Hello there my lovelies, FiddlerTheClown is here once again to deliver a message concerning this 'story' I happen to find myself writing. First of all however I would like to recommend two fanfictions. First of all; New World Blues by Doppelganger312 (probably one of my favorite fanfictions of all time, ever) and A Beacon in the Night by a close, personal friend of mine Kaeni.(He's actually won writing awards so he's more than qualified.)

Anyway, after a few months of writing I have enjoyed myself immensely, your support has inspired me to try harder than I would usually be required to do so. Not because of the pressure inflicted upon me by the teachers, parents, friends et cetera et cetera that plague my day to day existence but because I actually want to post another chapter to appease you.

You could almost call it greed, in some form or another I work harder just so I can receive praise from the few people who read this story. I don't receive money or any kind of actual reward for doing this but, and it does not happen often, I am filled with pride for something I have created (even if it does happen to be the bastardised version of an actual published story)

And so, to cut to the chase, after a few weeks of reading and rereading and rereading again the few chapters I have written I have come to a conclusion. It's absolute shit. I am going to rewrite this story properly, so that you can enjoy a thought out story and not some random ideas which transferred from my head to the laptop that was full of potholes and inconsistencies. Thank you and as usual feel free to leave any questions in the review section and/or pm me. Onto Chapter 1! (again)

The silence was palpable, like a blanket had been thrown over the room. It was broken occasionally by the sound of metal scraping against metal, the horrible sound screeching against the ears of the room's occupants.

It emanated from on the corners, coincidently the only part of the room which wasn't lightened by the pale luminescent bulbs dangling from the ceiling. It seemed as though even the light itself shied away from the menace which happened to stir in that patch of darkness.

It was the tell-tale noise of a knife being sharpened, they knew that, but in the world of a shinobi where kunai were as cheap as dirt it was rare for someone to keep one knife, let alone use it continuously to the point where it was required to sharpen it, and it unnerved them; but they were professionals, the best, the ANBU. They could face the devil himself without so much as a twitch, they would be able to put up with it. Well most of them were, there were a few recruits present and for them the scraping couldn't have been louder. But they continued to check their equipment, strapping down swords of various kinds and loading various shuriken and kunai into the pouches hanging just under the long dark cloaks that adorned them.

An eternity was seemingly fit into those ten long, drawn out minutes as the mysterious figure kept scraping his knife and the ANBU kept loading various items. But even eternity must come to an end at some point in time. That point in time had seemingly been brought forth upon them, its arrival heralded by the appearance of another masked, black-robed figure; entirely indistinguishable from the others but they were seemingly aware of the difference albeit from the slightly different patterns that adorned his mask or even from the very way in which he carried himself.

The trade-mark rustling of leaves, a common variation of the shunshin, was the only sign that he had even arrived in the room at all. If it was possible the tense atmosphere, created from the dark silhouette in the corner, increased tenfold. This new figure demanded respect and respect it would receive, though respect born from fear or respect created from respect itself was not known to them.

"The orders came in; we've got the green light. This is your initiation ladies and lethal force is more than recommended." The grin was almost visible through his mask, the bloodlust was oozing from his voice. "Just don't let me see any of you chickening out. Or you'll wish the enemy had captured you by the time I'm through with you."

Yep, definitely respect born from fear.

They moved quick, blending in with the shadows as they went. No one knew they were there and if it went as planned nobody would know they had ever been.

The apparent leader was at the front, the rest of them were littered around behind in a seemingly unconnected pattern save for the lone figure trailing behind them. But they were all travelling equally fast, a synchronised contingent moving rapidly forward.

Under the pale moonlight the darkness still seemed to cling to the man but it was beaten off enough to catch fleeting glimpses of the frayed, black and white coat tails hanging limply around his ankles and the occasional glimpse of long, limp hair being swayed by the wind.

Although he trailed behind the rest it was not from a lack of speed, far from it. The reason was as unknown to the rest of the squad as it was unknown to him, for reasons he couldn't care to remember his brain had somehow convinced his body that remaining slightly behind the group was a good idea. He hadn't been in the mood to have another argument with his brain so he had rolled with it.

They had been travelling for a while when they slowed down, grinding to a stop. Which is never really a good sign, especially when you notice your commander looking around at something that you can't see. This was the thought flitting through the heads of most of the recruits as they looked around, desperately trying to see whatever it was that had caused them to stop in the first place, almost selfishly looking for something to ease their tension.

But their nervousness was well founded, it seemed as though the group they had been tracking had found them first.

"Scatter"

It was almost a whisper carried through the clearing but for the squad of veterans it could not have been louder and so, as is usual when commanded, they obeyed. They darted away into the surrounding vegetation while they had the chance, not waiting to question their leader as to why he had uttered it in the first place.

As for the recruits that either hadn't heard him or had remained to question his orders, well, there death was quick if that's any consolation. They had barely even had the chance to register surprise before their skin had shrunk and blistered before cracking entirely, an understandable consequence when the human body is presented with heat in excess of a thousand degrees.

But that had been a mistake, a miscalculation so to speak on behalf of the fire spewing shinobi to actually fire off his jutsu (mind the pun) so early into the fight. A mistake he would pay for with his life and the remaining ANBU were not going to be cheated out of a free kill after such a brass display stupidity,

He collapsed almost instantly, numerous shuriken and kunai alike jutting out of his body as he pitched forward off the branch he had been balanced on.

As his body hit the forest floor a switch was seemingly flicked as shinobi from either side erupted out of the undergrowth, chaos ensued as small battles burst into life. Each man dancing his elegant dance of death to an imaginary tune, each step placed to an imaginary beat, each swing swung to a different tempo. And death feasted on those whose dance was inadequate, his sharp teeth digging into any and all who were bested, his great stomach consuming all but the best.

It continued, quite contradictory to earlier, as the long period of time was gobbled up and compressed by the natural wonder of adrenaline. The battles which should have spanned decades, such was their might, were squished into the blink of an eye. And as was taught to them by their sensei's and their sensei's before them they swiftly moved onto the next opponent after the previous one was dispatched. Not a tear was shed for the cold unmoving corpses, hidden beneath the muck. No guilt was felt for the possible orphans or widows they left behind in their wake, they had been taught by violence and so violence was all they knew.

The original squadron of ten ANBU had been diminished to a much smaller group of four, admittedly it had been an initiation of sorts for the new recruits but, alas, the small complication of their untimely ambush had ridden the small remainder of all but one of them. It was not that they were unskilled; they were of a much higher calibre than the opposing forces but it was a matter of brawn over brain. They were heavily outnumbered and even the ANBU had limits.

The battle continued.

Three out of the remaining four were bunched together, their backs facing each other as they stood in the middle of a clearing they had somehow found themselves stranded in. The clearing was littered with bodies as the enemy kept falling to the well-timed swings of the squad, but the flow was never stemmed as more and more and more poured out like cockroaches from beneath the woodwork.

Regardless they kept swinging, continuing to relentlessly cut them down. If they wished for death so fruitlessly was it not kind of the ANBU to give to them what they apparently longed for?

But they were tiring and as was taught to them; if your sword can cut down your foe then why waste chakra? And the option of close-quarters combat was seemingly slipping out of their grasp as their tired muscles started to protest.

Pretty soon they would have to start dipping into the chakra stored below their skin and soon after that they would be too exhausted to move let alone fight the apparent army that was expected of them. At that point the battle would be lost, they knew it and so did whoever was behind the attack.

But they continued to fight, running wasn't option and they had been robbed of any and all other possibilities by the brash decision of their captain to face the horde. What choice did they have

Death had come, it had not struck but it was as if it could sense the events that were about to happen. It was seemingly not as present while the cannon-fodder was being slaughtered, that was just for starters but now... now it was ready for the main course. It was waiting just out of sight, it clung to them like a disease; they were marked for death and they knew it.

One more had fallen leaving only the captain and his subordinate, Neko, left in the clearing. They were now out of chakra, out of shuriken but most importantly they were out of time.

As the enemy closed in around them the captain, still hungry for flesh, had resorted to ripping out the jugular of his opponents with his teeth alone. His arms may have been broken but his jaw still worked. Nasty and brutal, now that was deadly combination.

Neko, on the other hand, had resorted to a much more feral style of combat compared to the previous elegance that had flowed before her sword had been cast away. She had wedged the broken tips of kunai between her fingers and had entered a pseudo-boxing stance, every punch spraying blood and flesh; ripping chunks out of any unlucky soul stupid enough to get to close to her.

But it seemed it was not enough. One of the actual shinobi waiting at the back saw an opening, an opening he was more than obliged to exploit.

"Fire Style: Great Fireball" he exclaimed. His lungs expanded rapidly as the fire nature chakra mixed rapidly with the carbon dioxide and oxygen being sucked in. His body separating the oxygen and quickly creating a spark, small enough to avoid damaging the body but at the same time potent enough to create a flame fuelled by the oxygen. Adding liberal amounts of chakra and at the same time breathing out he channelled the flame out from his lungs.

All of this translated into the fireball being rapidly expelled from his mouth, well... it would have been if not for the small problem of his face no longer being attached to his head. A small inconvenience for a shinobi, right?

It seems that this particular shinobi had left his med-kit at home that day because, let's be honest, judging from the fact that his brain was splattered all over the floor he wasn't going to be getting up any time soon. Unless Jesus paid him a visit, he can cure the dead can't he? I can't remember. Didn't he turn water into wine or something? Oh shit, back to the story.

It seemed like the third remaining survivor had decided to drop by.

It wasn't quiet and yet it wasn't being exclaimed either. A dry, raspy monotone would be the best way to describe it as it echoed throughout the clearing.

"Please my children, patience. There's enough death to go around, if you would be so kind as to form an orderly line then I would be more than happy to stamp your faculty identification cards. Now ...who wants the STUDENT DISCOUNT!?"

It was an odd thing, the words themselves were not frightening in the slightest, they could almost be described as unintelligible gibberish. But it was more of a primal terror as it rose to a crescendo like a great wave crashing into the mob, rolling among them, spreading fear and confusion. As they frantically looked around, trying to find the source of the voice it continued to speak, seemingly unaware of the panic he had caused. "Oh? You're all volunteering? How excellent."

"RAZOR STYLE: DEATH OF THE FOREST"

This time there was no question whether he had said it or not, it was a guttural cry pledging untold pain and misery.

And pain and misery it brought.

The table shook, struggling in vain to keep its internal structure secure. I tell you, the poor tables have it hard these days.

But it lost its fight to remain in one piece as it splintered, crushed by the hands of a furious Tsunade; not a pleasant way to go.

"What the hell is this?!"

The ANBU captain stood stoically, his hands clasped behind his back. "That is the mission report from ANBU operation 1352 stamped and checked by your secretary." He replied.

"Look, we've been through this already. You know what the piece of paper in your hand is and what it entails. I know you've read it and you may not want to believe it but what you believe isn't really of my concern. I may not be the most controlled of ANBU captains but we both know that my record is spotless; I would not lie to the hokage." He continued, sick and tired of her sustained disbelief.

But the poor women still couldn't believe it. She beckoned him over as she started to drag her eyes over the report once again.

"Explain one more time what happened, in your own words."

"Permission to speak freely?"

"Granted"

"We had been tracking this group from Oto and when we finally managed to track them down they had already called for reinforcements. We were ambushed and lost three recruits in the initial attack..." he was interrupted by Tsunade impatiently waving her hand at him.

"Yes, yes I know all that skip to where just you and Neko were left" she replied with a blood vessel practically popping from her forehead, she knew he was just being an asshole on purpose.

"Make your mind up ma'am, I'm quite busy actually." It didn't take an idiot to sense the smugness oozing from his voice.

This time he actually did cower in fear as she raised her fist at him, he was no stranger to the screams of pain from the ever gallant 'Toad Sage' being flung through a wall at mach 3.

"Fine, fine. As I was saying Neko and I were stuck in the clearing as the rest of the squad had been declared KIA, except for Edgar obviously. Anyway, we were both unarmed and our chakra reserves were pretty much depleted when this cold, raspy voice rang out through the clearing saying... well I can't remember exactly what he said and I know it didn't make any fucking sense but it was fucking terrifying. I think it's written down in the report anyway." He paused, looking over at her for confirmation that he had actually written it down properly. She skimmed through the paper briefly before giving him a nod, not that reading it again actually assisted her in making any sense of it.

"So he shouts out the name of a technique; Razor Style: Death of the Forest or something?" once again he looked over to see Tsunade nodding her head. But once again neither of them had any idea what it was, they couldn't place the name.

"And just like that..." he snapped his fingers "about forty trained mercenaries dead in less than a second, I haven't seen anything like that since the Yondaime."

Tsunade interrupted quickly "You weren't very specific in your report, could you describe the technique?"

"Yeah, no problem, I'm not gonna forget it any time soon. As soon as he said, no, screamed out the name hundreds of shallow cuts formed in the ground; ripping out chunks of grass. They appeared to be wires coming out of the soil before all I could see was red, I quickly realised that it was blood. After I wiped my eyes clean... how do I describe it? It was like the thickest bamboo forest you could imagine except instead of bamboo there were hundreds of wires standing rigid, and speared on the wires were the bodies of the forty men, almost all of them missing body-parts. Legs, arms and even a few heads were equally sliced up, hanging alongside the corpses. The grass was literally painted red." He paused, almost as if he was recollecting his memories.

"He hopped down from a nearby branch, landing nimbly on the ground. He walked over to where Neko was heaving here guts out and rubbed her back softly while also laughing hysterically; it was unnerving to say the least. After congratulating him on a job well done I remembered that I hadn't seen him during the rest of the skirmish that had taken place after the ambush, after questioning him on it he gestured for me to follow him while Neko stayed behind to set up camp for the night. He took me to the part of the forest where we had first been ambushed and shown me that there had actually been Oto camp not 50 feet away."

Tsunade interrupted him once again. "Are you telling me that you faced an ambush head on even though there was an unidentified camp so close to your position? They could have easily been hostile and in this case they were!"

"I admit that it might have been a slight lapse of concentration" he let out a sigh at the derisive snort she sent his way "Fine, I fucked up. Anyway he showed me the camp... well, what was left of it. The whole place had been burned to the ground and there were at least 20 Oto shinobi and even 10 hostages crucified from trees, strung up with wire. The rest were all thrown in a pile down by the river, it appeared as though the blood had been sucked out of them, their skin was grey and wrinkled and they looked far older than they should have. You know the rest from there, we burnt the bodies, camped the night and then arrived back here at dawn."

Tsunade leaned back in her chair as she dropped the report back onto the table, it just didn't make any sense. "What was the name of the ANBU again?"

"I remember he called himself 'Edgar' and his mask resembled that of a cow's hide. I'm pretty sure he had also managed to find a tin of white paint and had applied the same cow like design to his ANBU cloak as well. I recall finding him, in the morning, in a hole he must have dug himself making cow noises. He was one of the recruits, surprisingly enough but really? A fucking cow?"

Tsunade wanted an opinion on this and although she didn't like it she knew she had to tell him. "Listen up, what I'm about to tell you has been declared an S rank village secret."

He stood a little straighter, S rank secret's were no joke and quite frankly he didn't feel like being executed.

"The identity of ANBU operative 489, codename 'Edgar' is our native Jinchuriki; Naruto Uzumaki."

The ANBU captain's posture slackened as his hands dropped to his sides in shock. "I'm sorry but what?! You're saying possibly the worst shinobi I've ever seen who probably couldn't even throw a kunai straight is probably one of the most promising ANBU recruits since Itachi?! How the hell did that happen?" he demanded.

Tsunade just put her hands to her face and let out a long, tired sigh. "I don't know, I really don't. Jiriya and I thought it would be a good idea to see how much he had improved during their training trip, so I decided sending him out as an ANBU recruit would be a good idea. But I couldn't ever have expected this would be the outcome. I've already talked about this with Jiriya and I know for a fact that Naruto couldn't possibly have possessed the skills which he demonstrated."

The ABNU commander couldn't come up with any viable possibility as to how this had happened, he tried none the less. "He's the jinchuriki of the Kyuubi isn't he?" he said, almost to himself. He looked up however when he heard Tsunade snapping her fingers.

"That idiot Jiriya said something about loosening the seal early into the trip, maybe the Kyuubi is starting to take control."

"I think you might be correct, in his mission report all that was written was 'I don't remember' that ties in with your idea. What are you going to do? Will you confront him?"

"No, I don't want him to panic. I'll send him and Jiriya off again, maybe he can fix the seal. Dismissed"

The ANBU nodded and disappeared from the office.

"But pervy-ssaaaaagggeeee we only just got back, why do we have to leave already?" called out possibly one of the most of irritating voices of all time whined out.

"Oh shut-up, we'll only be going for a few days. Besides if your quiet I'll teach you a super cool new jutsu." He feigned a smile at Naruto but he knew it wouldn't be a happy trip, if what Tsunade said was true than he'd have to confront the Kyuubi personally, which was not something he was looking forward to at all.

"Oh by the way Naruto, how was the ANBU recruitment mission we signed you up for?" he questioned, looking for any hints.

"Oh it was really cool!" he said, excited that he had been given the chance to go with the ANBU. But he looked down all of a sudden "Well I kinda got knocked out at the start of the fight, I don't actually remember anything."

Jiriya shook his head "Don't worry kid, it happens to the best of us." Inside he was going over what Tsunade had told him, so far she was right.

Regardless he continued on with his preparations for the trip as he sped through the hand-seals required for summoning.

"Kuchiyose-no-jutsu!"

The rune like symbols spread as a medium sized toad poofed into existence. Naruto looked down at the toad with a wave "Hey Gamakichi, how's it going?" Naruto asked happily.

Jiriya interrupted quickly "Don't worry about that Naruto, there'll be plenty of time for pleasantries where we're going. Gama reverse-summon us to Mt. Myuboku please."

"No problemo, oh by the way Naruto; your name kinda disappeared from our copy of the scroll of summoning, no biggie though I'm sure pops'll sort it out when we get there." Gamakichi said, his hands already moving towards the ground to begin the summoning.

Jiriya's eyes bulged comically for a second before he reached forward desperately trying to stop the toad, neither of them noticing Naruto's maniacal smile as Gamakichi's hands touched the floor and they all disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

Why was he so happy you might ask? Well let me tell you something, Mt. Myuboku is a pretty secluded place right? Well that's because the toads of old, back during the first Great Shinobi War when attack squads were sent out to target summoning grounds, decided that their heavily guarded mountain situated in the middle of nowhere wasn't safe enough and had carved seals into the base of the mountain. This prevented all but summoners and the summons themselves the permission to enter.

How did this affect Naruto? He was a summoner, wasn't he? Wrong. Unknown to the toads and Jiriya himself Naruto had terminated his contract. So know, as Gamakichi and Jiriya appeared on Mt. Myuboku relatively unharmed, aside from the severe mental strain that Jiriya was about to undergo. Naruto on the other hand was being thrown rapidly through space and time as he was deflected off of the seal barrier.

Who knew where he could end up? Well we do, and if you don't then I'm going to be severely disappointed in you, not angry; just disappointed.

Well there you have it, THE REWRITE OF DOOM BEGGINS! Seriously though, I did start this fanfic as joke and it was becoming hard to continue on the track I wanted to with the poor start I had given myself. So I will start again, this time no Naruto being ridiculously smart at 6 years old (What was I thinking? Thanks to icecold1039 for pointing it out) No stupid gimmicks like me throwing in characters from other series for no apparent reason. And I'm not just going to copy the cliché of Naruto being a teacher/student and copy and paste the cannon RBWY.

Also I'm going to scrap all pairings for now; I get the feeling that romance is going to be last on the agenda concerning this fic. I might have an idea for some sort of pairing later but it's an improbability based upon an uncertainty. (If you know where that comes from than you win the internet, no joke)

Thanks to all of those that have stuck with me this far and as always feel free to tell me what you think of the rewrite; good? bad? Want to gouge my eyes out with a rusty spoon while you scream at me for desecrating Masashi-kun's holiness? That's what the review section's for.

FiddlerTheClown, signing out.