Kurosuki Family Removal Mission

With Jiraiya still gone and no idea of when he would return, Naruto decided to train anyway he could in the village. While training in the woods, he came across three weak and injured men from the village of Katabame Kinzan. Naruto brought them back to Konoha. After they recovered and explained to Tsunade that they came Konoha for help in ridding their village of a terrible gang. Tsunade decided to assign Naruto on the mission with Might Guy's students to keep Naruto preoccupied from his obsessions of finding either Sasuke or Jiraiya. Before leaving, Naruto learned from Lee who was told by Guy that the leader of gang is Raiga Kurosuki, a former member if the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist. Naruto saw this as another chance to find Sasuke as Raiga might know where Kisame and Itachi are, who could lead him to Sasuke.

Before arriving at the village, the team stopped at a small restaurant that Lee knew well from his early days training with Guy. There, they met an old acquaintance of Lee's, Sanshou, and elderly lady who's best meal was an energizing and nutritious curry known as the "Curry of Life". Sanchou revealed that her son Karashi left the restaurant a while ago after getting a wrong understanding on being strong. The team then went to the village and were horrified to discover that not only was the villagers so traumatized by the gang that they refused to be rescued, but also that Raiga had a psychotic joy for funerals and would regularly bury people alive. After defeating Raiga's minions and discovering one of them was Karashi, then Naruto and the others were confronted by Raiga. In addition to Raiga's highly powerful lighting-jutsu, Naruto and his team found themselves at an even bigger disadvantage from a powerful genjutsu even Neji's Byakugan was powerless against.

Soon, it was discovered that Raiga's unique genjutsu and much of his power was actually coming from a young boy he was carrying on his back. The boy was named Ranmaru and possessed a unique dojutsu. After separating the two, Naruto was able to launch him off a cliff with a Rasengan and defeat him. Afterwards, Naruto and the team retrieved Ranmaru. They learned that the boy had been with Raiga for years by choice because the two of them had an understanding of each other. Raiga gave Ranmaru a reason to live and feel useful. This made Naruto remember Haku who shared a similar relation to Zabuza and ultimately refused to let Ranmaru go down the same path as Haku did and offered him another path.

Later while the team was cleaning up Raiga's damage to the village, Ranmaru had Karashi bring him to Raiga's burial. Ranmaru was able to tell that despite Raiga's fatal wounds from Naruto, Raiga was still barely alive. Ranmaru without hesitation transferred almost all of his energy into Raiga to save him. Infuriated by the sight of a seemingly dead Ranmaru, Raiga took his rage out on Naruto and his team. While no longer having Ranmaru's eyes to aid him in battle, Raiga instead gather natural energy from a lightning storm of power and enhance his lightning jutsu. After Ranmaru was saved and recovered, Ranmaru began to understand what Naruto was talking in night about trying to find value in life by killing others. Ranmaru helped Sanchou and Karashi revive the fallen Leaf Genin with the "Curry of Life". Ranmaru then tried to convince Raiga stop this meaningless battle, but Raiga only viewed this as betrayal. After seeing that Ranmaru had made up his mind and Naruto managed to overpower Raiga, Raiga decided give himself a "burial" by crushing him with a rockslide. With the mission completed and Ranmaru now being an apprentice to Sanchou, Naruto and his team returned to the village.