone to go off with the Uchiha.

Kakashi was starting to feel attached to the group, looking around at them, they reminded him a lot of his old team.

He promised himself he wouldn't become attached again and yet here he was, going soft and chuckling at Naruto, who flew through the air and plummeted down to the ground.

If only Minato sensei could've seen him now, taking care of his own team. It was something his sensei had always wanted Kakashi to pursue but the masked man was too deep into his killing stage, he stayed with the Anbu black ops and took on as many assassination missions as he could.

He wouldn't wish that life on anyone but that didn't mean he couldn't pass along some wisdom to his charges.

Sakura was waiting patiently for her sensei when he walked over and started his lesson.

"Alright, Sakura" Kakashi started out with showing her the hand signs, which hadn't taken long to memorize at all "Ok I want you to gather dust and small particles with your chakra" Sakura did as told and managed to create a pile of dirt before it broke off not a second later. Her chakra control was near perfect.

Kakashi breathed out "Good, now try pushing more chakra through it until it is stable enough to stand on its own, we can worry about the image later"

Sakura tried again and managed to create the disoriented clone for a few more seconds before it fell again.

The girl had extremely low chakra reserves, that was proven.

"Alright try again" She tried again, creating a clone until it stood on it own

"That's good. Good job, kid" Kakashi said, ruffling her hair.

Sakura smiled at her sensei and kept practicing with him watching over and providing a few tips occasionally.

Finally she created an earth clone that stood tall and looked slightly like her, only it looked like dirt, whereas the clone was supposed to look exactly like the user "Good job Sakura, we'll stop for today, every day you'll do your taijutsu in the morning and work on the Jutsu I've taught you until you have a good control over it" Sakura nodded, panting and kneeling on the ground, exhausted from the small exercise.

Kakashi waved the boys over who had done a good job on their Jutsu's but none of the genin had nearly achieved the hang of it.

Their sensei dismissed them for the day and disappeared to a different training ground to start his own workout. Lately, he had taken to upping his taijutsu by adding straps that played as weights by adding chakra to it, making it heavier, it was the same type of straps given to the genin. not only had he brushed up on his taijutsu but also on his ninjutsu, bettering himself in any Jutsu's he either wasn't familiar with or hadn't used in a while and genjutsu had been more difficult to exercise but it was being improved.

The trio discussed their training with each other, talking about what they could do better in their morning taijutsu spars and finished up their training together. Running the laps were becoming easier so after the laps, the kids could still stand on their own, barely, and went out to Ichiraku's ramen for dinner, learning more about each other and simply talking. After dinner they set off to their own homes and promptly collapsed onto their beds, falling into a dreamless and peaceful sleep.