~ Author's Note ~

Chapter Eight: The Tale of a Hero

Damn... So last chapter Sasuke revealed some heavy shit about what happened, we don't know what happened 'necessarily' after they left the festivities, maybe there's more to the situation than just that. Now Sasuke's suspicious of Boruto/(Ryuu) and we all know that he's not going to just settle with this. Okay so this chapter is that next day after she met Boruto. Be sure to comment below and add this to your favs if you like it because that's always nice to see! Let's get into this.


Let me just confess something right now, I am not a morning person. Sure I get up early for Gentle Fists training with Grandfather and Aunt Hanabi occasionally teaches me shurikenjutsu, even if it's not her favorite thing in the world. This morning though, I'm wide awake and stumbling around my room to get ready for the day. Sarada is coming by today to show me around the village again.

My cloak and scarf are thrown haphazardly over the back of my computer chair after I got home yesterday. Misplacing them would have been bad so I set them in the one place I wouldn't loose them. In front of me. Panic settles over me, what if Sarada knocks on the door to the Compound and Natsu answers it instead? She wouldn't know who Sarada was asking for and when she found out, Natsu would tell Mom for sure.

I grab the scarf and wrap it tight around my head like yesterday and pull the cloak over my arms, making sure to flip the hood up as I creep silently through the hall of the compound. Reaching the door, I open it just to come face first with Uchiha Sarada who jumps back a couple steps. Her face is flushed from embarrassment, but I shrug it off. Nothing to be embarrassed about.

"Sorry Ryuu, I didn't tell you what time I'd be over," she laughs.

Waving it off, I motion forward. "No problem, so what are you going to show me first Uchiha?"

She glares playfully, I don't know how I can tell, but it's something in her eyes. "Watch it Ryuu. Anyways, I was thinking we could swing by the village center so I can show you the Sixth's office building and then we'll go up to the Hokage Rock."

Sarada leads me through the crowded streets of Konoha and while yesterday I wasn't sure where I was going, I didn't feel as uncomfortable as I do right now. It's like someone is watching me. A creepy feeling, but whenever I look around there's nothing suspicious. I even activated my Byakugan a couple of times only to find nothing out of the ordinary.

Maybe the heat's finally getting to me.

Just about the time I was sure I was having a heatstroke from the sun blazing against my back, Sarada stops beside a towering building with a fancy design to make it stand out among the residential areas. This must be the Sixth's office or something, there's no way that this is just some old building from the past. The village was destroyed, Grandfather never told me by who or why, but that's what he'd said.

"This is the Hokage's building," Sarada held a hand towards the glass panes on the building overhead as if I didn't already have that figured out. "Lord Sixth assigns missions here, upgrades and adds ninja's to the rosters, and this is where all important people come for the annual meeting of the Kage's."

I rub the back of my neck, admittedly cloaked, in confusion. "At the risk of sounding like a complete idiot, what's a Kage?"

Sarada blinks at me before she sighs a long deep sigh. "Okay, I should have anticipated that. So the Hokage is what we call our village leader, but the other hidden village leader's are known as the Kage's. Each hidden village has a Kage. For Sunagakure, or the Hidden Sand, it's the Kazekage; the Mizukage for Kirigakure, the Hidden Mist Village; Raikage in Kumogakure, the Hidden Cloud Village; and the Tsuchikage of Iwagakure, the Hidden Stone Village."

I nodded, that makes sense. All the Kages are just the leaders of each of the hidden villages. "I wonder though, the current hokage, no disrespect, is getting quite a bit older than he used to be. I wonder who'll be next as the Hokage..."

Sarada glanced over as she tore her eyes from the building, she seems to be thinking about something before she nods. "It's up to the current hokage to pass the title, but pretty much everyone knows who the seventh hokage will be."

"Who?" I asked, curious. How could it be so obvious for an entire village to already know who the next hokage of their village is going to be. That seems like something only the current one would know, but then again, it's not like I know that much about my own village anyways. Just told stories by Grandfather and tales of the hokage's and what they've done.

Instead of answering me, Sarada turns and walks in the other direction and leaves me stumbling after her.

"Was it something I said 'ttesbasa?" I call out, she doesn't respond, furthering to confuse me even more than I was before. The least she could do is answer me if I made her mad or something.

Nothing was said, by Sarada at least, during the next few twists and turns through the village. Goosebumps still running up my spine as I feel the chill of someone's cold eyes staring at my back, burning a whole though me.

I'm stunned when I realize where we are, the faces of all the hokage's recorded one by one in the rocks. All six perfectly sculpted to attempt to match its counterpart and to commemorate them as heroes. Sarada motions towards a concrete staircase that leads up towards the sky. To the top of the Hokage's heads I supposed, there's no where else for it to go.

It sure as hell won't take us into the clouds.

Sarada sits down on the head of the Sixth Hokage Hatake Kakashi and I reluctantly pull up beside her and drop down against the burning rock. It feels strange to be up this high, the Compound is so low to the ground and there's no wind blowing like up here. I can feel the breeze tugging at my cloak and I long to free my hair from beneath the scarf and let the wind whistle through my hair.

Knowing that I can't though, I push that feeling down and try to focus on Sarada only to fail miserably when I look off the rock to see the entire village of Konoha in one sweep. Yeah, I assumed the village was gigantic yesterday, but sitting this high up really shows how big it really is. All the people down below and weaved in between the stores and buildings look like minuscule ants.

By the front of the gate where I suspect is the way out of the village is a dip in the earth. A scar in the loosest sense to represent it's torn scars from a battle long since passed. Signs of a fight that must've been horrible, where many must have died. And yet the village looks so peaceful, like there could never be anything else but this serenity. It was a deception of the eye that could fool anyone, especially if you weren't looking for the signs.

"Our village was destroyed once, in an attack by the Akatsuki leader Pein. The Akatsuki was a criminal organization who seeked peace by their own personal means to accomplish it. The real 'Pein' was actually a man named Uzumaki Nagato. He sent Pein and other forms to attack and destroy the Village Hidden in the Leaves. The village was decimated, many lives lost. Our home was flattened and everyone was going to die, but..."

Sarada trailed off and I glance over at her.

"But the hero of the leaf returned in time to save the Fifth Hokage Tsunade from death at Pein's hand. Uzumaki Naruto, the person everyone hated became a hero that day when he saved the village and defeated Nagato. Even convincing him that he would bring peace and Nagato, having faith in Naruto, brought everyone back to life that he'd killed during his attack on the village."

My eyes widen, that was the same kid from the story Grandfather was telling me about. The kid who was orphaned when he was born, endured the hatred of the villages, and was the jinchūriki of the creature that killed his parents. How come Sarada didn't mention any of that? Unless she doesn't know anything about that, her parents might not have told her.

So this guy saved the whole village? No wonder Grandfather said he was a hero on his own merits.

"That's why Uzumaki Naruto will be the Seventh Hokage and personally, I think it's well-deserved. That was his life long dream after all," Sarada sighs, looking out across the village.

"Have you met him?" I ask.

"Sort of, one day I ended up on some kind of mission assignment where he was meeting up with my Papa about something. I was having a lot of problems then and me and my friend, the one you met, Chōchō, couldn't just return to the village. It was too dangerous, so he brought us along and I got to see my Papa for the first time since I was little."

"Oh." I didn't want to sound rude, but that was a little odd. I mean why would you sneak out of the village on a potentially dangerous world when you're not even a ninja by Konoha's standards? Then again, seeing as how I'm sneaking out of my house right now means that I don't have much room to say shit, so I'll just keep that thought to myself.

"Hey, I have a question. And I know it's personal and you're not that fond of him," she stumbles over her words. "I mean, if you meet your father, what would you do? I mean, how would you react... My father and I aren't that close, but I've always known who he was. I'm sorry," she shakes her head. "That's not, I-I shouldn't have asked you that."

Despite my rising anger, not at Sarada for asking, I take a breath to calm myself. "I don't know what I'd do. Probably punch him in the gut as hard as I could for not being there and then ask him why. Why he didn't want me, or why he wasn't around. Find out the facts about him and finally know whether or not he thinks I'm some worthless mistake or if he cares for me at all..."

Sarada said nothing, what could she really say? That must've made her uncomfortable. The chilling eyes on my back draw my attention again, the hair on the back of my neck standing straight up. Glancing over my shoulder, all I see are the puffy white clouds scattered in the light blue sky overhead. Nothing out of the ordinary here, I know someone's watching me.

If they were going to try something, they would have by now. The humidity in the village climbs to nearly unbearable heights, it's a couple hours past noon. Deciding it would be best to head home, I excuse myself and say goodbye to Sarada, heading back towards the Compound.


Third Person POV:

Sasuke Uchiha spent the day spying on children, what the hell is wrong with this picture? After his revelation yesterday, he had to find out just how likely his hypothesis about 'Ryuu' was. He spoke about his missing father to his daughter and how he'd react if he ever met his biological father. That wasn't what convinced Sasuke of his parentage though.

Those signs were far to vague to make any conformations, but Sasuke knew for sure that 'Ryuu' was Naruto's spawn by something that he said, one word that Sasuke recognized in a different form. His daughter wouldn't be able to identify it, she hardly knew anything about his old friend and what she did was only stories of his heroics and nothing of Naruto's hardships.

What convinced Sasuke was the sentence he'd said to Sarada.

"Was it something I said 'ttesbasa?"

A normal thing for a child to ask, but that last part was the nail in the coffin for Sasuke, while his old friend said 'dattebayo,' it seems his offspring inherited that damned verbal tick with only a slight variation, saying 'dattebasa' instead. No one else, except for Naruto has that stupid verbal tick and his wife and daughter had one, but their's was nowhere close to sounding like Naruto or this kid.

After Ryuu parted ways with his daughter, Sasuke followed the boy back to the Hyūga Estate and watched Ryuu slip in through the gate and sneak up to what Sasuke assumed was his bedroom. A heavy sigh escapes him, running a hand over his face. Now he knew the truth, that the boy was Naruto's, but he still has no idea what the boy actually looks like and the situation revolving around his conception. However, if Hinata felt the need to hide 'Ryuu' he must look like Naruto and some other force has to be at work.

Why else would she keep him hidden unless that was so? Sasuke made a decision, Sakura is going the the Hyūga Estate for the boys yearly check-up soon and Sasuke will go and see the boy personally. After all, if the boy really is Naruto's offspring that kind of makes him an uncle to the brat and he wants see the child's potential. If Sakura tries to protest, well he's got the cards in his hands now.

She can't afford to deny him this chance. Decided, Sasuke slips into the shadows, making his way back home where his daughter Sarada is probably waiting for his arrival.