AN* Well here it is, the first chapter for a new story. Challenge issued by Dragon Sage God, so credit for initial work goes to him for putting me onto this show. Anyway, leave your reviews at the end and let me know how I did.

Firsts

A soft frown crossed his face as he watched the man who had done so much for him fake his way into finding suitable candidates. He had stayed near enough to act as a safety net, ensuring that his guardian would not come to harm but he was careful as well to remain far enough back as to not cause a problem and potentially ruin the tests he was performing. Of more then three dozen attempts only two had been suitable candidates for what he had planned and now he prepared to give them the tools they would need to succeed.

"I don't like this," he said.

"No one is asking you to," came the reply from his partner where he sat devouring a baguette "but despite your misgivings he does know what he is doing."

"I don't like watching him put himself in harms way. I could handle this easily enough,"

"You don't have the power to deal with the Akuma. He told you this. We are powerful, no doubt about it but we do not have Tikki's abilities,"

"So you both have said, and yet you claim to be the strongest of them," he smirked.

"I AM the strongest. But raw power isn't everything, you know that." his partner huffed as he finished his food.

"It's a pity we can't just track down Nooroo,"

"Agreed but it's not in the cards. Whomever has him is doing a good job of staying hidden,"

"Ugh, I hate all this skulking around. I'd rather go out there and handle this head on,"

"That's a pretty ironic statement coming from you," his partner chuckled.

"Oh shut up Ignis." he sighed as he walked off, following after the diminutive master until he had managed to secretly deliver the two Kawami's to their new partners.

"I am impressed that you restrained yourself." Master Fu chuckled as they started walking.

"You told me not to, and seeing as how I am basically mooching off of you I feel obligated to at least follow your lead on matters such as these." was his reply as his gaze shifted over the populace with practiced ease.

"You are too uptight. It might be good to relax a bit, live somewhat of a normal life if you can," Master Fu noted.

"You honestly expect me to blend in? Really?" was his response "From the stories I've told you, me and normal are about as far apart as the north and south poles,"

Master Fu chuckled at that remark before he replied "Yes, and I know that since you took that necklace you intend to live the life of a hero as well. But even heroes need to have a life away from the battle. It would not be a disservice to those that you have left behind to live and perhaps even enjoy this new life,"

"We'll see." was all he said as he reached up and touched the necklace gently running a finger over the dragon styled motif.

As the morning went on he made his way back towards the school, intent on observing the young woman that had been given one of the powerful Miraculous. She was a klutz from what he managed to observe of her but she was kindhearted and that made her a target. Stepping down from his perch he easily climbed down and walked towards the school with a smirk on his face. He would deny that he was following Master Fu's advice about living a new life, he was only going to be there to monitor the young woman, that was all.

"Yeah... I don't even believe that, and I'm the one saying it," he thought.

Walking in he asked for directions to the principal's office and arrived in short order, rapping on the door quickly.

"Come in,"

"Hello." he said as he walked in, a small smile on his face "I'm sorry to interrupt but I just moved into the area and was hoping to register."

"Ah, of course." the principal nodded as he motioned for him to take a seat "Your parents are here as well?"

He opened his mouth to continue when the door was opened by a larger, angry looking teen with dark hair and blond banes. The principal reacted harshly, shouting at the young man to learn to knock and telling him to do it again. The young man closed the door and a few moments passed quietly while the pair waited before the principal called out for him to come in, which was when the door was smashed off of it's hinges and a rock golem walked into the room, standing over seven feet tall already with his right hand clenched into a fist. The young man was about to react when the golem kept on going, smashing through the windows, shouting a person's name as he walked further into the city.

"Well, shall we put a pin in this?" the young man asked with a raised eyebrow as he helped the principal up.

"Y-Yes." he stammered out as he brushed himself off and reached for his phone, calling the police as the young man stepped out of the room and made his way outside where he planned on tailing the newly minted super villain until the two Master Fu had chosen could intervene. He didn't intend to get involved himself unless he felt there was a need to but that didn't mean that he wasn't going to stay nearby just in case something did go wrong. New heroes couldn't be expected to do everything right on their first go, nor could their reactions to a combat situation be predicted easily. Fear for another person was one thing, but fear for their own lives could cause them to hesitate at the wrong moment.

It was relatively easy to tail Stone Heart, since he wasn't exactly being subtle about his direction or his intentions as he kept shouting the same name over and over again as he walked, though he noted that he grew larger every time he was hit by an attack, meaning that he would have to be very careful in how things were handled if the new heroes couldn't make the cut. Making his way into the stadium he kept to the upper level where he watched as one of the new heroes, Cat Noir arrived on the scene and began to battle the giant Stone Heart, causing him to grow larger and larger. Glancing up he spotted the young woman, fully transformed and ready to fight but he could tell that she was scared and wasn't sure if she could handle the battle ahead. Glancing down at the field again he saw two things that made him react quickly. First was that there was a young woman with a phone recording the whole battle. Second was that Stone Heart had thrown a goal in her general direction and it was going to hit.

"Ignis, Burn It Down!" he called out as the dragon partner let out a snarling laugh as it joined the necklace and transformed him into his hero persona. His usual street clothes disappeared in red fire as first appeared the pants and shirt, both black in color with a scarlet circle appearing just over his stomach, then the boots appeared on his feet, red as well and stretching up to mid calf, followed by the scarlet coat with twin black swirl patterns appearing at the upper arms and finally came the mask of a dragon, hiding his face from the view of the public as he leapt down in front of the young woman, his weapon in hand, a blade shaped and colored like a flame extending out just over three feet in length with six upward facing spikes that had four on the right and two on the left, it's grip was a simple gray rod and the guard was black and started at the very bottom of the hilt, spreading out in an oval like shape with two spikes near the bottom pointing down and two near the top pointing up. With practiced ease and simple movement he swung up and sent the goal flying up and into the stands.

"Whoa!" she exclaimed as he stood there, and turned his gaze up towards the girl.

"It's now or never!" he shouted to her as he walked forward, intent on helping Cat Noir who had been grabbed when he had been about to protect the young woman and instead had been distracted by his arrival.

The young woman didn't disappoint as she used her yoyo to get down to the field, and free Cat Noir as they landed haphazardly at the remaining goal. Standing up the pair talked as he moved in front of Stone Heart, keeping the giant's attention on him.

"Sorry big man. But you're going to need to give the rookies a moment." he said with a chuckle as Stone Heart swung a massive fist at him that forced him to dodge "They'll be ready to play again in just a bit."

"I'm not playing!" Stone Heart shouted in a rage as he slammed a fist onto the ground and instead of the dragon masked hero there was only a crushed ball in his place as he heard chuckling from behind him.

"You might not be, but this is the most fun I have had in quite some time." he said as he leapt back to avoid the counterattack, while Cat Noir rushed forward, apparently having used his new super power and not realizing that it was a single shot only. Just before Cat Noir could be hit he flickered into sight and back over by the destroyed goal with relative ease.

"Whoa. Thanks for the save." Cat Noir laughed.

"You wasted your power." he noted in a chiding manner "You should have listened to your partner."

"I was just a little too excited." Cat Noir admitted.

"Understandable. I trust you got the whole story from your Kawami." he said looking towards the young woman.

"Yeah." she nodded.

"Good. Then I'm done here." he said as he stepped away from them.

"Wait what?!" she shouted.

"This is your trial, not mine." he replied "I am here to act as a safety net, not as an ally. I will step in the moment I feel that it is necessary to save lives, or if I need to offer advice, but you need to learn how to handle these things on your own. Take if from someone who knows, there will not always be someone there to bail you out,"

With that he stabbed the sword into the ground and stood off to the side, making it clear that she needed to do this herself. He watched quietly as she activated her power and then seemed to put everything together into a means of stopping the enemy in front of them, sending Cat Noir into one of his giant fists while she in turn leapt up to get caught in the other, forcing Stone Heart to drop the crumpled up piece of paper that the Akuma had used to transform him. As soon as she was in his fist she called out to the young woman, Alya he noted, who turned on the hose that filled the extra suit that her powers had create and forced his hand open and allowing her to remove the Akuma. He nodded then, seeing as they had things well in hand and started off, sword balanced on his shoulder as he walked past Alya who looked at him with wide eyes.

"You are so cool. What's your name?" she asked.

"Ryu. You can call me Ryu." he answered as he walked out of sight, not noticing the mistake that the young heroine made as he left.

A few hours later he had returned to Master Fu's home where he saw the news about the massive increase in Stone Hearts and quickly brought his hand into contact with his face.

"You had no way of knowing that his would happen." Master Fu remarked.

"I should have stayed to make sure that she handled it," he sighed "I assumed that she knew what to do once the threat was no longer there,"

"It was a simple mistake. She will learn from it," Master Fu replied.

"Assuming of course that it doesn't destroy her precious little confidence," he countered "It's only a matter of time before those copies start attacking. The original is a teenager, pretty easy for them to hit a low point."

"Spoken as though you are not one," Master Fu laughed.

"Just because I look like one again doesn't mean I am one," he tried to counter.

"Or perhaps you just do not want to be one again. Was your own teenage years the first time around so bad?"

"Bad enough that I don't want to relive them," he answered.

"Ah but you are not reliving them. You are simply making a fresh start,"

"I sincerely doubt that." was all he said as he walked off towards his own room "I've got some work to do. Can't mooch off of you forever."

"I have told you that you may stay here as long as you wish,"

"And I told you that I am uncomfortable living off of the charity of others. I'll just need a bit of time to get my feet up underneath me, then I'll be out of your hair," he said.

The next day he returned to the school, walking into the still damaged Principal's Office and nodding to the man.

"I am surprised that you came back. It wasn't a great first impression of this school."

"I won't hold it against you that one of your students suddenly transformed into a giant rock monster." he laughed casually "I doubt that it is a regular occurrence,"

The principal chuckled as well at that as they started the paperwork, and once finished along with the tuition he was ready to start.

"It will take a few days to file the paperwork. You can start on Monday." he said.

"That's great. Thank you," the young man smiled as he shook the Principal's hand before heading out, noting the commotion as several different students all were talking about someone named Adrian. Watching with eyes more skilled then he would appear he spotted the young man and recognized him as Cat Noir's secret identity.

"This was a good decision after all." he nodded to himself as he made his way towards the ground floor and the exit. He made it less then two blocks when he heard the commotion behind him and saw Stone Heart at it once again. Slipping into an alleyway he stopped when he tapped on the inside pocket of his coat, rousing Ignis.

"Ugh, do you know what time it is?" Ignis asked.

"Time to work," was his reply.

"Oh. Well in that case what are we waiting for?" Ignis chuckled.

"Ignis, Burn It Down!" he called out as he once again transformed into Ryu. Leaping up onto the rooftops he spotted the path that Stone Heart was taking and saw that he had two hostages. Leaping down he saw two things, first being that Cat Noir was arriving on the scene and second was that so were the Stone Minions. Leaping down he looked at Cat Noir as the minions arrived and the original had grown in size to a massive height.

"You really don't learn from your mistakes do you?" Ryu asked as he looked at the six minions that surrounded them as the original walked off.

"I'm still kinda new to this." Cat Noir replied as he dodged a giant stone hand.

"I can tell." Ryu replied as he went low to dodge the next one and leapt backwards to give himself some breathing room "Where's Ladybug?"

"No clue!" Cat Noir exclaimed, continuing to dodge around.

"Well we need to move quickly. Think you can keep the copies distracted for a bit?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Cause I can use my power to buy us some time but I need to get closer to the original." Ryu explained.

"Whoa, you're joining in this time?" Cat Noir asked with a grin.

"It was my mistake to not make sure that Ladybug handled the threat appropriately. I clean up my own messes." Ryu answered "Good luck Cat Noir."

"You too man." Cat Noir nodded as Ryu leapt off the top of one of the minions and continued leaping over the rooftops to close the distance between himself and Stone Heart. Leaping down he saw Stone Heart standing on the Eiffel Tower observation deck as the police had the area surrounded. Assessing the situation he knew that he had only one shot at stopping Stone Heart, and buying Ladybug time to come in and deal with the threat that the Akuma represented.

"I demand the safe return of my daughter!" the mayor shouted through his megaphone and Ryu muttered a curse as he stopped and flickered from sight landing on the bridge just as Ladybug arrived, catching the blond haired girl before she hit the unforgiving pavement.

"You're late." he noted as she stood up and Cat Noir joined them.

"Uh yeah. Sorry." she chuckled.

"It's a good sign. A hero knows how to make an entrance." Ryu chuckled as he heard the chief of police telling them to open fire on Stone Heart.

"No don't attack them! It will only make things worse, you know that!" Ladybug shouted.

"Unlike you I have a new plan, now move aside. You've already failed once." the man said.

Ryu decided that enough was enough as he slammed the tip of his sword into the ground, shaking the bridge and getting the officers and the two young heroes to jump in shock.

"And your plan will only cause rampant chaos and destruction." Ryu said loudly as he lifted his sword "She made a mistake, but she is new to her gifts and has already done more good as a hero then I did my first few attempts."

"Really?" She asked in shock.

"Trust me if you knew the me back then you would be shocked at the differences." Ryu chuckled as he moved in front of them "You can do this, both of you. I can buy you a few minutes but while that is going on you are going to need to work quickly."

"Right." the pair nodded. Just as Ryu was about to activate his power Stone Heart went into a coughing fit that ended with him spitting up a gigantic swarm of butterflies before falling backwards onto the observation platform. A second later and the swarm took the shape of a man's face and began to speak.

"People of Paris, listen carefully! I am Hawk Moth!"

"Hawk Moth?" the two younger heroes repeated back in shock.

"Ladybug, Cat Noir! Give me the Ladybug Earrings and the Cat Ring now! You've done enough damage to these innocent people!" Hawk Moth declared.

Ryu could chuckle as Ladybug didn't waste a second as she clapped and stepped forward, calling out the man who caused the entire problem "Nice try Hawk Moth, but we all know who the real bad guy is. Let's not reverse the roles here. Without you none of these innocent victims would turned into villains in the first place. Hawk Moth, no matter how long it takes we will find you, and you will hand us your Miraculous!" Ladybug declared as she charged forward, leaping up and unleashing the power of purification, destroying the manifestation of Hawk Moth "Let me make this promise to you!" Ladybug declared as she turned and faced the people down below "No matter who wants to harm you, Ladybug, Cat Noir and Ryu will do everything in our power to keep you safe!"

"Wow, whomever she is beneath that mask I love that girl," Cat Noir said as the people behind them cheered.

"Wipe the drool off your chin, you'll make a bad impression," Ryu remarked as he cracked his neck "And the job ain't done yet. Time to handle Stone Heart."

"Yeah." Cat Noir said as the pair leapt up to join Ladybug as Stone Heart stood up once more.

"You'll never take Mylene from me!" Stone Heart shouted as he started to climb up the Eiffel Tower "Come to me my stone beings!" With that order the copies began climbing as Ryu glanced over the side and blinked.

"Well we might have a problem," he remarked "I'm counting a half dozen on this side alone, and since fighting them will only make things worse I suggest that you come up with a clever plan."

"Well we know where the Akuma is." Ladybug noted.

"In his clenched fist, the one he's holding Mylene in. So..." he trailed off.

"So we know he's in love with her... That's it! We don't separate Stone Heart and Mylene, we bring them closer together! They're made for one another, they just don't know it yet." she gushed, as Ryu tilted his head to the side to show his utter confusion.

"Uh... I'm not really following you, but guess I better trust you. Something tells me this is how it's going to be from here on out," Cat Noir noted.

"A wise man knows when to follow a woman's lead." Ryu nodded sagely as the pair took off after Stone Heart "I'll give you all the time you need."

"Thanks Ryu! Ladybug called back to him.

"I think it's time for some order!" Ryu shouted as he spun his sword around and slammed the tip into the ground "LAW! None of the duplicate Stone Hearts will be able to move!"

With a wave of scarlet fire each copy of Stone Heart suddenly found themselves stuck in place as Ryu moved to follow after the pair, knowing that the countdown on his transformation had already started. Standing on the side below the climbing stone behemoth he watched as the two rookies reached the top and Ladybug implemented her plan, using her own super power Lucky Charm. From his angle he wasn't able to see what she had received from the power but knew that it would be useful. Tilting his head he watched as she used her yoyo to wrap around Stone Heart's body and fist, drawing it in and then making Mylene kiss the giant, causing him to release her in shock as well as the Akuma. Nodding he watched as Cat Noir leapt off after the Akuma using his staff to knock it back up to Ladybug where she would use her powers to destroy it, though Ryu was ready to move to save the two civilians as he wasn't sure if her plan was all the way thought out.

His concerns were only half correct as while she hadn't planned it all out, her Lucky Charm had, giving her the parachute to save Mylene while Cat Noir used his power to help him save the returned to normal Ivan. With a grin he decided to show off one more trick as held up his hands, letting two fingers on each hand create the shape of a plus.

"Dragon Shadow Smoke!" he called out as copies of him appeared around him, each moving to one of the transformed civilians as they returned back to normal, grabbing them and taking them safely back to the ground.

Standing off to the side Ryu could only smile under the mask as he watched Ladybug play matchmaker once the chaos had died down, memories flickering past him in a wave that brought to many conflicting emotions. Before he could even attempt to make heads or tails of it all he heard the alarm going off, warning him that he was going to be changing back to his normal self soon. With a nod to the two young heroes he ran off, flickering from sight like a mirage as he managed to get a half dozen blocks away before he was back to normal, a sigh escaping his lips as he felt the super human strength leave his limbs.

"I'm hungry." Ignis complained.

"I know. Let's get lunch." he agreed as he walked off to find somewhere to get some food.

"I received an interesting phone call today." Master Fu remarked that evening as they sat down to dinner.

"Oh, new client?" he asked.

"That you are attending College Francoise Dupont," the old man said with a grin.

"It's not like that," he sighed.

"Is it not though?"

"It's just to keep an eye on those two. Today was a close call that could have ended badly,"

"Perhaps. But they did handle themselves well, and learned from their mistakes." Master Fu countered.

"It's pointless to try and argue with you." he sighed.

"That is because you know that Master Fu is correct." Wayzz, Master Fu's Kawami replied with a grin.

"He's just being stubborn." Ignis snorted "It's what makes him such a good hero."

"Ignis don't talk about me like I'm not even here."

"So when do you start?" Master Fu asked.

"Monday."

"I see. Well we will go and get all of your school supplies tomorrow then. Do try and make some friends your own age."

He was quite a moment before he spoke "Which one?"

The days passed quickly enough when he walked into the school, backpack hanging from his shoulder as he walked into Ms. Bustier's class.

"Alright class, we have a student starting a little late this year. So give a warm welcome to Naruto Uzumaki." she said.

Smiling lightly Naruto ran a hand through his blond hair and nodded the the class.