Sunagakure Support Mission

After word reached Konoha that Gaara and his team needed help against a group of ninja called the Four Celestial Symbols Men from the Takumi Village who kidnapped Gaara's new student, Matsuri, Naruto joined the rest of the Konoha 11 (minus Tenten) under Shikamaru's command to help. Naruto was particularly glad he could finally pay Gaara back for helping them during Sasuke's defection. Quickly, Shikamaru formulated a strategy to best handle the situation and had Naruto pair up with Lee for main offensive assistance. The two helped arrived in time to save Gaara from Suiko, an opponent with chakra-absorbing armor after being struck by a Water Dragon jutsu. After Gaara recovered with help from Sakura's medical Ninjutsu, he took over for Naruto and Lee to finish off Suiko. Afterwards, Gaara went on ahead to save Matsuri. Naruto followed soon after.

Naruto arrived in time to see Gaara facing off against the leader of the Four Celestial Symbols Men, Hoki, now armed with all the unique weapons of his allies. Unfortunately, Gaara was still too exhausted to properly fight back. Naruto quickly went to help Gaara. After Hoki shouted his anger towards the Five Great Shinobi Nations for overlooking his village's greatness as weapon makers and vowing to destroy them, he trapped Gaara in a giant iron sphere which began absorbing Gaara's demon chakra of Shukaku. Doing so slowly began to make Gaara transform into Shukaku. Hoki then used that chakra and himself as a sacrifice to perform a resurrection technique the Takumi Village founder, Seimei. Quickly after emerging, Seimei reconfigured the weapons of Hoki as armor for himself. Seimei then began siphoning off Shukaku's chakra, making Naruto repeatedly try to break Gaara free.

Eventually, Gaara's transformation process proved too great for the prison to handle. While Seimei was looking forward to facing Shukaku, Gaara was able to suppress Shukaku and revert to normal, amazing Naruto and everyone else who appeared. While everyone else didn't understand why Gaara would take advantage of Shukaku's power, Kankuro explained that Gaara was determined to rely on his own power from now on. Gaara then used his remaining chakra to turn some of the canyon around them into sand and crushed Seimei, finally ending the battle. As everyone rushed to help Gaara who fainted shortly afterwards, Kankuro noted to Naruto how he finally found someone who he can relate to.

Later while Naruto was recovering at the village, Jiraiya showed up. After explaining how he had spent the past few months gathering information on Akatsuki, he told Naruto he was finally ready to train him for the next two years. After recovering and having one last bowl of ramen with Iruka, Naruto finally set of with Jiraiya to begin his training, vowing to become strong enough to free Sasuke from Orochimaru when he returned.

Episodes