Disclaimer: I don't own anything that has been copyrighted. I make no money out of this, I only entertain, or try to. I am only paid in smiles, reviews, and in people liking what I've shared.

Note 1: AU, may contain sues, crack, ocs, oocs, etc.

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Heaven Is But A Dream

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Chapter 10

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The first thing on Naruto's to-do list was to get the two girls he'd collected out of stasis. It just wouldn't be humane to leave them in there until the day he died after all, how would their souls pass on since they existed in a realm separate, somewhat, from his own. No one would be able to get to them.

That last thought was followed by a hint of both sadness and hope due to his one true dream and ambition was to do just that. Die. Sad, but true. The one thing any immortal would wish after a long long time was the one thing that, most, would not be able to get. Due to a number of different reasons, one of which was that they were immortal.

Now Naruto, he was a different breed of immortal altogether, he had the protection, and curse of sorts, of one of the most powerful Beings in all of existence, and the burden that his very own father had decided to saddle him with was the root cause of all his pain and suffering at the hands of the shinigami refusing to let him pass on.

The two girls hadn't been very cooperative after he had released them from their forced slumbers. One of them just stared at him like he was the devil himself, while the other...ok...the other did that too, but that was only for a few scant second before she tried crawling pathetically backwards, and as far away from him as possible.

Seeing that he lived in a warehouse, one of several, she crawled pretty far before her back bumped into a wall. A wall that was just as solid as she was and one that would not budge no matter how little or a lot she put into her crawling.

It was pathetic by his standards really.

He had one girl that just stared at him irresponsibly, even after he had kicked her a few times to see if she'd cry out in pain, and another that was simply just too terrified of him to move an inch close enough to hear him give her a command, compliment, threat, praise, anything really.

It was rather frustrating, he had to get them to cooperate with him, or at the very least obey him if he was to present them to the Hokage for inspection or whatever the hell the old man wanted to see them for. He just hoped the old guy wasn't into young nubile flesh, that kinda freaked him out, and he was the freakiest bastard in all the village. The things in the forest of death feared him more than they feared fire and a whole bunch of other things.

It was probably his fault though, his fault that he had them undergo a really bad case of drug testing and experimentations in the form of weeding out the weak from the competition and trying to kill a very pesky garden variety S-class snake by the name of Orochimaru, who had yet to show hide or hair of himself in the village. It was quite...boring.

The only thing he had left for himself to do was pull out his golden mist chains and haul the farther away girl to right about a foot or two in front of him, have her float in the air so that she couldn't start crawling like her life depended on it again. With the other girl, the one that was relatively unresponsive, well he just put a collar, the dog kind, around her neck, attached a leash and had her follow him that way.

That second thing didn't really work out well since the girl had seemed to have lost the will to live, or do much of anything for that matter. She was like some sort of clean slate. He could probably have her gang raped by a bunch of wild and diseased zombies and she wouldn't bat an eyelash, or gag even. It was quite disturbing, even for him.

He was missing something, he was quite sure of it, and thus decided that if they weren't going to go to the Hokage, the old man would be the one to go to them. He left some clones in his stead to watch over the more or less comatose yet awake girl and the one that tried and tried, and would surely futilely tried to get away from him.

When he got back he regretted not giving his clones specific instructions as to what they would be doing with the two...tools. He was rather shocked, and mildly disturbed at what his clones could get up to when he left them alone with two, odd, girls for a lengthy period of time.

The only reason it was lengthy was because he had to wait in line for the Hokage to see him. Damn the old man and finally trying to defeat his most hated enemy. Paperwork.

He had expected some semblance of peace and order. What he got made the old man go over the deep end for a few minutes. It took all of his sheer will power to resist taking the old man up on his offer to become the Godaime Hokage. The old man had lost it for those few minutes, who in their right mind would offer him such a prestigious position in life. He would be in charge of a whole village of people that would be lawfully forced into following his every whim, his every wish, his every command.

Though he did regret his decision when one of the accompanying Anbu commented that he could have ordered the whole village to try and kill him in any and every single way they could think of possible and he would still protect them from any threat to the village that was discovered during his reign.

All those missed opportunities, but there would be enough of eternity to mope about such things in the future. He had more pressing matters to attend to.

The girls.

"Well, from what I can see," the Hokage said, this was after the clones had been...controlled or dispelled or both of course, "The two girls are in good condition. Physically speaking that is. What I want to know is what you plan on doing with them? I've already seen what your clones can do to and with them. I want to know your own personal plans and not the things you'd come up with if left on your own for a precariously long time alone with them."

"Well I was thinking," Naruto said, "Since they're both legally my slaves and therefore my property, I was going to have Haku, the unresponsive one become one of my ninja tools, like she was back with her old owner. While the Oto girl whose name I still have no clue about would become my maid, I guess. I mean she doesn't even look anywhere remotely ready for battle or wanting to fight even."

"So...a ninja tool and a...maid?" the Hokage asked, he wanted to be sure he heard right, his Anbu guard, who wouldn't be able to do jack if Naruto wanted to hurt and kill any of them, had other things running through their depraved and rather sick minds, but they dared not voice such things in the presence of their leader and the one teen that could potentially survive the end of the world and complain that he hadn't died with everyone else.

"Alright," the Hokage decided, "I'll have their registration papers and all that prepared by tomorrow morning. Be sure to pick them up, I'll be very busy for the remainder of the month after all and might not remember to have them sent to you, but don't worry about the filing, I'll save you the trouble of doing that too."

"Thanks old man," Naruto said, "Say...you wouldn't happen to know where I could get several sets of maid outfits now would you?"

"..." the Hokage did not want to answer that question since he knew several places that could provide the blonde with such clothing, custom tailored to the girl or girls that would be using them. He didn't really want to be the one to give Naruto the Talk after all, since those places had a lot to do with the Talk.

"Jiji?" Naruto poked the old man to get his attention, no pain involved though since this was his friend and grandfather figure of sorts after all, "You still in there?"

"I'm alive and well, and you'd do to remember that," the Hokage said as he was snapped out of his inner debate on whether or not he should help the blonde with his errands.

"About those uniforms, and clothes too, yeah, clothes for them would be great too," Naruto added.

"You remember Anko, right?" the Hokage asked.

"Yeah," Naruto said, he could surely never forget such a freaked out woman, "That's one woman I'm not likely to forget for a long long time."

"Good, good," the old man said, "That is very very good news. I'll have her purchase whatever supplies you need. No need for you to have to visit any of those places after all."

"If you're referring to shops found in the red light district, I know all I need to about them already," Naruto stated, "No worries about that dreaded talk of yours. I've had it already, in every way humanly possible. That and the shinigami told me all about it just so that I'd get back in my reformed body that ONE time."

"Uh...ok...well at least now you know where I was thinking of you getting your supplies," the old man said, "But I must insist that Anko be the one to get them.."

"You're not trying to dump one of your more mentally unhinged tokubetsu jounin in my lap are you?" Naruto had to ask. He just had to.

"No," the Hokage said, "Its just my solution to getting back some of the screws she lost witnessing your...revivals."

"Fine," Naruto said, "She can be the one to buy all the stuff you think I'll be needing, you can take it out of my next paycheck, S-ranks pay a lot anyway."

"Yes they do," the Hokage agreed, "Is there anything else you need of me?"

"Yeah," Naruto said, "You know anywhere I can get some padding for walls, along with furniture, cheap?"

"In need of some fixing up cheap," the Hokage asked, "Or used, but not used enough to need fixing cheap?"

"The first one, but not about the padding," Naruto replied.

"The Dump," the Hokage said, "No pay needed, since we usually just have someone destroy the things that are not needed and recycle the things that could still be of use but don't need much manpower in fixing or reusing. As for the padding...how much do you need?"

"About enough to cover my whole old apartment thrice over," Naruto replied.

"I'll have a C-ranked mission done in your name to get what you'll be needing for whatever nefarious plot you have planned in that head of yours," the Hokage said, "I'll take it out of your next paycheck, which will be later in the evening since I've already got a mission for you."

"Really? What is it?" Naruto excitedly asked.

"The Hyuga clan is in need of a dummy to practice their more devastating techniques on for whatever reason," the Hokage informed him, "I told Hiashi that I had something he could use, but it required his entire clan to submit to agreeing to sign a number of contracts that would make them forced to keep their silence. He agreed to that, and the hefty sum you'll be getting as compensation. It was really a pride thing on Hiashi's part."

"So...I'm to be their punching bag?" Naruto asked.

"Pretty much," the old man stated.

"Sounds like fun," Naruto said, still happily, "I could use a restock."

"You do know that this mission has a zero percent chance of you dying, right?" the old man asked, he was curious as to why the blonde was so happy about having such a mission. He was sure that Naruto would have argued about the no dying bit some.

"Yeah, but that's not really a downside," Naruto said, "I've come to terms, sort of, with my affliction. If and when its my time, it will be my time, until then. I'll just enjoy what I've got...though I'll still try to find some shortcut to my dream. As for this being something to be happy about, well, I'll be fighting one of them in the finals. Might as well make that single one know just how hard it will be to keep me down. Heh heh."

"Thank your for that information," the old man said, "Have fun. I'll be rooting for you in the finals, all subsequent missions for you will be delivered by word of mouth by one of my trusted Anbu, and if they aren't so trustworthy to you, feel free to eat whoever approaches you."'

"Thanks a lot Jiji!" Naruto happily said, before sending a bunch of clones to the Dump to get everything that he would need and some extra, it was always good to have extra.

With the Hokage gone, Naruto had a few minutes left to see about getting the two girls to cooperate with him.

He though long and hard, in his mindscape, until he stumbled upon a solution.

He had a tool, a very useful tool at his disposal now. Going with that flow of thought, he acted.

"Say Haku," Naruto said as he crouched down in front of the kimono clad girl, "He may have discarded you, but I'm more than willing to pick you back up. I could use you, and you do want to have a purpose once again, don't you? Someone to serve?"

She actually reacted by looking up at him, at his face at that last question or offer. Something awoke in her, something that had lain dormant. It was a tiny flickering flame, a shard of the crystal of hope within her. She hoped that it wasn't all a dream, that this person that had been part of the reason why she no longer had a purpsoe in living was not lying to her.

"A deadman has no use for a living tool," Naruto continued, "But a living one, has much use for one with your talents. So how about it? Be the tool of this master, and I'll keep you at my side til my dying day."

That last bit could use some work, but he didn't think revising it was necessary. He was a ninja after all, they lied, and it was definitely a kind of lie, since he was the immortal here and not her.

She continued to look, searching for a hint of deceit and actually failed to find any. Thinking it a dream she unconsciously produced a lone ice needle and proceeded to impale a digit with it, the pain would more than prove that it was real and that she was not dreaming all of this up.

With a confirmation from the pain that was sure to go away, she nodded her head in affirmation to his offer. She was now his in every way, to do with as he pleased, as long as she could be of use to him. She liked that, having a purpose. It was nice, and it made her simplistic self, happy.

A small smile made its way to her lips, as she sat up and looked more attentive and a slight bit more alive than before the short conversation.

One down, another one to go.

"I know of your connection to Orochimaru," Naruto stated to his floating captive.

She whimpered in such a way that clued him into the fact hat she was more afraid of him, terrified, horrified, and all that, than able to even hear him speaking. It was as if her mind could not hope to comprehend that she was in the presence of a human, albeit an immortal one, but still a very much human person. One with hopes and dreams, even though they leaned more towards dying.

So he slapped her around some to get her attention focused solely on the present. Focused on him, and his manic grin, his patience with her wearing thin.

"You listen and listen well, girl," he growled out menacingly, his bijuu chakra rising to just beneath his skin, "I spared your life, when I could have just ended it. You owe your continued existence to me. You will stop acting like such a pathetic insect," his voice and tone growing even more sinister, "You will know your place. Serve me well and you might be treated better than Orochimaru ever treated you. Fail to show me your worth, and I might have to resort to...well, your mind is a sewer filled with all the things I might do."

She shivered in his grip, involuntarily jerking here and there thanks to her fear of him, this monster before her. This demon of fire and illusion.

"If you understand me and agree to willingly serve," Naruto stated, his voice growing firm but losing the dark tint to his tone, "Then tell me the name I am to address you by."

"Kin," the girl tremblingly replied, "Tsuchi Kin..."

The grip around her tightened, she was not over her fear of him, since she now fully believed that no matter how far she hid, he would always find her. He, and his ghostly golden chain, would surely be able to find her. She feared that he'd be able to acquire her even in death, and she did not want to die.

"Call me master," he ordered her, uncharacteristically so.

"Yes, master," she reluctantly said, finally resigned to her fate as his slave.

"Good," Naruto said, his voice returning to what it normally was, "I will be leaving the two of you," he addressed them both, "Since I have a mission to attend to. A woman will be stopping by later who will be bringing you on a short shopping spree. She will be purchasing you clothes and anything else you will be needing. I'm sure the Hokage has already or will already have given her a list, but if there is something that you fancy getting, feel free to get it. Make sure this trip counts, I might not be so generous in the future."

With those words said, he turned his back to them, and left the warehouse with nary a care in the world. He passed by the first of his many errand running clones returning with some things from the Dump.

He made his way to the Hyuga clan compound, or district really. Once there he informed the Hyuga guards on duty that he had an appointment with their clan head regarding a training dummy for their clan's taijutsu style.

One of them remained at the gate with Naruto, while the other went off in search of their clan head for instructions as to what to do with the blonde. They couldn't just ignore him, as he could be telling the truth after all. The man returned a moment later with their clan head, who motioned for Naruto to walk beside him on their way to the training ground.

"So you will be the one providing us with the training dummies?" Hiashi asked him.

"In a manner of speaking," Naruto said, "Though I wouldn't go so far as to providing you with plural targets."

"Oh? The Hokage assured me that my clan would be getting something that could be used over and over again," Hiashi said, "One that would be able to withstand even our more devastating techniques."

"Which is why I'm here," Naruto stated, "I'm your training dummy. The walking talking training post. Once this training of yours begins, you'll know why the Hokage chose me for this mission."

"We shall see," Hiashi said, "I know you will be fighting my nephew in the finals. If you perish during this mission, it will be no one's fault but your own at believing you have what it takes to take on our more destructive techniques and survive."

"Think what you will, Hyuga," Naruto said, "But by the end of this mission you will wish our relationship had started on better terms."

When they had finally arrived, Naruto was ordered to stand in the center of the training ground. Then Hiashi ordered those that were to be using Naruto to show him, the clan head, what they were capable of. He ordered them to show no mercy to their training dummy, going so far as to say that it was a Hokage sanctioned exercise. Which in a manner of speaking it was.

They did as ordered.

They were a kind of graduting batch of Jyuken students really. Not the whole clan training at one time. Just members of the clan that were learning the more devastating techniques fo their clan's style of fighting. It was a mixed class of main and branch house members, all of them no older than 20. But all of them clearly able to deal quite a lot of damage.

They had studied well and studied hard. Mastering and memorizing quite a lot of information. This was to be their gradutation exam from the level that they were still in to a higher one with more techniques to learn and much more discipline to develop.

When one of all of them, simultaneously delivered a killing strike, they all stopped to look at their handywork. Hiashi on the other hand activated his clan's doujutsu to see what what was happening within the blonde and how a corpse could continue standing.

What he saw made his blood run cold and his skin go even paler than it already was. His clansmen had the same reaction as they finally bore witness to the miracle or horror that had been taking place before their very almost all seeing eyes. It was a terrible sight to see, one with no rhythm or flow or reason at all that they could find or think of.

Every injury repairing itself within moment of being received. Even an exploded heart reformed itself almost instantly from being burst due to a powerful strike diected at it. Lungs punctured and should have been irreparably destroyed fixed themselves. And it all happened within a matter of mere seconds.

After managing to reign in his emotions and regain his stoicness, Hiashi addressed the class.

"Since our...training post still lives and breathes regardless of the fact that it shouldn't even be possible," the clan head said, he was still very much unnerved by the event, but not as much as Anko of course since what she had borne witness to had been even more surreal, "I want each of you to demonstrate all that you have learned. State what you are about to do before doing it. I will announce who shall advance and who shall have to remain at the current level and be passed on to another teacher, once all of your have finished."

It took them the rest of the day to get the testing over and done with. Hiashi even demonstrated what the ones that passed would be learning under him, as well as what the others that failed would be missing out on. It was incentive for both groups to want to better themselves, make them greater in the eyes of the clan head.

Naruto, who should have been a mere stain on the ground students before that, had just remained in place. As he had been ordered to. The only order he'd probaly not ever be able to fulfil was to die, something which he would have gladly tried to do again and again and again.

Hiashi personally walked the genin back to the gate, something which he rarely ever did even for respected guests. There was a very short list of individuals who had ever been escorted out of the compound personally by this particular clan head.

"I thank you for the secret that you have shared with my clan," Hiashi told him as they reached the gate, "I shall inform the Hokage if I am ever again in need of your services."

"Err, thanks," Naruto said.

"The night is still young," Hiashi said, "Enjoy the rest of the evening, and thank you once again."

Naruto had managed to change the man, somewhat, and somehow. Whether or not the change would be a welcome one or not was too early to be seen. Hiashi and his students and former students would never be the same ever again. Not after finding out Naruto's secret.

The man had done everything in his power, including performing a variation to his clan's style that he had been keeping secret for a very very long time, just to see about actually confirming that someone could't be that resilient to death. His logical mind could not comprehend the possibility of a real immortal working for him. Since his logical mind couldn't accept it, it broke and reformed itself, but something had defintely changed. Only time would really tell what and to what extent it had changed.

"*"

When Anko had arrived to get the measurements of the girls she would be buying things for, she had not expected to find one girl practicing her fighting skills, while the other girl followed the orders of the clones with them.

She also hadn't expected one girl to be normal while the other to be a tad bit submissive. It was weird to say the least. What she had also expected was to find herself talking to the blonde immortal, something which she was happy that she didn't have to do, since even just thinking about him, and not his clones, had sent painful shivers running up and down her spine.

"Uhm..." Anko said, "I'm here to get the measurements of two girls...uh.."

"Haku, Kin," one clone stated, "Go with her, we'll remain here until the boss gets back. You already got his permission anyway."

The two younger girls followed the young woman out of the warehouse, and away from the disturbing district and into the red light district that wasn't that far away from them. The two girls wondered why they were there, they knew that they would be getting clothes, but wondered why there of all places. A bunch of men were even looking at them in ways that were relatively normal for Anko and the way she dressed.

They passed by many of the things that one would expect to find in such a district, and even more after they reached a shop that catered to their needs. Anko put everything they had gotten from that place in a storage scroll for each of them.

Anko, after finding out that the two girls were slaves of Naruto, decided that in order to please their immortal and very scary master, they needed some additional skill sets added to what they already knew. Cooking, cleaning, and probably fighting for him, were basic things. Pleasures in life were things that would surely be appreicated by him, plus it would surely get Anko some plus points in his book, and so he wouldn't come after her for her soul in the future for whatever reason she could cook up in that mind of hers.

Anko signed the two girls up for some classes for a bunch of extra curricular activities, some of which could actually be used on certain special kuniochi only missions. She would have to inform the Hokage about her personal decision though and hope for the best.

Anko returned the two girls, slightly overwhelmed girls, to the newly refurbished and renovated warehouse around the same time that Naruto returned from his mission. She decided to be honest with someone that could kill her in many many painful ways about what she had done for the two girls. He thanked her for thinking about their well being, and told the two girls that he expected them to master whetever it was that Anko had signed them up for. It was still his money that was paying for it all after all.