A/N: The following characters have been replaced by Strife, Fury, War and Death: Naruto, Sasuke, Hinata and Kakashi. Since three of the most powerful clans aren't in this story, there won't be any bloodlines, therefore there I created three clans and each powerful in its own way. There are some changes in the personalities in some of the original characters of the Darksiders' universe, but it's for the greater good! :D Enjoy!
XXX
It was a beautiful day! This was what Strife Karat thought while standing on top of the Academy roof. Strife was a tall twelve-year old boy with black hair and yellow eyes, typical of the Karat clan. He was wearing his usual clothes: a blue T-shirt with the Karat insignia on the back along with white shorts and blue sandals. The Karat insignia on Strife's back was covered in yellow, and it consisted in a fist with two revolvers on each side, with flames involving the fist and, what it seemed for most of inhabitants of the village, dust falling of the revolvers. The Karat clan was famous for its excellency in accuracy with guns and strength in close-quarters. Each bullet fire was precise and each punch was capable of destroying huge rocks effortlessly. They were also known for excelling in fire and earth jutsus, developing their own jutsus in those affinity, many which needed the Karat blood to work. They were also known for solving conflicts quickly and not being able to tolerate many of peoples' personalities.
But damn, if it was a beautiful day! The birds were singing, it was warm and there were a few air breezes which maintained the balance of the climate, the children were playing and laughing in the playground, War was painting the Hokage monument with hentai figures in each Hokage, there were no clou- wait, whAT?! WAR WAS DOING WHAT?! Oh god, he is in big trouble! I could already see a few ANBU squads moving around! That idiot..
War was also a twelve-year boy with white spiky hair and white eyes and was born in the Zartag clan. He usually wore a white T-shirt with a red jacket with a few white stripes in the sleeves and the Zartag insignia in white. It consisted with a sword pointing upwards with flames involving the blade. The Zartags were known for being master swordsman and using the elements for enhancing the blade, usually fire, but sometimes air, for example, to increase its speed or power. They were the police force of the village, with them, the criminality decreased greatly because no one dared to go to jail with one less arm or leg! Despite that, they were friendly, funny and very nice and its children were known for being excellent prankers.
The bell of the Academy was ringing and it was time for classes.
XXX
In the classroom
'Lame boring classes, always teaching the same thing, anyone smart should know this by now' thought Strife. It was true though, Iruka-sensei was teaching the past of the Hokages for the fifth time and he didn't seem to stop there! Shikamaru was one that, like Strife, founded this too easy and only slept in the classes. Strife followed his example; he was already the top of his class, so why bother?
"Strife Karat, care to explain me why are you sleeping in my classes?" Iruka asked.
"Well, maybe because I already know this and anyone with the slight intelligence as well?! I don't know, maybe?" retorted Strife with a bit of sarcasm. A few of his classmates laughed, especially War, who almost fell from his chair. 'Note to self: ask Shikamaru for tips on how to sleep in class without getting caught'.
"Then please, since you already know this, tell me what did the first Hokage did in his prime!"
"Well, in a nutshell, the first Hokage was the one that founded the Hidden village of the Leaves and defended it against one of the most, if not the most, powerful men that ever existed, Absalom, that wanted to rule the world" declared Strife, without any bit of interest for the subject.
'Well, can't complain, it's only the fifth I'm revising this so I guess he's correct', "Good job, Strife" said Iruka "Now, War, can you please tell me how important was the second Hokage for the village?", as he finished his sentence, the bell rang and everybody started packing for the next class. War sighed, since he didn't know much of the subject. 'Lucky bastard!' everybody thought. This was the twenty-first time that happened to War! 21 times saved by the bell! I mean, how can this be even possible?!
XXX
In the playground
It was time for the Taijutsu class and Mizuki-sensei was finishing pairing the fights
After quite some time, there were only four students that haven't fought yet. The most interesting matches were Shino vs Kiba (Shino won), Shikamaru vs Chouji (Shikamaru won) and Sai vs Ino (Sai won, effortlessly)
Mizuki "Alright, next up is Fury Minz vs Sakura Haruno! May the following students please step up?"
"FINALLY, a chance to shut up that banshee!" said Fury while laughing.
"Oh you are SO gonna pay Fury!" retorted Sakura.
'Calling it already, Fury wins' thought Strife as he looked to Fury walking to the fighting zone. Fury was a beautiful and rather tall twelve-year old girl. She had pink long hair and a pair of pink eyes. People usually made fun of her because of her eyes, saying that were ugly, however, many boys actually wanted her to be their girlfriend just because of her perfect body. She was wearing her usual clothes: a pink dress without sleeves with a zipper in the middle and a white Minz insignia in the back, accompanied by black gloves, black shorts with a pink stripe in the back and a pair of black low-heel knee-high boots. The Minz insignia was a crescent moon with whips covering all the right side of the side (think how the sunrays are drawn in the sun when we were younger, except it's a crescent moon and it only covers the right side). The Minz clan was known for preferring whips as main weapon and for being beast tamers. They could basically tame any animal of the world. Never understood how, though... They're also very reasonable and kind and are experts in knowing how someone feels and to treat them. Speaking of treatment, some of its clan members prefer to be medic-ninjas and they're excellent in that area!
Fury was very different from the other girls, while the others were too busy being true fangirls and kept admiring Strife because he was most likely going to be rookie of the year and so strong and some other things, Fury actually wanted to be a kunoichi and trained hard for it, instead of going on a diet to try to impress Strife.
While Strife was thinking about Fury's clan, Fury was enjoying every punch she did on Sakura, and eventually, Sakura couldn't take anymore and fell tired in the floor
"Winner: Fury Minz! Next and last fight: Strife Karat vs War Zartag! May the last students please step up?" Strife was walking casually to the fighting zone while War was jumping with excitement 'What the hell is that idiot doing jumping?' wondered Strife. " Good, now please bow to each other and whenever you're both ready, begin."
After bowing, War just said "Ready to finally lose Strife Karat?" Strife just sighed.
"Begin!"
War rushed straight forward to Strife while preparing a punch. Strife just walked backwards. 'What is Strife doing? Is he afraid of that guy? No, It can't be…then why?' was all Fury thought while Strife was walking backwards. Since Fury was introduced to the classroom two years ago, she took a special interest in Strife, due to the fact that he wasn't like any of the other students. Unlike the others, Strife was actually very wise and always preferred to be alone than being in company of others. Also because Strife had those deep sad yellow eyes every time he was alone. She always wanted to get to know him better and understand him.
Anyway, while, basically everybody was thinking what Strife was doing, he finally stopped near the outline of the fighting zone with War still rushing at him like a psycho. It was War's chance to prove to the others that he wasn't just another deadlast and he finally threw his punch, being his target, Strife's head. Strife simply dodged the punch, grabbed his arm with his right hand and placed his left hand in his back and pushed War to the outside of the fighting zone.
"Winner: Strife Karat!"
The public, or to be precise, Strife's fangirls: "Way to go, Strife!"
War 'Dammit, that bastard' thought while laying down defeated and looking at the ground. In the next seconds, War saw Strife's hand grabbing his, trying to get War up. War accepted and both bowed each other and War smirked. "You're not that ice cold like some say, Strife, good to know!" War said this while smiling. Even though War was the deadlast and a jerk, he was one of the few people and didn't look at Strife with disgust and didn't see him as a monster, due to its past, and Strife respected that and looked at War like a potential friend. Strife smilled as well, after hearing War's words.
'Strife is, SMILING?! I've never seen that one before!' thought Fury.
"Alright, next up is target practice, this is simple guys, you just have to throw 4 shuriken and the 4 dummies you see there. You can throw however you like, since creativity it's one of the aspects of evaluation. Now, who wants to start first?" Mizuki asked. Strife raised his hand. "Alright, Strife, here's 4 shuriken."
Strife grabbed the four shuriken, three in the right hand and one in the left. He positioned himself in front of the first dummy with his back directed at the dummy. He placed his left hand in front of his body and simply threw the shuriken in his left hand. The shuriken nearly hit his ear ring and flew straight for the dummy's head. In the next instance, he threw the three shuriken with his right hand while spinning to the left. The first shuriken made contact with the second, making his trajectory changing to the 2nd dummy's head. Meanwhile, since the 2nd shuriken made contact with the first one, it also changed trajectory to the 3rd dummy's head. The fourth shuriken flew at greater speed and didn't make contact with the other two shurikens. In the end, the three thrown shuriken hit the last three dummy's heads at the same time.
The other classmates and even Mizuki were amazed and shocked on how good Strife's precision was. This wasn't the first he did something this good but they couldn't stop being amazed by him.
"Hell, Strife, that was amazing… *clears throat* ...I mean, good job, Strife, good creativity and good precision, if this were a test you would get 100%. (80 for hitting the dummies' head and 20 for creativity) Now, who's next?" asked Mizuki. It was no surprise that Mizuki was always like this when it was target practice and it was Strife practicing. After a while, Fury was in second place with 79 points and War, well, in last with 30 points.
XXX
Outside the Academy
The bell rang! The classes were finally over! Finally, Strife could go back to his compound so he could relax! As usual… but, this what Strife loved to do the most, enjoying being alone, looking at the sky and possibly hear some music in his cellphone.
When he was on his way back home, Strife heard some cries for help in the nearby woods. As curious he was, he went to see what was happening.
After side-stepping a few blocks, he saw Fury being surrounded by three drunk chunnin.
"It's useless little girl, we are in the middle of the bushes, no one is going to listen!" One of the chunnin said laughing. "Just let us have some fun!" Said another one while he was unzipping his pants.
'Holy shit! They're going to rape Fury?! I have to do something!' thought Strife, standing on of the branches. Strife usually didn't act like this, when someone called for help, usually was a villager or sometimes a shinobi, he didn't help the person, because they often see him as monster because of the rumors that have spread concerning his past a few years ago. But Fury was different, she was kind and he saw in her as a potential friend, since she didn't look at him with disgust and hatred but with confusion and kindness. And because she didn't act like a fangirl.
When Strife saw that one of the chunnins rushed to the girl preparing to give her a punch while shouting "STOP STRUGGLING!" he immediately jumped from the branch and went to save her from being raped.
Fury naturally was in state of shock and fear was the only thing that she felt. When the chunnin started running and prepared to give her a punch, she went on a basic defense stance and closed her eyes. She found odd. Wasn't she supposed to get punched? When she opened her eyes, she saw Strife, with his eyes closed, and holding the chunnin' fist tightly. The chunnin struggled to get loose of him. Strife simply opened his eyes. His eyes seemed different somehow.
"Hehe, the Ice-Cold Strife Karat is back! HAHA, I'LL BE SEEN AS A HERO TO THE VILLAGERS ONCE THEY KNOW THAT YOU WERE KILLED BY ME!" stated the chunnin that was on the back, the one that wasn't afraid.
Strife then moved his head slightly to his left, facing towards Fury, where his eyes met hers. She could see now in full detail how they were. A normal eye has a white cornea, an iris with various colors (yellow in Strife's case) and round black pupil. But not this time, Strife had a vertical black pupil, covered by a bright/pure yellow iris that glowed like the sun, followed by a dark yellow cornea. Fury, along with the chunnin that had his fist hold tightly in Strife's hand and another chunnin in the back, were terrified. She had never seen such eyes! They were full hatred, sadness and most important, mercilessness.
"Fury. Step aside. Please." Strife said calmly. Fury just nodded with her mouth open. She was lost in his eyes and couldn't do much, she walked slowly to a nearby tree and stayed behind it, never losing sight of either Strife or the three chunnins. Strife also was looking at her and until she was in a safe place, he then faced the other two chunnins.
"Don't worry boys! He's just all-talk! He only uses those eyes just to cause fear, he doesn't really have the guts to kill someone!"
"He doesn't seem that all-talk to me dude! I don't know… I might just quit, its late and I'm hungry…"
"NO! Till I get what I want, no one leaves this place without my permission! Now let's show him he's just a BRAT!" With that said, both of them rushed towards Strife from different directions.
When they were closed enough to Strife, he just twisted the wrist of the poor chunnin that had his hand hold tightly for all that time. He kneeled in pain. Strife jumped to his head with his left foot and jumped again with his right foot, this time, to the chunnin on the left. The chunnin tried to dodge his left kick grabbing it, only to get kicked in the face with his right foot, leaving the chunnin unconscious. The other chunnin was running with a kunai in his right hand while screaming die, he then tried to slash Strife's head. Strife ducked, grabbed the chunnin's arm and broke it, giving a strong palm in his elbow. Strife then moved the chunnin's back hit a pressure point in the column, making him fall to the ground unconscious and unable to move for a few hours.
Strife just backed off from the three chunnins' corpses and glared at them. "S-Strife?" It was Fury, who just came out of hiding and coming towards Strife slowly, still terrified from what just happened. "A-Are y-you o-okay?" Fury was closing distance between the two, still walking slowly. Strife faced her and just looked at those pink eyes. "S-Strife, w-what w-were those e-eyes of y-yours?" Strife place his right hand in his eyes, and as he was taking off his hand, dark dust was coming out of his eyes, making his eyes his normal yellow eyes. The dust flew with the air current. "Sorry, Fury, for what happened here. These eyes are a form of my bloodline, the Karat bloodline. They are usually manifested when I'm really angry and when I enter in combat mode with strong enemies. It basically lets me predict the enemies' movements and detect his weaknesses quickly"
"O-Oh, I-I s-see." Fury smirked. "So, you were angry at them because they were going to hurt me?"
"Something like that" said Strife.
"So you do like me" Fury smiled and Strife just rolled his eyes and sighed, and started moving towards his estate.
"Don't be ridiculous, I only saved you because you're different from the others." Strife knew Fury had a bit of sarcasm in her and she used it just to make some people laugh or to embarrass someone, but that was just too far in his opinion.
"What do you mean, Strife?"
"You're not like the others, you're different. You've seen how these three chunnins were looking at me, didn't you? They were looking at me with those eyes, full of hatred and disgust, just like the other villagers… you know what I'm talking about, you were stalking me a few weeks ago and you've noticed the looks I get from the villagers…" Fury blushed, she was so certain she was hidden, and it didn't even occur to her that he had spotted her. But Fury's blush wasn't only because of her "bad ninja skills" but because he let her stalk him! Anyway, Fury knew what he meant very well, after he explained of course. She knew what feeling to be hated was, due to the fact many of their classmates hated her and especially her eyes. But the hate Strife received was far more deep and greater. She just wanted to hug him and let him know that he could count on her.
"Well, see you tomorrow, Fury" said Strife while preparing to go back to his home.
"Yeah,… see you … hey, WAIT! I wanted to ask if… you… *sigh*" Aaaand, he was gone. She wanted to ask him if he wanted to have dinner with her family. She was sure her family would love to get him to visit them, besides, who wouldn't want to get to know who saved their precious little daughter, no matter who the person was?!
Moving along, she grabbed her backpack and started moving towards her estate.
XXX
In the Minz estate
"Dear, are you alright? We were worried! What happened? You missed dinner!" Larah Minz, being her mother, started hugging her daughter and shot questions after questions, followed by some comments…
"My dear, please, let our daughter breath! How can you expect her to answer if you're crushing her!" said William Minz. For Fury's sake, there was someone in that compound that understood her.
"It's alright Father, Mother was just being worried… I just had a rough day and just needed some air to calm me down. I don't want to eat though, thank you. May I go to my room, to get some rest?" Fury said. She was only this formal when she needed something urgent or some peace and quiet, which helped her anger issues a lot.
"Ãhm … sure, dear, if that's what you wish for!" Said the clan head.
"Thank you, Father", 'I need to tell War about this, surely he'll want to know about this!" Fury didn't have many friends and War Zartag was the best friend she had. He understood her and was there to defend her when she was in trouble with the other boys and some girls.
When Fury entered her room, placed her backpack in the hanger on the wall and picked up her phone and called War.
"Hey, War, you're not going to believe in what just happened to me while I was returning back home!"
"Why? What happened?"
Fury went through the process of explaining everything since the bell from the Academy rang, to the cross over the three drunk chunnins that led her to the forest to rape her…
"THEY DID WHAT?! THEY DIDN'T SUCCEED, DID THEY?!" War intervened her the moment he heard rape. Many of the boys of their classroom actually thought of 'having some fun' with Fury, because of her incredibly beautiful body, only to get smacked in the head by War. Matters concerning Fury were extremely delicate with War, everybody knew of his overprotectiveness of Fury, and he affirmed that he viewed as her sister , due to the fact of both the Zartag and the Minz clans were close allies and War's life was pretty similar to Fury's one so they both understood each other very well.
"Wait, I haven told the best part yet!"
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN BEST PART?!"
"Just LISTEN, GODAMMIT!" Okay, not that well I guess…
Fury explained what were the chunnins' plans involving her, one of them wanted to give her a punch to make her struggle less when performing the 'fun' part. She closed her eyes and when she opened once more, wondering why nothing had happened. But when Fury said that Strife Karat was defended her holding one of the rapers' fist, War just stopped the story again…
"Wait wait wait wait wait wait… repeat that part again Fury, please."
"Ahm, Strife showed up to help me by holding one of the rapers' fist?"
"STRIFE?! By Strife, you mean the Strife Karat?! The infamous Ice-Cold Strife?! Well, after today's fight with him, he didn't seem that ice-colded to me but I still don't believe it!"
"I know right! He even SMILED to you after that!"
"Oh yeah, I almost forgot that!"
"I could believe myself that Strife was actually HELPING me! Anyway, one of the chunnin said that…" Fury then explained that he was going to be a hero after killing Strife and after he told her to move to a safe place. She explained in detail that his eyes changed and how amazing he was fighting to protect her.
"WOW! He already managed to get to the second phase of his bloodline limit, and at such young age! He's incredible!" War was in awe after hearing that.
"Wait, you know about his bloodline limit?"
"Well, yeah, his clan and ours are the only ones with bloodline limits in this village! You and I also have the power to change our eyes! It consists in three phases. Most of the members of the three clans usually hit the second phase when they turn eighteen. It consists in the change of color of the cornea. The activation of the second phase makes the user have unique abilities that vary from each clan. The activation of the second phase of the Karat' eyes have the ability to predict the enemies' movements and detect his weaknesses very fast. From the Zartag clan, my clan, it enables the user to easily manipulate the primary affinity of the user and use it at our own will, especially with our own swords, which makes them more powerful! I want to activate the second phase so bad, hehe! Moving right along, your clan ability is to summon any animal that you've encountered before in your life. That is so cool! Imagine yourself summoning an awesome beast that can slaughter everything at your own will!"
"You're a jerk, why would I want to 'slaughter everything'? But, yeah, that's pretty cool! I can't believe you know so much about this subject!" Fury was in shocked, war has been the deadlast his entire life and he actually knew something that Fury didn't!
"Well… I'm actually reading from a book that was in my secretary…" Fury just laughed. That explained everything.
"Wait, you said three eye phases, what about the third one?"
"Hmm, wait, let me check, ahm, it says here that only our ancestors activated it and there isn't much information about it… That's a pity!"
"No fair! I was getting so interested!" said Fury, acting like a little kid. War actually loved that attitude of hers, it made him feel like a big brother.
"Yeah… Hey, Fury, do you think there's a chance that we could become friends with Strife?" asked War.
"Hmm… From my experiences with him, he seems to like us, because we are 'different from the others'…"
"What do you mean, different?"
"That's what I asked him in the forest, he told me that we don't look at him the way the other villagers and some ninjas look. They look at Strife with eyes full of hatred and disgust and only see him as a monster, an ice-cold killing machine."
"Hmm… so that's why he smiled at me earlier… that explains it!" War deduced. Fury agreed. It was the reason Strife was so friendly around War and why he saved her earlier. War started giggling. "Hey, what's wrong? Why are you giggling?" asked Fury.
"Oh it's nothing!"
"Tell me!"
"You sounded earlier like you wanted to have some more experiences with him… good experiences" Fury blushed.
"Oh, SHUT UP! I'm going to sleep! I'm too tired to hear your jokes!" War sounded like he was having an attack of laughter and didn't show any signs of stopping. She turned off her phone and started dressing her pyjama and went to bed. She always had her curtains open, so she could see the moonlight. 'Have some more experiences with Strife… that does sound like a good idea! I wouldn't mind see his well-toned body for once!' She closed her eyes. Fury stated imagining some pictures of Strife without his T-shirt. A small nose-bleed came out. She then slept.
XXX
Still in the Minz estate
'Shit shit shit shit shit! I'm going to be late!' It was already 07:45 and she usually takes half an hour to arrive school.
"Here's the breakfast, my dear! Start running!"
"Thanks Mother!" she grabbed the toast in her mouth and the liquid yogurt in her left hand while closing the clan's door with the right hand. She started running like there was no tomorrow! Halfway to the school, she found War also running while eating a toast.
"Late as well?"
"Yeah! This is the third time! I can't be late anymore, if not, I fail this year because of my tardiness" said War while taking another bite of the toast. Fury punched in his shoulder, making War choke and spitting out some rests of toast. "What was that for?!" asked War.
"That one was for last night's joke!"
"Oh, yeah, that one, I am sorry, I just couldn't resist! It was too good to pass! I did say it was nothing before you started imploring for what I was laughing" said War, trying to excuse himself.
"Oh, shut up you! You know I am too curious! That was unfair!" War knew this very well and he loved the way Fury started begging to know the answer.
"But seriously now, you do have a crush on Strife, don't you?" War asked, this time without any intent of joking. War acted like this when concerning that matter with Fury.
Fury widened her eyes and looked at the ground "…yeah…"
"Hmm, its okay Fury, I won't stay in the middle of you two if you are going to be a thing, which I doubt. From the way you describe how he saved you from losing your virginity, he earned my respect!" said War, acting like a father. Fury giggled and picked up her pace.
After quite a while, they finally reached the school, quickly entered the classroom. Every student was already in their seats and Iruka just said "You both reached in the 5 minutes of tolerance, you won't get any fault but next time there won't be any tolerance!"
War immediately started talking "I'm sorry Iruka-sensei, it won't happen again, we promise!" Iruka just nodded and pointed to their seats, which both deduced to sit or else. War then said "Hey Strife! How are you!" immediately Fury said "Hello Strife!"
Their classmates started looking at them. Why would someone say hello to him. They would get ignored like everybody else, this what every single student wondered, only to hear from Strife "I am fine, thanks guys, hello to you two"
Everybody, except Fury and War, were shocked. Sakura, Strife's number one fangirl, thought "WHAAAAAAAT?! DID HE, MY BELOVED STRIFE KARAT, JUST SAY HELLO TO THAT JERK AND THAT BITCH?!" War and Fury just sat in her places while a still shocked Iruka was preparing his class.
Strife just smiled "They're really something else. I won't be surprised if we actually end up being friends!"
"Now listen up class, tomorrow is the Genin's exam and I'll be here to do some revision and ask some of your doubts!"
Strife smirked "Finally I am getting out of here!"