Here comes chapter 2, and with it, the entry into the books timeline. Hope you'll forgive me the cliffy, I wanted Harry's first experience with magic to be in the next chapter.
Chapter 2
Almost a year had passed since Harry had started training in the shinobi arts, and thanks to his greatly improved diet and physical exercise, his abilities had grown significantly.
Over the year, he had mastered one more genjutsu that put a single person to sleep, as a precursor to the more advanced Temple of Nirvana illusion that affected a much wider range. Of course, it would be a while before he could try that one, as it was classed as an A-rank illusion.
Other than that, his other great accomplishment was the mastery of the replacement technique, and he could now switch with random objects to escape attack without slamming into things.
That skill coupled with chakra bursts to his legs meant that Harry Hunting was a thing of the past. Even when the bullies had managed to corner him in areas where he could not run away, like in school, Harry demonstrated an incredible ability to dodge, having worked extensively on his flexibility.
However, as his birthday came up, he decided to add a more advanced technique to his repertoire, and start branching out into ninjutsu as well.
Since offensive jutsu of any type would draw too much unwanted attention, he decided to start working on the Shadow Clone technique, which formed solid bodies of the user. They were not very durable, since a single solid hit would dispel them, but their advantage lay in the fact that when dispelled, everything the clone learned would return to the creator.
This had drawbacks, of course, since not only was there a risk of mental overload if you absorbed too much at once, but with the memories, you also received an impression of the clone's condition. That meant that if the clone was fatigued, that fatigue would affect you as well.
It took him a full day to figure out how the technique formed the chakra before he felt it safe to do so. Unlike the main character of Naruto, he didn't feel like he had chakra to burn, so he controlled its use very carefully, having added the water walking exercise to his training regime a few months ago.
The air next to him shimmered and from it, formed a second Harry. "It worked." He grinned widely.
"Of course it did. Did you expect to fail?" The clone replied.
"Well, I didn't use up too much chakra, so I can clearly make more." Harry mused.
"So, what should I do now, boss?" The clone asked.
"Well, it's a good thing it rained yesterday. You can work on water walking for a few hours. The puddle's not much, but it's not like we have access to a river or even a pool." Harry sighed, staring at the large puddle where he was forced to train his water walking skill.
"Sure thing, boss." The clone Harry saluted and walked to the puddle, stepping on top of the water like it was solid ground.
At the moment, Harry's limit was five clones. Any more then that, and his body started to feel the strain, and he also took great care to dispel them in five minute intervals to prevent any harm to himself.
Now that he had clones to cover reading and any chakra training, he had more times to focus on his physical development, and he was determined to get into peak shape by the end of the summer.
Sometimes, he wondered what it would be like if he could talk to anyone that wasn't a clone of himself, but, with the rumors that his relatives spread, telling everyone that he was deranged and dangerous, and with his cousin and his gang bullying everyone that even walked too close to him, it wasn't going to happen anytime soon.
The next thing that came to mind was to try a different type of clone. From the books he had purchased, he got knowledge of two more clone types, the Water clone and the Earth or mud clone.
His first attempt was with the water clone, but to his surprise, trying to form one cost him just as much chakra as a Shadow Clone. While this was a drawback, it told him that his chakra wasn't water natured.
In contrast, Earth clones took only a tenth of the power he needed to form Shadow clones. Earth clones didn't return the memories to the caster when dispelled, but having been made of such a durable material meant that they were also very tough. In fact, it usually took a killing blow to dispel them, so Harry quickly started using them for spars.
True, their skills were no better then his, but with the ability to put what he read about martial arts in practice, he was making slow, but steady progress with his unarmed combat.
Happy that earth type ninjutsu were easy for him to perform, which was a clear sign of earth natured chakra, he started practicing one more ninjutsu called the Headhunter technique, which allowed you to move beneath the earth and trap your opponent by pulling him down into the ground.
When performed correctly, only the victim's head remained above ground, hence the name of the technique.
When he summed his total skill in the three main shinobi branches, namely taijutsu, ninjutsu and genjutsu, along with all other subjects he had been reading on, like survival, trap making and weapons handling, he could without any bragging call himself a rookie gennin, which was a significant accomplishment, since only a handful of ninja in the Naruto world became gennin at such a young age.
"Stupid human, making noise and breaking my nap. I should bite him, I should." Harry heard a faint voice while he was weeding the garden. There weren't a lot of chores he did around the house nowadays thanks to genjutsu, but he still did a lot of cooking and most of the yard work. The first, because he enjoyed it, and the second for the exercise it provided.
"Who said that?" Harry looked around, moving carefully around the yard.
"Just a little closer, human, and your ankle is mine." He heard the voice again, and this time, turned his eyes downwards, and noticed a garden snake eying his foot, coiled and ready to strike.
"You don't want to bite me." Harry said, more to himself, and was surprised when the snake unwound and raised its head so it could see him better.
"You can speak the serpent tongue." Its voice was full of surprise and awe.
"I do?" Harry blinked at this unexpected revelation.
"You can speak to me, can't you? My mother told me stories of humans who had the power to talk to serpents. I never thought I'd met one." The snake seemed pleased about that fact.
"So, what do I get out of this ability?" Harry asked.
"Snakes will not attack you if you speak with them, and will obey your orders unless it puts them in danger, or they are under the command of another speaker." The snake replied.
"Alright. One last question. Do you know if there's something like a contract with certain snakes or similar?" Harry got a sudden idea, and felt it wouldn't hurt to ask.
"I don't know, but I'll ask around and come back in three days." The snake replied.
"Thanks. I'll give you a mouse when you come back." Harry grinned when the snake's eyes lit up and it slithered away, singing an off-key song about mice.
While waiting for the snake's return, Harry went to read more details about the snake summoners in Naruto and their most used techniques. While the bulk of them required the signing of the snake contract or were too advanced, there was one thing that he could learn.
The Kanashibari or paralysis technique was a genjutsu variant that used projected killing intent to freeze your opponent in place for a few moments, allowing the user to launch a follow up strike against their opponent.
The problem was he had no real experience with producing killing intent, so it took him the full three days to master this technique, practicing mostly on the few cats and dogs he ran across.
"Where's my mouse?" He heard the snake speak from next to him as he was pruning a rose bush.
"Right here." He went to the tool shed and pulled a small mouse from an old toolbox. The snake swallowed it quickly and sighed contently.
"Did you find anything?"
"Yes. I asked around, and found that a contract exists. Once I learned that, I sent word to the contract guardian and he said that he would come to meet with you in a week." The snake replied.
"Why in a week?" Harry was surprised at the long delay.
"He said it would take him that long to come here from the Amazon, wherever that is." The snake gave him the equivalent of a shrug.
"That's on the other side of the world. How can you speak with someone that far?" Harry gasped in shock. How had the snake managed to speak with another snake across the world?
"I don't know, really. I just do it." The snake shrugged again.
"So, where should I meet this guardian?" Harry asked.
"I told him where you spend most of your time. He will meet you there." The snake replied.
He was a bit surprised that the snake knew where he trained, but then again, he was keeping an eye out for humans, not snakes that could hide in the thick hedge, the many bushes or even the tall grass in the area.
The week passed in a frenzy of training as Harry worked hard to refine his mastery of everything he had learned and also expand his chakra pool.
"So, you are the one that seeks the contract." Harry looked up and let out a surprised gasp.
Above him, curled around a branch of the oak tree was a twelve foot long snake with rainbow like scales and two long feathery wings that sprouted from just behind its head.
"That is correct, honored guardian." Harry spoke in the most respectful tone he could muster.
"You are a most interesting human, hatchling. So young, yet I sense great power in you. Becoming our summoner is a privilege, young hatchling, and one that the spirits can revoke at will, should you become unworthy of the contract we have formed with you." The coatl spoke in a lazy, almost bored tone.
"I will strive not to disappoint the spirits of the serpents." Harry replied firmly.
"A good answer. Very well, hatchling. I will grant you the contract." With that, the coatl slithered down to the ground, where it unhinged its jaw and spat out a long rolled up scroll made of something that felt like snake skin, affixed on an ornate wooden rod with twin snake heads formed on the ends.
Harry unrolled the scroll and scanned the names of the previous summoners, only to find there were only three other names. The first was written in symbols completely unknown to him, and the second was written with Egyptian hieroglyphics. The third was written in Old English in long, serpentine handwriting. It took him a few moments to read the name which said 'Salazar Slytherin.'
Recognizing the dark ink for what it was, Harry pulled out a thick needle that was stuck in his shirt that he had cleaned and sterilized beforehand and pricked his thumb, using the thick needle as a makeshift pen. Once his name was signed, the scroll rolled up on its own.
"Congratulations, summoner. Now that you've signed the contract, you are also tasked with guarding it, so please, take the scroll and swallow it." Harry stared at the coatl as if it suddenly sprouted two extra heads.
"Excuse me? What do you mean I have to swallow this thing? It's longer then my whole arm." Harry snapped.
"The scroll has powers on its own, hatchling. You will not even know it is there." The coatl gave him the serpent equivalent of a chuckle.
Feeling apprehensive, Harry picked the scroll up and tilting his head upwards, started sinking the long scroll in his mouth. He felt the rough texture of it on his tongue, but when it hit the edge of his throat, it was as if the scroll vanished completely.
After finally getting the whole thing inside his mouth and into whatever was sucking it in, he looked around only to find the coatl was already gone.
"Well, let's see if this thing was worth it." Harry formed a series of hand signs with his still bleeding thumb and slammed his hand on the ground.
A puff of smoke burst from beneath his hand, and when it cleared, he saw a foot long asp staring intently at him.
"You called me, summoner?" It asked calmly.
"I was just testing the contract. You are free to leave." Harry grinned. A summoning contract was merely the first step to becoming a truly great ninja.
Now that he had a contract, he continued to train hard so that he could expand his chakra reserves and thus summon stronger and larger snakes.
His life went on in the same unbroken routine, day after day, until his cousin's eleventh birthday.
His parents had planned for a zoo trip for Dudley, and Harry was as usual, to stay with a neighbor called Mrs. Figg, an older woman with a whole herd of cats in her house.
What the Dursleys didn't know was that Harry would just put the woman under a mild genjutsu and spend the day in training.
This time, however, it seemed that he would be accompanying the Dursleys on their trip, since Mrs. Figg recently broke her leg and was thus unable to take care of him.
So, it was with a sigh at the lost training time that Harry found himself squashed between Dudley and his friend Piers as they traveled towards the London zoo.
Despite his initial misgivings, Harry ended up having a good time as he observed all sorts of strange and exotic creatures that he had only read about so far.
The reptile house turned out to be one huge heckling show, with the human visitors as the victims.
"Yeah, just keep walking, tubby." "Wow, look at her, she's ugly even for human standards." "I'd bite his face off if this stupid glass wasn't here."
Harry had to stifle his laughter as the snakes abused the people observing them in every way possible.
As he stood, listening to a pair of cobras discuss in great detail the high possibility that his relatives were some strange crossbreed of humans and animals, he heard a faint hiss from behind him.
"You, with the messy black hair, come closer." Harry turned around and saw a ten foot long sandy snake with a black stripe on its back look at him intently.
"A wizard at last. Please, you have to get me out of this damn place. The lack of magic is killing me." The snake hissed pleadingly.
While confused about its words, Harry was not a person to let it suffer and die, so after carefully weaving a genjutsu, he started to examine the glass, trying to find a way around it.
With his mind focused on the glass, he suddenly felt his chakra flare up for a moment, and to his astonishment, the glass simply vanished.
The snake immediately rushed out and wrapped itself around his waist like a belt.
"Your magic is strong, wizard. I'm starting to feel better already." The snake hissed gratefully.
"We'll talk later." Harry hissed in reply and moved his genjutsu to hide his new companion.
"So, what sort of snake are you?" Harry asked his new companion once they were safely back in Harry's room. It took a lot of effort on his part to convince his relatives to give him Dudley's second bedroom, but he managed it.
"I am an Egyptian striped asp, wizard, the deadliest serpent there is." It said proudly.
"Why do you call me wizard?" Harry asked curiously.
"That is what those with magic are called. I sensed your power, and knew that you could help me. As thanks, I offer myself as your familiar." The snake replied.
"You said you were deadly?" Harry asked after a few moments.
"There is no antidote for my venom other then the tears of a phoenix, but the legendary birds of fire are very rare. Furthermore, my bite does not kill instantly. Those I bite will suffer great agony for hours before their inevitable death." The snake sounded smug at this fact. Before signing the contract, Harry would have been shocked at this, but he learned from his summons that lethality was a trait serpents valued greatly, since it meant less trouble when hunting pray.
"So, how do you become my familiar?" Harry asked.
"Take some of my blood, and give me some of yours in return. Then, you must name me." The snake replied.
"Alright." Harry pricked the snake with the needle that was always present on his pants so he could easily nick his thumb for summoning, and licked the blood off before he pricked his thumb and offered the needle to the snake.
"As for a name…" He thought for several minutes before it hit him.
"I will call you Acheron. In mythology, it was the name of the river of pain." Harry explained.
"I like it, master. You should also know that my venom cannot harm you now." The newly named Acheron replied happily.
"I'm glad you like it. Come on, I'd like to get some training done today. I'm still trying to master that damn technique." Harry let Acheron wrap around his waist again as he went to his training spot in the park.
"Alright then. Sen'eijashu." Harry cocked his hand back and swung it forward, letting a single snake shoot out of his long sleeve and wrap around a branch of the oak tree. To his dismay, however, the snake vanished moments later.
"You're the snake summoner?" Acheron's eyes were comically wide at the sight.
"Yeah, sorry for not telling you earlier." Harry grinned lightly.
"If my family knew I was the familiar of the snake summoner, they'd die of envy." Acheron's eyes practically glowed at the thought. "Master, do you think you could make a little trip to Egypt?"
"Sorry, but I'm not taking you to Egypt just so you can brag about me." Harry laughed. It seemed he had finally found a friend to talk with.
"It's incredible how much a single letter scared them. I wonder what it was about?" Harry was relaxing in the garden, hidden by genjutsu while an Earth clone was doing the yard work. The strange letters started coming a week before his birthday and his relatives were quickly losing their sanity thanks to them. His uncle actually boarded up the mail slot and the next day, every possible crack on the door, making it impossible to open, so they were forced to go in and out from the back door.
"Why didn't you just take the letter, master?" Acheron mused from his lap.
Harry took a long sip from his glass of iced fresh lemonade before he answered.
"These letters obviously distress my relatives, and whoever is sending those shows no inclination that they will stop anytime soon, so I can just get one whenever the next batch arrives. In the meantime, watching my relatives suffer under the constant barrage of letters if far too amusing to let it end quickly." Harry laughed viciously. While not a vengeful person by nature, he saw no reason to ease the suffering of the Dursley family at this time.
His uncle Vernon finally snapped from the extremely increasing number of letters that their home was getting bombarded with and decided to take them all on a drive through the country, often backtracking and taking random turns.
It was a sound tactic considering Vernon was standing on the edge of complete panic until their wanderings led them to a little hut out on a rock in the sea during a violent storm.
It was actually a pretty good hiding spot, and Harry was curious to see whether or not the person who was sending them letters at home as well as everywhere they stopped for the night would manage to get to the cabin.
Slowly, the Dursleys started to fall asleep, and as it neared midnight, only Harry was left awake.
"Happy birthday, master." Acheron poked his head from his collar and hissed in a comforting tone.
"Thanks." He scratched him beneath his jaw for a moment before the snake retreated back to the warmth beneath his shirt.
And then, just at the stroke of midnight, someone started to pound at the door. On the third strike, The door gave in and Harry stared as the biggest man he had ever seen calmly walked inside.