Naruto Fuujinroku

by Daneel Rush

These are the chronicles of the Golden Wind God. In the beginning, the orphan became a heir. In Fantasia, the heir will become a shinobi. DEAD.

11. End of the Phantasmagoria, Part 2

Disclaimer:I don't own Naruto.

Author's Notes: Well, this chapter not only marks the end of "Phantasmagoria of Dichromatic Eyes," it's also the chapter with which I'll break the million-word marks. Well, technically, I crossed this mark a long time ago, if you count the two unfinished stories I deleted ("The Dragon Emperor" and "Death & Beyond: First Period"), but, still, seeing the number on my User Stats gives me quite the feeling. Damn, it's been six years since I posted the first chapter of "Son of Darkness, Son of Light," the 23rd of November of 2001. So many things have changed (back then I thought I just had a frail health……now I know it's a bit more complicated……well, a lot more), but a few things have remained the same, which is sort of a relief. I still enjoy anime. I still enjoy reading. I still think lolis rule……forget that last one. Now, seriously, it's been one hell of a ride. I have no idea when this ride will end. Heck, maybe tomorrow I'll wake up and just clean my Fanfiction folder forever and ever. So, while it lasts, please keep looking forward to whatever this poor, pathetic soul can come up with, okay?

For a change, the extra will go before the chapter itself!

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Character Profile - Houraisan Shiki (蓬莱山 四季)

Physical Information

Age:????

Sex:Male

Birthday:03/01

Blood type: O

Height:157.5 cm (5'2'')

Weigth:46.2 Kg

---

Ninja Information

Registration ID: None

Hidden Village: Konoha

Rank:None (Kage-level?)

Team:None

Bingo Book Rank: S

---

Advancement Data

Academy Graduation Age: ----

Chuunin Exam Age: ----

Elemental Affinity: Wind

Other Elements Known: all but Fire

Signature Jutsu: Houraisan Mugen Kekkai and its variations.

Missions Completed: None

---

Stats (in a scale from 0-10)

Ninjutsu:10. Shiki knows an incredible amount of techniques. He is a walking jutsu encyclopedia. In a way, he was Orochimaru's inspiration. However, no one has an idea of just how many jutsu Shiki knows, because he never uses them.

Taijutsu:4. Maybe even a four is a bit too high. Shiki only knows Hakkeshou, and that's only because Saya pestered him until he allowed himself to be taught the style.

Genjutsu:4. Shiki's knowledge of Genjutsu is strictly theoretical. He does know the basic dispelling technique, but that's about it.

Intelligence:10. Shiki is, in lack of better words, a genius. In addition to his IQ of 168, Shiki possesses eidetic memory and hyperthymesia, as well as an incredible ability to multitask (even without Kage Bunshin) and an unnatural ability with numbers and calculations. Saya believes that Shiki's mental talents are, in fact, a neurological bloodline limit that will die with him, as both he and Saya are infertile.

Force:2. Shiki is not a strong man. If anything, he is average (as in normal human average, not ninja average).

Speed:2. Shiki is not fast, either. He can increase his speed with chakra with amazing effectiveness and efficiency, though.

Stamina:8. Considering his lack of proper training, Shiki's stamina and chakra reserves are quite formidable. While his great chakra capacity is somewhat understandable, his sheer stamina isn't, just like Saya's. Those in the know guess it's a consequence of the "condition" that has made them so long-lived. Saya claims it's because of all the sex.

Seal Knowledge:10. 'Nuff said.

---

Now, really, please do enjoy the end of the phantasmagoria.

---

Phantasmagoria of Dichromatic Eyes

Chapter 8

End of the Phantasmagoria (Part II) – Children of Fire

---

"Hanabi-sama is waiting, Houraisan-sama."

Naruto nodded weakly and followed the woman, allowing himself to be guided through the vast extension of the Hyuuga district. No matter how many times he went to that place, he was amazed by its sheer size and old-fashioned elegance.

"Ne, Atsuko-nee-chan……" Naruto, like Shiki, was starting to get acquainted with the names of almost every Hyuuga. "How come I'm 'Houraisan-sama' here and I am 'Naruto-kun' in the hot springs?"

"Because here is here, and there is there." The woman "explained" calmly as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, not even bothering to look down at him. Naruto could only pout and drag his feet behind the woman.

"……excuse me for my rudeness, but you look tired, Houraisan-sama." The tall woman in her early thirties spoke in a subservient but obviously concerned tone. Naruto, who had been looking at his sandals, lifted his head to see the long mane of ebony hair that gracefully covered her upper back like a most beautiful mantle.

"Well, there was all that physical exercising in the Academy today……" He mused. "…and then Taijutsu practice with kaa-chan……but that's not enough to take me down!" He hurried to walk by Atsuko's side; his mile and gait showing he still had plenty of energy, indeed. Atsuko did look impressed.

"Really? Are you sure, Naru-Houraisan-sama?"

"Yup! Kaa-chan says I'm a 'Stamina Monster', but I don't know if that's a compliment…" He frowned. "……Anko said it would make me very lucky in a few years. Do you know what she meant by that, Atsuko-nee-chan? Saya-kaa-chan got really mad at Anko for some reason, though……"

All Hyuuga women, Main or Branch, were taught to be elegant and composed since their early years. Most of them took the lessons to heart. A few, like Hanabi, forgot everything they learned seconds after the lecture was finished and were eventually deemed to be "lost cases." Funny thing is that even the "lost cases" among the Hyuuga are often a notch above the ordinary female when it comes to elegance. A select few, like Himeko, Atsuko, and even Hinata, became exemplars of feminine elegance.

In that moment, Hyuuga Atsuko had to use everything she had been thought to protect her image of an elegant Hyuuga female. It wouldn't do for anyone to see the notoriously crimson blush that threatened to invade her cheeks.

"My……oh my…………stamina, you say?"

Naruto didn't help much. His wide grin and his words were more effective than any jutsu. "Yup, stamina. Lots of it."

"Is……is that so……"

Oh, the girls would have so much to chat about that night……

"Where's Hina……Hinata?" Naruto corrected himself. He could only use "Hina-chan" in front of Hiashi………ironic as that might be. He openly used "Hana-chan" when in the Hyuuga hot springs, though.

Atsuko silently thanked the gods who encouraged Naruto to change the topic.

"Hinata-sama returned home from the Academy barely in time for dinner and right after that she secluded herself in one of the meditation rooms, demanding absolute privacy and no interruptions. She works so hard, that girl……" Atsuko muttered the last words with obvious concern. Naruto had long ago noticed that Atsuko saw all Hyuuga children as hers. What Naruto didn't know was that this was because Atsuko was incapable of having children of her own. This was also the reason she was still single and would remain single until the end of her days.

While she does love all Hyuuga children, she will be the first to admit she has a soft spot for her elder sister's child, Neji, even if the boy isn't prone to displays of affection.

"Heeh, she does, doesn't she?" Naruto commented with a knowing grin Atsuko couldn't read. What Naruto knew that Atsuko didn't was that Hinata was obsessed with the latest exercise Saya had assigned her.

While Naruto was being taken to Hanabi for her first Taijutsu lesson, Hinata was sitting in the middle of an empty room staring at a bucket in which a bonfire raged. The exercise was twofold. First, she was supposed to become able to seize the scorching coals from within the bucket and put them on a nearby plate without burning herself. It was an exercise in speed, the key element of the style she was learning. Second, by meditating close to the fire, Hinata was supposed to "understand the flame" and hopefully figure out how to use Fire-nature chakra.

Saya had made things clear: Hinata's instruction in the Karyuu style wouldn't progress any further unless she learned to tap into the chakra of her favored element.

"We are here, Houraisan-sama." Atsuki declared after stopping in front of one of dozens of identical sliding doors in the Hyuuga grounds. "Hanabi-sama waits behind this door."

Naruto couldn't stop himself from gulping. What the hell am I thinking!?, he wondered. He might be quite proud, but he wasn't as stupid as to think he was an expert on Taijutsu. From what he could tell, Hiashi wanted him to teach Hanabi all the Taijutsu he knew.

"Umm……so……um……bye-bye?"

Atsuko almost giggled. Curiously enough, the matter of Hanabi's instruction under Naruto had remained a secret between Hiashi, his daughters and the Houraisan Clan for several months, since Naruto's last birthday, when it was decided that he would become Hanabi's sensei. The catalyst of the secret becoming public would end up being Hanabi herself. Her education into Hyuuga matters not being as advanced as her sister's (and there's also the fact of Hanabi being three years old), Hanabi couldn't stop herself from sharing her excitement with a random Hyuuga. One hour later every single male and female in the clan knew that Hanabi was SOOOOO happy because training with Naruto would be SOOOOO much fun.

It should be clear by now that Hyuugas are quite the gossipers.

One hour and five minutes later, the entire Council of Elders was screaming bloody murder in Hiashi's studio. Nobody knows exactly what happened inside that room. The council isn't talking, of course. In any case, they left the office almost half an hour later with looks of poorly-concealed frustration, and they never made another reference to Hanabi's education.

"Please take care of Hanabi-sama. Farewell, Houraisan-sama."

Naruto "watched" Atsuko bow politely, as expected when dealing with a Clan Heir, before walking away with a brisk yet fluid pace. Only when she disappeared from the range of his Senrigan did Naruto turn to face the door.

He opened it.

Of course, Senrigan couldn't give him much information. It was one of many training rooms in the Hyuuga grounds. Of course, since the only thing Hyuugas train is their Jyuuken, their definition of "training room" is just a large, empty room. Hanabi was there, of course: sitting on the very center of the room, facing him. Unfortunately, Senrigan couldn't show him the unbridled emotion that shone in her milky white pupils, and Naruto's perception jutsu wasn't focused enough to detect the way Hanabi's little body shook with excitement and anticipation.

Naruto closed the door behind him before addressing Hanabi. "Hey."

Hanabi only smiled wider. She was told to stay still until told otherwise. It was a real test of her patience and will.

Naruto closed the distance that separated them and dropped to his knees, offering her a weak smile while he tried to deal with his nervousness. So he'd just get Hiashi and an entire clan after him if he screwed up, no big deal.

"Hana-chan."

That was the axe that chopped off the chains. If Naruto could ignore standard Hyuuga student-teacher protocol, so could she.

"Naruto-nii-chan!!!"

"Whoa!"

A second later, Naruto had his back on the floor and a recently-turned-four-years-old-and-quite-joyful Hyuuga girl on top of him. Hanabi's new way to address Naruto wasn't really that new. Naruto actually liked Hanabi's new term of endearment; it was a hell of a lot better than "Ruto." However, he had also noticed that Hanabi did shift back to "Ruto" when she was mad at him for whatever reason (usually because he didn't do whatever she wanted him to do or because she didn't have his undivided attention).

Something else Naruto had noticed was that Hanabi loved both hugging and being hugged. It was an obvious consequence of leaving in a family where physical contact and open displays of affection are the exception rather than the rule. What everyone but Naruto had noticed (everyone being Hinata, Naruto's adoptive parents and the ladies who are regulars at Ladies' Day on the Hyuuga hot springs) was that what Hanabi truly loved was hugging Naruto and being hugged by Naruto.

It is understandable. After all, Naruto is the only one who doesn't hold back in his interactions with the girl.

As for Naruto, he felt like a huge weight was being cast out of his shoulders. So he was training with Hana-chan. It's not like Hiashi expects him to turn his daughter into a mean war machine in a day or something. Besides, knowing his luck, Hanabi would turn out a Taijutsu genius that would surpass him faster than he could say 'Hakkeshou'.

He still wasn't sure of whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. While he liked Yokazeryuu and had every intention of being a decent close-combat fighter, he had already come to terms with the fact that his true vocation was Wind Manipulation. Not seals. Seals were an accursed obsession he would never get rid of. If there was anything Naruto truly liked, it was a challenge, and he couldn't think of anything more challenging than cracking the many layers and details of Fuuinjutsu.

Hadn't he said it before? He'd have a blast teaching Hanabi.

"Ne, Hana-chan."

Merely inches above his face, Hanabi's own brimmed with enthusiasm. A trademark Naruto grin adorned her lovely infantile features. "Hmm?"

At such a close distance Naruto could actually tell Hanabi's quite notorious facial expressions, which prompted him to return the smile with one of his own.

"Ready to have some fun and learn how to kick ass?"

Making a mental note to ask her sister what an "ass" is, and why should she learn how to kick it, Hanabi answered Naruto's question based on the part she could actually understand.

"Yup!"

---

Writing had become a ritual. For someone to whom the simple acts of reading and writing are a challenge, the act of sitting down, grabbing the brush and condensing thoughts into written form was serious stuff.

Naruto just wanted to write his thoughts. By writing them, he would ensure he never forgot them. After a month, he had only gone through four formal lectures, but he had read more about Fuuinjutsu than most Shinobi read in their lifetimes.

The art of sealing was, by far, the most ridiculously complicated thing he had ever "seen." He could barely make anything of the crazy concepts Shiki was trying to drill in his head. His sensei had even admitted that it was quite early for Naruto to start studying such a difficult art. However, Shiki didn't seem to have any intention to interrupt his Fuuinjutsu education and Naruto had no intention to relent. He'd just have to put a little bit more effort, that's all.

If he knew what IQ was, Naruto would have wished he had a few more points.

What Naruto didn't know was that most Seal Specialists didn't bother to study the theory behind Fuuinjutsu. Being the Shinobi they are they just memorize the well-documented techniques and the tried-and-true methods that get the results they want. They learn what symbol does what and what effects different arrays of symbols will inflict on different targets both alive and inanimate. It's mostly education focused on application: learn how to do it and learn what it does. Don't care about the hows or the whys.

Unfortunately (or fortunately) for Naruto, he was stuck with Shiki, and Shiki cares about the how's and the why's. No man on Earth has studied the theory of Fuuinjutsu like the leader of Clan Houraisan, mostly because no one gives a damn about the theory of Fuuinjutsu nearly as much as the leader of Clan Houraisan, and with good reason. They are Shinobi, not sages.

On the other side, Shiki is not a Shinobi. He is a good example of a real "sennin." So, if Naruto wanted to learn Fuuinjutsu from Shiki, he would have to study all the ridiculously complicated details no Shinobi cares about, much to his chagrin.

In any case, the boy was resorting to taking the entangled mess of thoughts he had gathered in the past month and try to make something remotely orderly out of them. He decided recording those thoughts on paper might help. So he got started, talking loudly to himself as he wrote.

"Shiki-sensei defines Fuuinjutsu as 'the Art of manipulating one or more properties of an entity definable within a bounded field.' What the hell does that mean? Well, we have to define 'Bounded Field.'"

"In a general way, a field refers to any……what was the word……ah, right! 'A hypothetical space in which the state of an entity can be described'. The term 'bounded' means that this state is confined to specific values, and therefore it cannot be infinite……of course, this is just me repeating sensei's words; I have no idea what they mean."

"Every sealable entity can be defined in terms of a Bounded Field, a set of Properties and the State Functions associated to those Properties. The calculation of these Fields and Functions are made with some crazy mathematics I don't give a damn about. The point is that the State Functions show the different states a Property of an entity can take. These are called Bound States."

"A seal is a chakra construct that imposes specific conditions on a Bounded Field, and so imposing a specific Bound State on the entity to be sealed. All seals obey the Postulates of Fuuinjutsu. The first postulate states that an entity can only be sealed into a Bound State of the Property or Properties that you want to manipulate. There are no other acceptable states. This means that you just cannot seal anything in any way. There are only specific ways in which something can be sealed. The second postulate says that among all the Bound States associated with a given Property, there is one Natural State, and the entity will always try to reach this Natural State. This means that, the further my seal keeps the entity's Property from its Natural State, the more difficult the seal will be. Shiki-sensei made this example……in theory; you can make a seal that makes you immortal. However, in practice, using this seal is absolutely impossible, because the Natural State of all living things is to die one day, and being immortal is as far from the Natural State as you can get. With that example all that crap I said before makes a lot more sense, doesn't it?"

"And now come the fundamental Bounded Fields………fundamental my ass! I DON'T GET ANY OF THIS CRAP!!! And these are supposed to be the simplest!? This doesn't make any sense! Why do I have to learn all this mathematics shit!? Aaaaargh, my head hurts!!!!"

A few yards away, in the living room, Saya shot a worried look at the door to Naruto's room.

"You do realize you're asking too much from him, don't you, Shiki?"

The husband took a long sip of the warm, invigorating green tea. "I do. I don't expect him to understand the minute details of the theory any time soon. I do intend to introduce him to storage seals next weekend."

"Then you're just torturing him? Minato didn't start reading Fuuinjutsu theory until he was seventeen!"

Shiki calmly shook his head. "Saya, nowadays nobody bothers to study the theory or doing any mathematical work when designing seals. And that's because myself and others already did that a very long time ago. Nowadays, if a ninja wants to make a new seal, he just has to look for an already-existing seal with a similar effect and use it as a basis. They all do nothing but modify the works of others. Take Seal 'A', put a few more symbols and lines here and there and you get 'Original Seal B'. No one is innovating; no one is trying to think outside the box, no one is trying to come up with something truly original. Fuuinjutsu has become a stagnant art. My hope is that Naruto becomes the one to change that."

"Naruto."

"You've said it before: the kid is creative. We both know he can think outside the box. I just want him to realize that there's so much that hasn't been done with Fuuinjutsu yet. I want him to develop his own Fuuinjutsu style, just like I did with Mugen Kekkai. It's the same reason I haven't taught him many jutsu: I want him to use that brain of his, instead of being stuck as a loud-mouthed ramen-loving idiot."

"You and I both know he can do it. As long as he wants to, he can do it. Because there's nothing impossible for him."

---

Naruto arrived early to his second day of classes and claimed the seat next to Sasuke's before any of his fangirls. Sasuke and Naruto would claim those same seats every single day onwards until their graduation. Sasuke grudgingly admitted to himself that between the girls and Naruto, he'd take Naruto anytime. Besides, it wasn't like he could stop the stubborn blond bastard.

Several months passed.

It was lunchtime of the first day after the summer holidays. Naruto's and Sasuke's relationship didn't extend beyond the classroom's walls, so the blond and the raven-haired hadn't seen each other for a month or so. That didn't stop them from returning to their previous routine the moment they met in the classroom: Naruto had greeted the quiet Uchiha with a "Yo!" Sasuke just 'hnn'ed' and took the seat by the window.

They spent the morning lectures in silence; Sasuke attentive and quickly scribbling notes; Naruto leaning back with a relaxed expression and memorizing the teacher's words.

Sasuke couldn't help but be piqued with curiosity when Naruto, instead of taking out his usual lunch box, revealed a scroll out of somewhere in his clothes. That's when he noticed that Naruto didn't really carry anything else with him. He was used to Naruto not carrying notebooks, but the heir of Houraisan had never failed to show the particularly voluminous "Saya-chan's Rabu-Rabu Bento!" (This being the name carved on the side of the box, much to Naruto's embarrassment)

That's why his curiosity went up and way past the roof when Naruto unfurled the scroll revealing the strangest array of symbols he had ever seen.

Then again, Sasuke hadn't really seen many arrays of symbols.

Naruto's curious display had caught the attention of pretty much everyone who hadn't left the classroom, namely Sasuke's stalk…admirers (including Haruno Sakura and Yamanaka Ino). While they couldn't understand a thing about the array of symbols, it as easy for they to tell it was perfectly symmetrical in every direction. That is, the whole array was made of a single pattern that repeated itself from the center outwards in a geometrically fractal pattern.

Naruto performed a sequence of three hand seals and touched an apparently-random symbol with the tip of a finger. Those who were the closest reflexively backed away from the sudden poof and the cloud of smoke. The loud and obvious display of the unsealing also drew the attention of some fourth-year students who, coincidentally enough, passed by the classroom door on their way out of the building.

The blindfolded Naruto was already enjoying his unsealed boxed lunch when the smoke fully dissipated.

"Wha……what was that?" Sakura voiced everyone else's thoughts. Her voice was awkwardly hushed. Naruto only grinned. He was about to reply when a second voice from behind interrupted him.

"Na-Naruto? Is that you?"

Naruto stiffened. "That voice!" Quickly spinning around to jump off his desk, startling Sasuke, Sakura, Ino and everyone else who was watching him or pretending not to in the process, Naruto expanded his vision to find the source of those words. "You are……!!!"

"Naruto!! It's really you!!!"

"Ten-chan!!!"

He hurried to meet his long-lost friend, only to be welcomed with a smack on the crown of his head.

"OW! Ten-chan!!!"

"No 'Ten-chan' me, Naruto!" Her voice was strong enough to make Naruto cower, but those who could see her face could see she was more amused than angered. "You lied to me! You never showed up by the shop again! You little runt! You bad friend!"

Hinata, who had known Naruto long enough to learn how to read his body language (……a little), was the only one who noticed the way Naruto was stunned by Tenten's words, if only for just an instant. He quickly recovered and went for a half-assed grin and a hand on the back of his head, but that didn't stop Hinata from shooting a cold stare at the newcomer.

Naruto had the decency to look apologetic. At least, as apologetic as a blindfolded person can look.

"Eeeh, uuuh, I've been doing a lot of training, Ten-chan………and I don't really know where your place is, so……"

"You could have asked Saya-sama." Tenten unknowingly used her best pouting voice. Naruto actually winced.

"Ehehehe…right………I'm sorry?"

Twack! Another smack.

"OW!!!"

Tenten grinned.

Even if her looks weren't really tomboyish, everyone who was watching could just get that feel from her. Maybe it was because of her smile, which lacked the distinct "flair" of a young girl's smile, being replaced with a sort-of-masculine mischievousness. "Silly Naruto."

Feeling the change in the tone of her voice, Naruto allowed himself to return the grin. "Ehehehe."

"Ne…" Tenten bent her body slightly forwards, inching her face closer to Naruto's. "What was-"

Tenten had to stop midsentence to look around. She had felt a sudden chill going down her spine; a sensation of impending danger of the likes of nothing she had felt before. It was a feeling she would get quite acquainted with during her kunoichi career.

At the tender age of nine, Tenten discovered killing intent.

"……Ten-chan?"

Tenten ignored Naruto's questioning words. She was sure it had come from somewhere to her right……but that didn't make sense. The only ones there were that boy wearing shades who didn't even seem to be paying attention to her, and that cute Hyuuga girl……

Shino frowned. For some reason he couldn't fathom, his kikaichuu seemed to be crawling away from Hinata. He could almost swear it was getting warmer, too.

The bun-haired upperclassman decided to just let go. The horrible feeling had passed as suddenly as it had emerged on the first place.

"Ah, Naruto, what was that you did just now?"

Naruto responded with his megawatt grin. Center of attention, all right. "Hehehe! Thanks for asking, Ten-chan!"

Tenten followed the blond back to his seat, ignoring the looks she was getting and wondering if she looked at her upperclassmen the same way. She also ignored the way the penetrating look the Uchiha was giving her. A few years later she might have thought he was stripping her naked with his eyes.

"My family's specialty is seals, just like the bastard's is Fire techniques."

"The bastard?"

Sasuke raised a hand with an expression of obvious disgust. "That would be me."

"Oh."

"Ah, yeah. Uchiha bastard, this is Ten-chan. You'll never be nearly as cool as her."

Sasuke suppressed a growl, but actually took Naruto's words to heart and looked at the girl with even more attention, resulting on Tenten drawing the quiet ire and envy of his admirers. The girl actually blushed a bit at Naruto's opinion of her. Had she really impressed him that much in the single morning they spent together?

"We……we have actually met, Naruto, remember?"

Naruto blinked under his bandana. "Oh……oh, right!" Naruto turned to Sasuke with an angry look. "That's when you said you didn't like ramen, teme!"

Sasuke nodded and smirked. He remembered that too. He would never admit it, but it was one of his fondest memories.

"I still don't."

"I swear; there is something terribly wrong with you." Naruto stood up again (his lunch long forgotten) and put his right fist on his chest. "In the name of the world's ramen lovers, I swear I will fix you, Sasuke!"

"In the name of all that is good and holy, please don't."

"Bu-But!" Naruto tried a supplicant expression, but it was hard to tell, given his condition. "Sasukeeeeee……" He whined. "It's ramen!"

"…………so?"

"Ugh……ah!" Naruto withdrew a familiar-looking stick from his "Pocky holster." "At least you have to like Pocky."

Sasuke developed an unhealthy twitch of the right eye. He would keep it until the end of his days. "………now you're just asking for a beating."

Naruto snorted. "Right, as if you could."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. "Is that a challenge, Naruto?"

Naruto smirked……and shrugged. "Nah, it's lunchtime."

Sasuke could only blink when Naruto turned his back to him and faced Tenten one more time with his usual radiant smile. "What were we talking about again?"

Everyone stared dumbfounded at the sector of the classroom where all this took place. That was the longest conversation Uchiha Sasuke had participated in since, well, ever. And he had actually shown initiative to join the conversation!

The girls in the classroom began muttering amongst themselves.

Slumped down on his desk on the front row, Nara Shikamaru lazily opened an eye and shot an unusual look at the Houraisan and the Uchiha.

"Hmmm………amusing. Amusing, but troublesome."

"Wha……what is it?" Chouji managed to articulate between mouthfuls of rice.

"Nothing." Shikamaru declared the conversation to be over by dropping his eyelid. However, there was a curious vestige of a smile on his face that not even Chouji could make anything of.

Tenten? Tenten only chuckled.

"So you two have been friends all this time?"

The heads jerked to look up at Tenten. "We're NOT FRIENDS!!!"

The same two heads jerked one more time to look at each other. "WHAT THE HELL!?"

"STOP COPYING ME!!"

"I'M NOT COPYING YOU!!!"

"DAMN IT, UCHIHA!!!/NARUTO!!!"

"YOU WANT A PIECE OF ME!?"

"HEY!!!"

"AH!? THAT'S IT, I'M KICKING YOUR ASS!!!"

Tenten's laughter interrupted the escalating simultaneous dialogue. "Ahahaha, you two are hilarious!!!"

Sasuke glared at Naruto while Tenten clutched her sides in laughter. He was getting odd looks from most of the classroom, too. Especially from the girls.

"See what you've done, Naruto. She thinks I'm 'hilarious'."

"Well, it's a nice change from 'ramen-hating bastard'."

"I'm not hilarious!" Sasuke hissed. "I'm the cool, quiet guy."

It was Naruto's turn to explode in laughter. "You, cool!? You've gotta be kidding me! You're not cool! I am cool."

He then pointed to Shino in the back seat. "Shino is cool."

Shino nodded. Hinata raised an eyebrow.

Naruto pointed at Chouji. "Chouji is cool, too."

Chouji beamed. Shikamaru smiled without opening his eyes. Nice one, Naruto.

Naruto then pointed at Tenten, who was still chuckling a little bit. "Tenten is super cool."

The weapon-mistress-to-be grinned in appreciation.

"Anko is cool. She's completely insane, but she's cool. Itachi-nii-san was, like almost as cool as ramen is awesome……until the mass murdering, of course. Now he's just badass. Like the old man. He's not cool at all, but if he's the Hokage he's got to be pretty damn badass, ne?"

Sasuke knew he was supposed to explode in anger and reduce Naruto's face to an unrecognizable bloody mass. Any single mentioning of his older brother's name made his blood boil and his face contort in an ugly mask of cold anger. However, he just didn't feel that when dealing with Naruto. Maybe Naruto just saw him and Itachi from a completely different perspective, or maybe there was just something about Naruto that made Sasuke not hate him………much.

He still wanted to kick Naruto's ass for being so damn annoying, though.

"You? You're not cool. You're just an Uchiha pretty boy."

"You're so dead."

"Yeah, yeah, you always say that."

"Hey! I'm cool, too!"

"Yeah, sure, whatever, Kiba."

Tenten giggled. Naruto was still damn funny. "So, about these seals…?"

"Ah, right! These are storage seals. Haven't they taught you these, Ten-chan?"

Tenten only shook her head.

"Umm……" A sheepish Sakura raised her head as if she were in the middle of class. "I……I think storage seals are covered on the last year……"

"Oh." That was Naruto. "Anyway, it's really cool! And really useful! You can put almost anything in these, so you can carry lots and lots of things!"

"Hmm……" Tenten leaned over Naruto's shoulder to check the scroll more closely.

Shino very subtly moved a bit to the left. Yes, it was definitely getting warmer. And, yes, his insects were very wary of Hinata for some reason.

"But……" Tenten muttered. "If you have to make all these weird symbols to seal a single thing, then it's not really that useful."

Everyone around Naruto (yes, even Sasuke) nodded. Naruto shook his head.

"Oh, no, no, no! This isn't a single seal! This is a whole seal array! I have lots of things stored in this scroll!"

He made the ram seal and touched another part of the scroll. A square shaped bag made of cloth appeared.

"Like a spare change of clothes."

Another hand seal, another tap, another poof of smoke. "The scroll with my notes on Fuuinjutsu."

And one last time. "Extra Pocky, of course!"

Sasuke growled.

"You just have to be careful when making the array, so that you don't end up making a mess with all the things you want to seal. Of course, it's more complicated if you want to add vectors and sub-matrixes and stuff……"

"What's a vector?" The ever-curious Sakura asked. Tenten tugged at Naruto's right arm, showing that she shared the pink-haired girl's curiosity.

Naruto frowned. He was trying to come up with a way to explain one of the most basic concepts in the most basic form of Fuuinjutsu. "Oh, right!"

He did the ram seal one more time. This time, a larger explosion of smoke covered the scroll without Naruto touching it in any moment. Naruto had summoned a blank piece of paper, a brush and a small flask of black ink. He quickly made six parallel vertical lines followed by six horizontal lines crossing the first ones.

"Let's say this is a seal array, and each little square is, like, a slot where I can put a single thing. There should be, umm, twenty-five slots, right?"

"Yup." Tenten answered for everyone.

"Right. So, the simplest storage array does just that: it puts things in these slots and lets me unseal them and seal them back whenever I want. The thing is; I have to seal and unseal things one at a time. So, if I wanted to, umm, empty the whole thing, it would take a long time, right?"

"Right."

Naruto nodded and smiled. "So, you can also make the array so that you can seal and unseal whole lines of squares at the same time, either this way…" He slid the brush over a column or squares. "…or this way." He did the same motion over a row. "These are vectors."

"The whole array is also called a matrix. So, a sub-matrix is a smaller matrix inside the big one."

"How big is the array in your scroll?"

Sasuke suddenly became the center of attention of almost the entire classroom (plus Tenten). "……what!?"

Naruto chuckled. "Mine's a 6-by-6 array with full vector configuration as well as 1-by-3, 3-by-1 and 3-by-3 options."

Even if he was without sight, he knew his classmates (plus Tenten) wouldn't get a word of what he had just said, so he quickly explained himself.

"It's a 6-by-6, so I can store up to thirty-six things. I can summon any row and any column at the same time, and I can summon things in groups of three or groups of nine. It was a homework Shiki-sensei made me do, but I keep it with me because it's damn useful……and it took me a whole month of work –including a whole week of all-nighters– to get it done. Ugh, seals are a pain………"

Shikamaru shuddered. At least his family techniques weren't that complicated.

Sasuke narrowed his eyes. "You keep learning all sorts of interesting techniques, Naruto."

"Oh, come on, Sasuke; don't tell me you didn't cackle in glee when you realized you had your family's jutsu scrolls all for yourself."

Sasuke actually blushed. Her mother had shot him odd looks for weeks after she heard his maniacal laughter.

"Ne, Naruto……"

"Hmm? What is it, Ten-chan?"

Tenten's gears were turning. "You……you said you can store anything in these seals? Like, let's say……weapons? Lots of weapons?" By the look on her face, any adult would say she was closer to sexual release than any nine-year-old should be.

Naruto's grin was almost evil. "See, Sasuke? That's why Ten-chan's waaay cooler than you."

While most of the classmates eventually lost interest and returned to their lunches, Naruto, Sasuke, Tenten and Sakura spent their lunchtime (something they would regret later) talking about the ways in which weapon specialists used seals. Sakura thought she had hit the jackpot. She was learning and spending time with Sasuke! He was even looking at her straight in the eyes!

Eventually (too soon, Sakura would say), Tenten said her goodbyes, not before making sure Naruto promised one more time to stop by her place sooner or later (preferably sooner).

Naruto's Senrigan and Sasuke's eyes were still following her departing form as she approached the back door when Tenten suddenly cried in pain and surprise and fell forward, barely putting her hands in front of her in time to not fall flat on her face.

"Ten-chan!!" Naruto rushed to the back of the classroom to check on his friend.

Tenten was rubbing her left leg. Naruto couldn't see her worried and puzzled expression, though.

"It's nothing…… a sudden cramp, that's all."

"A-Ano……" A quiet, shy voice drew Tenten's attention. "A-Are you okay……?" Hinata, from her seat (Tenten had fallen right behind her), offered a small hand to the older girl. Tenten blinked.

Whoa……not like Neji-san at all. Tenten thought while she accepted the aid and let Hinata pull her up. Whoa, she's pretty strong!

Hinata, skilled actress she is, didn't find it hard to hide her disappointment. She had aimed to totally disable Tenten's left leg. Apparently she still had to practice hitting pressure points at high speed. The fact that not even Shino next to her noticed her lightning-fast strike was a small victory, though.

---

Shutting off his Senrigan (no need to waste chakra, after all), Naruto let his body rest on the grass.

Naruto didn't celebrate his birthday. That's not to say he spent his birthdays like he spent any ordinary day. The tenth day of Kannazuki is one of Konoha's holidays, after all. That means no lectures at the Academy.

He knew he had many reasons to be happy on his ninth birthday. Two years before, his life changed forever. However, he couldn't help but fall prey to a bitter melancholy. Last year he had been too excited with his Academy registration and his official adoption as a member of the Houraisan Clan to think about…well, anything else.

Unfortunately, it was different that year. For some reason (he blamed an evil god whose sole purpose in life is making him miserable) he couldn't stop his mind from reviewing the looks, the voices, the insults, the contempt, the shunning, the disgust, the bullies and the occasional thrown object. The looks had faded into a blurry, indistinguishable form, and the voices had been reduced to a generic male voice and a general female one. However, they still bothered him, and he didn't know why.

He had no need to worry about ugly looks anymore thanks to his lack of sight. His overall situation had improved since that fateful day two years before, and especially since he officially became the Heir of Houraisan. However, there were still those who didn't care about the fact he had been adopted by a "clan of nobodies."

While it was obvious to him that Shiki-sensei and Saya-kaa-chan had some sort of reputation among shinobi, it was just as obvious they were utterly unknown by the common public. While civilians treat all members of great clans with the utmost respect, Shiki and Saya were just ordinary people to them. Even worse, they now were the adoptive parents of the "demon brat." Therefore, the cold, contemptuous attitude Konoha had used on Naruto had now spread to his small family, too. While Shiki rarely visited places other than the Hokage Tower, Saya spent a lot more time with Naruto and she, too, had become the object of looks of scorn and disgust. Naruto couldn't see this, but he could feel it. He could also hear the things they uttered when she walked by his side. Sometimes he felt like just letting loose and kick their asses. Somehow, whenever such thoughts reached his mind, Saya noticed and squeezed his shoulder. He once asked her about that, wondering if she had some sort of badass mind-reading power. Saya simply smiled gently and said "A mother knows."

He didn't really understand, but her words made him love her even more.

Nevertheless, in the end, the situation hadn't changed much. Only now he had a reason to persevere and not let the words of other people get to him. He had a family.

Then why did it bother him so much?

There were probably several reasons. The most immediate would be Sakura. While they were never the best of friends, they had had a good relationship ever since he joined the Academy. She would gladly help him whenever he had questions about the lectures (Pity for his blindness? Eagerness to show off her book smarts? Naruto didn't give a damn); he would help as mediator so that she could have a decent conversation with Sasuke, and, since they shared a common friend in Ino (and the three of them shared a love for flowers and plants in general), they generally had a good time together.

So, when one day Sakura started acting distant towards him, to the point of actively avoiding him, he got worried. The only explanation he got from her consisted of nine painful words.

"My parents won't let me talk to you anymore."

Obviously, Sakura had made the terrible mistake of mentioning Naruto to her family.

Naruto didn't care anymore. He had gotten used to being hated. But something still bothered him.

……why?

No one would give him a reason: his adoptive parents, old man Hokage, Anko, the nice Hyuuga ladies……and that pissed him off.

This is the reason he didn't celebrate his birthday. This and the fact that every person he would have liked to invite to a celebration of any sort would be busy attending the Golden Festival.

"Stupid Kyuubi……had to die the day I was born………"

A certain nine-tailed Kitsune was quite amused by this comment.

He had departed from the house after dinner and cake, claiming that he wanted to take a walk. His parents didn't say anything, and he was thankful for that. While day and night no longer made any difference to him (Senrigan works the same no matter the time of day), he had a good idea of what time it was. He could even hear the sounds of celebration coming from the village as a hushed humming. It was a shame he wouldn't get to see the fireworks (Mikoto and Sasuke had surprised the whole village by announcing there would be fireworks that year). He was sure the bastard was looking forward to showing off his Katon skills in front of the entire population of Konoha. If just for that, Naruto knew the show would be quite interesting.

He was about to release a long, bored sigh……until he caught the sound of footsteps.

"Who's there!?" Naruto shouted in alarm. He rolled to get on one knee and quickly made the seals for Senrigan (while mentally kicking himself for cancelling it on the first place). It was simple mental reaction. He had little reason to assume the newcomer was in any way a threat (or any person other than Shiki or Saya), but he had been thinking some rather depressing thoughts just before.

The footsteps ceased.

"Naruto-nii-chan?"

Naruto felt awfully cold for some reason, to the point that he interrupted his hand seal sequence. Something in her voice…… "Hana-chan!?"

Hanabi gasped and ran over to familiar arms. "Naruto-nii-chan!!!"

Naruto stayed still, speechless, while the inconsolable girl cried on his chest. Such was the extent of his disconcert.

"Ha-Hana-chan, how……why……what?"

"Naruto-nii-chan, I was scared! I called your name, but I couldn't find you!!!" This was her answer before she buried her face back on his chest for a second round of wailing.

Naruto was surprised, confused, and more than a little scared. It was a kaleidoscope of emotions that bothered him greatly.

If just for that, Naruto swore he wouldn't allow anything to make Hanabi cry.

Not again.

Taking advantage of her stillness, he wrapped his arms around her small body and joined hands to redo his seals.

"Fuuton. Fuujin Senrigan no Jutsu."

"Hana-chan, why are you here…?"

"'cause it's your birthday!" Hanabi cried, looking up at the mildly glowing orbs that replaced Naruto's eyes. "I wanted to……" She hiccupped.

Naruto blinked. He quickly reconstructed the events with the little tidbit of information he had just received. Hanabi wanted to see him on his birthday (as she is too young to go to the Festival with Hiashi and Hinata), so she somehow evaded her guard (which was probably a bit lax due to the holiday) and went through the back gate to the Houraisan Clan Grounds. Of course, in such a big forest at night and with no idea where to go, she quickly got lost.

Naruto expanded his field until he caught three other human-shaped signatures. The four Hyuuga shinobi had probably found Hanabi a while ago, but their training specified with excessive detail when they were allowed to intervene and when they were not. Had Hanabi succumbed to her fear and begun crying in the middle of the forest, they would have rushed to her aid. However, she was not alone anymore, so they would just watch her from the shadows.

"The Houraisan Clan will see to Hanabi-sama's wellbeing from now on." Naruto spoke loudly in his best authoritative voice……which wasn't really that good. "You may leave."

Normally, the Hyuuga guards would dismiss the words of a child. This child, however, happened to be the heir of an allied great clan. Naruto had dismissed them. Hanabi was no longer their responsibility. Should something happen to her, the blame would fall on Naruto's clan. The words of an heir were a binding contract.

When he was sure the guards were gone, Naruto compressed his perception jutsu to no more than five meters radius. Hanabi had stopped crying and just looked up at him with mild confusion. The blonde tried a comforting smile.

"Well, you found me, Hana-chan."

Hanabi's big white eyes blinked like the flutter of a moth's wings. It took her a few seconds to make something, anything, of the simple sentence Naruto had uttered.

She smiled.

Naruto, who had decided to focus his perception solely on Hanabi (there wasn't anything interesting to watch elsewhere, anyway), managed to notice that it wasn't the usual wide grin the youngest of Hiashi's daughter's always sported. He would even say it was a shy smile.

"……happy birthday, nii-chan."

Naruto swelled with unbound happiness. Sure, it was nice being congratulated by his adoptive parents (and he didn't mind Saya's asphyxiating smothering one bit). The Third Hokage was too busy that day to pay him a visit, but he at least sent a note (with kanji large enough for Naruto to read) and a gift (the birthday cake the Houraisan family enjoyed right after dinner). He also got a note signed by Hiashi and Hinata, as well as a present from the Hyuuga heiress (he was surprised Hinata had figured out the recipe for the Elixir of Forceful Rest; a fancy name for a sleeping concotion that grants the benefit of a full eight hours of sleep in half the time. She really had a penchant for those things). He thought nobody else knew of his birthday, so his surprise was immense when he also got an interesting package containing a scroll and a note.

Happy Birthday.

Thank you.

While the note itself didn't give any hint on the sender, the content of the scroll allowed Naruto to figure out his identity (an identity that pleased Naruto immensely). He was incapable of using its contents, but the scroll with Katon: Boukouka no Jutsu joined his slowly-growing library of precious documents. Besides, even if he didn't figure it out from the scroll, the big box of homemade nikuman with a suggestion to share it with the whole family signed by one Uchiha Mikoto was an obvious giveaway.

Sure, it had been quite the nice birthday. Still, Hanabi was the first person other than his parents that congratulated him face-to-face. The childish honesty and sincere affection touched him in a way no birthday note, gift or card could hope to match.

Any traces of his earlier depression were utterly obliterated. How could he possibly be depressed when he had an angel like Hyuuga Hanabi?

"Hana-chan……thank you."

Hanabi's grin widened a bit (still not nearly as wide as her usual grins) and she lifted her body to plant a peck on his right cheek.

"Eh?"

"That was from Tsuki-san."

Hyuuga Tsuki, 21 years old. When Hanabi (being the loose-mouth she is) made a comment on Naruto's approaching birthday to one of her attendants, there was a commotion within the female ranks of the Hyuuga. What could they do for the child on his birthday, without the Council of Elders (or the rest of Konoha) noticing?

The answer was simple (?). Naruto spent the most time with Hanabi, so Hanabi would give Naruto a kiss for each and every single one of them. The little, innocent girl couldn't figure out how kisses could a birthday present make, but she had been assured Naruto would like it, so she went along with it. They had also said she might come to like it too, but, after the first kiss, she couldn't make anything of it.

Hanabi kissed the exact same spot on Naruto's right cheek.

"Ah…"

"From Chitose-san."

Hyuuga Chitose, 33 years old.

And again.

"Uhh……"

"From Mikami-san."

Hyuuga Mikami, 28 years.

Before Naruto could open his mouth to say anything, his lips were locked by Hanabi's for two astoundingly soft, mildly sweet and slightly moist seconds.

Hanabi paid no heed to the dumbfounded Naruto. After all, it was kind of difficult to tell he was dumbfounded, not having eyes and all that.

"That was from Mayumi-chan. She told me to kiss you on the lips." Hanabi shrugged. "I don't really get the difference." She explained. "I think it's weird, but I've seen other people doing it."

Naruto, having being brought back to Earth by Hanabi's words, actually put some thought into that. "Now that you say it……I do remember having seen adults do the whole kiss-on-the-mouth thing. Yeah, I mean, what's the difference?

Without any prior warning, Hanabi kissed him again, this time for a full four seconds.

"You feel any difference, nii-chan?"

Naruto frowned and concentrated, as if he were working on one of Shiki's assignments. "Well, I was surprised, but that's because you kissed me all suddenly and that……but, uhhh……I think……could you-mmmhhmhmm!!!"

Hanabi kissed him again.

"Hana-chan! Tell me before you do that again!!!"

"I'm gonna do it again." Hanabi immediately declared.

"Eh?-mmhmm!!!"

After the fourth kiss, while Naruto struggled with a sudden lack of oxygen, a heart that beat faster for some reason and a ticklish feeling he couldn't quite decipher, Hanabi frowned in the standard Naruto-ish way (she's absorbing more and more traits from her sensei, it seems), resting her left elbow on her right hand and her head on the left hand. It was an interesting posture, considering that she was sitting on Naruto's lap on the first place.

"It's kinda……ticklish?"

Naruto blinked and smiled a bit. "Oh, you get that too! Weird……we should ask Saya-kaa-chan or something."

"Hmm……oh, anyway!"

Hanabi switched to the left cheek this time.

"That one's from Otsune-san."

"Ha-Hana-chan!"

Hanabi just grinned. For some reason, the ticklish feeling appeared after that kiss, too (or maybe it had been there the whole time; she just hadn't noticed it). It wasn't an unpleasant feeling, so there. In fact, while she didn't like tickles (a consequence of being extremely ticklish and everyone else taking advantage of that), this particular ticklish feeling was mild and nice.

She was starting to enjoy this kissing game.

---

Across a small table placed in front of the main entrance of the Houraisan house, Shiki and Hiashi chatted over tea. They also watched over Hinata's practice. That day she was just practicing the standard "circle walking" of Hakkeshou around a particularly large bonfire. Even from a distance, it could be seen that the heat was bothering her quite a bit.

"I can't help but notice Saya-san's absence." Hiashi stated. "Why isn't she watching over Hinata's training?"

"Well, actually, Saya hasn't watched over Hinata's training for quite a while." Shiki explained. "She has made it clear that Hinata must learn how to shape Fire-nature chakra. Her Karyuu training won't be resumed until Hinata fulfills that condition."

"However…" Shiki took a sip of his tea. "There is actually another reason Saya is absent today. In fact, she's locked herself in the dojo since the early morning."

"And what would that reason be?"

Shiki grimaced. "Jiraiya actually published his…umm……romance novel."

Hiashi twitched. He was quite aware of the nature of the Sannin's……literary career. "………is that so."

"He sent Saya a free copy. She's been reading it since sunrise."

"Oh really?"

"Yeah really."

They watched Hinata in silence for a while. Her plain blue training outfit was soaked in sweat; her panting marked the pace of her motions and the rhythm of the swings of her arms.

"………where's Naruto?"

"He's actually in your house, Hiashi. When he came back from classes and noticed Saya wasn't around, he decided to just go get Hanabi."

Hiashi nodded in acknowledgement. "He takes it quite seriously. Hanabi's training, that is."

"Did you expect anything else?"

"Of course not. I would be quite disappointed otherwise."

The dojo's door was harshly slid open, revealing Saya and her disturbingly wide smile.

"Ahhhh, that was great!!!"

Hiashi found Shiki's perturbed expression quite amusing. Saya approached the two while patting her orange book affectionately.

"That was one good read."

Shiki sighed in defeat. "Really."

"Really!" Saya decided not to get a seat for herself and just claimed her husband's lap. "I mean, gratuitous sex aside, Jiraiya is actually a pretty decent writer."

Shiki and Hiashi rolled their eyes.

"It's porn with plot!" Saya declared happily. Then she dropped her voice as if she wanted to share a secret. "And it was quite educational too. I actually learned some pretty interesting things……"

"………I'm not getting a decent rest tonight, am I?" Shiki whined.

"Nope!"

"Figures."

Hiashi chuckled and looked back at his daughter, only for his expression to fade into a frown. The married couple followed his eyes. Hinata, having fallen prey to exhaustion and heat, lay on the grass, breathing heavily and clutching the soil with her small fists.

Saya sighed and jumped off her "seat," approaching the fallen girl with a fast gait and a stern expression.

"So, how's it going?"

"……not………yet…………"

Saya rolled her eyes. "Girl, I've been training you for almost four years. I've taught you all the Karyuu you can learn without Fire Manipulation. Your speed; top notch, and it will get even better as you grow up. Dexterity, reflexes, coordination, agility, flexibility; all those things you've obviously improved. You could beat any of your classmates, heck, any Academy student (…except maybe that cousin of yours Hiashi mentioned……) and maybe even most Genin! Naruto wouldn't stand a chance against you as he is right now."

Hinata's drowsy mind and exhausted body reacted to the name. Naruto-kun……

"If it's standard Taijutsu, I cannot teach you anything more. I've been waiting for you to figure out how to mold elemental-natured chakra, but you've disappointed me. Heck, I even took pity on you and taught you the basics of Houraisan no Doryuu just to teach you anything!"

"Naruto figured out Wind chakra in two months. If what Naruto told me is true, Uchiha Sasuke figured out Fire chakra in less than a week. I never asked you to be like them. All Uchihas find it ridiculously easy to use Fire-nature chakra, and Naruto's just………it's like the wind loves him or something. His normal chakra control sucks, but his control of wind chakra makes me look like a fucking civilian. Suna shinobi will just hate him, I'm sure of it."

The lack of further reaction from Hinata almost angered Saya. However, she did know just what buttons to push. She had let Hinata try to work things out on her own. It hadn't worked. Now Saya would make Hinata work things out, the hard way.

"Damn it, Hinata, I'm not asking you to figure out a second element! I know that takes time. Every day, before going to the Academy, Naruto leaves two clones to work on Lightning manipulation, and he's no closer to getting it than he was three years ago! But this is FIRE, Hinata! Your natural element! And you've been training every single day for almost four years."

"You've reached the limit of my patience, Hyuuga Hinata." Saya turned her back to the fallen girl. "Leave now and do not come tomorrow. I'm done teaching you. I have no time for useless students."

Saya walked a few steps and went straight for the kill.

"My son has no need for weak companions."

Hinata's body stiffened. She could hear Saya's steps as she walked away. Dismissing her.

Discarding her.

Just like everyone else.

Everyone but Naruto-kun.

"No………"

Saya stopped. "Excuse me?"

"I……I want to be strong……I want otou-sama to be proud of me. I don't want to be sad all the time."

"No……" Hinata hissed as she struggled to get up, channeling chakra to her arms and legs for a little extra push.

"You and I……we want the same things, Hina-chan……"

"You will train me, Saya-sensei……" Loose bangs of bluish black hair covered Hinata's pale eyes. Her clothes were a mess and her skin was stained with dirt mixed with sweat.

"……really." Saya sighed in obvious boredom.

I promised……I swore……I would become strong. I'll protect Naruto-kun. I must become strong!!!

"I will become strong!!!" Hinata screamed desperately as she rushed towards Saya. The Taijutsu Goddess rolled her eyes.

With a chakra-aided burst of speed, Hinata struck with her fingers of her right hand; a Jyuuken strike. Saya effortlessly leaned to her left to dodge it. Hinata hadn't finished her first strike when she clenched her left fist and aimed right below Saya's sternum. The older woman had to move a step back. Hinata stopped her punch half way and turned it into an elbow thrust, and Saya corrected her evasive maneuver by leaning a bit to the right, but Hinata immediately followed up by quickly raising her forearm in an attempt to hit Saya with her left fist's knuckles. Saya's reflexes made it so that Hinata only grazed her right cheek instead of smashing her lips.

Hinata turned clockwise to strike at Saya's right ankle with her right heel, but Saya was more preoccupied about Hinata's right hand and the Jyuuken strike aimed at her liver. She hadn't even noticed Hinata activating Byakugan. The Lady Houraisan moved her right leg away from Hinata's strike and her right hand swatted Hinata's offending fingers away before they could reach her. Never interrupting her spin, Hinata charged both hands with chakra and began a sequence of high-speed wide hand swipes which Saya promptly dodged and parried.

"Your daughter is fast, Hiashi. That was a flawless execution of Ryoutotsugeki"

Hiashi didn't respond. His superior eyes didn't lose any detail of the unusual bout between master and student.

Deciding that enough was enough, Saya decided to go on the offensive. She applied a bit more strength to her parries to push away Hinata's arms, disrupt her sequence and create an opening. She tried a right palm thrust to Hinata's face, but the Hyuuga heiress surprised her by bending her body backwards.

At a speed that mesmerized even Saya, Hinata struck her sensei's offending forearm with the tip of a finger. Saya winced at the familiar sensation of being struck by Jyuuken. She knew Hinata was unable to seal the individual Tenketsu, but that didn't make it any less damaging……and damn painful.

"Nice." Shiki commented matter-of-factly.

Hiashi remained silent.

Using the same hand that struck Saya, Hinata grabbed her master's forearm and, at the same time she raised her upper body, lifted her right leg for a roundhouse kick. The motion pulled Saya towards Hinata, and the Taijutsu Master had to block the kick with her left arm. Hinata quickly dropped her leg to regain stability. Saya felt herself being pulled towards Hinata one last time before the small girl let go of her arm. The pull bent Saya's body so that she was almost at eye level with Hinata. Saya took noticed of the clenched left fist, but she also noticed the right hand that aimed a Jyuuken strike to her forehead. Saya ducked, and she knew she had done exactly what Hinata had wanted her to do.

Shiki couldn't notice; his eyes are not as perceptive. He just knew; she was his wife, after all. He could read her better than anyone. Hiashi, on the other side, did notice. In the instant before Hinata unleashed her attack, Saya switched to "Goddess of Taijutsu" mode.

"KONGOUKEN!!!"

Hiashi, decades of Hyuuga instruction aside, couldn't hide his surprise. Was it his age catching up to him, or his little daughter's fist had created a shockwave?

Hinata's frenzy was somehow abated with the release of the powerful Diamond Fist, the precursor to Tsunade's legendary super strength technique. She was a bit confused. She had expected to hit Saya's chest and send her flying a few dozen yards, but her mighty fist only hit air. Where was Saya anyway?

Hiashi had barely been able to notice Saya's sudden hyper-speed movement, ducking Hinata's fist and slithering behind his daughter. Hinata didn't have a chance. Even with Byakugan, her reaction speed still wasn't good enough.

"Kyah!?" Hinata cried when she felt her feet being swept away. The next thing she saw was Saya's left heel being dropped on her chest with the force of a sledgehammer.

Shiki winced and Hiashi frowned after Hinata's cry of pain reached their ears. Even with her sight obscured by her tears, Hinata could see Saya looking down at her fallen form.

"That was pointless. You just pissed me off, Hinata. Now get lost."

Hinata's right hand clutching her heel prevented Saya from walking away. Saya was about to resort to a tirade of insults before kicking the girl away, but she couldn't.

Two voids.

Two voids looked up at her.

Hinata's widened eyes; the empty, lifeless expression on her face; the aura of emptiness and desolation that the girl irradiated scared the hell out of the Taijutsu Goddess. No child should have been able to project such emotions.

But Hinata was no ordinary child. She was a girl drowning in the sea of her fears and insecurities.

"Let's become strong. Together." Naruto's smile, encouraging her.

Naruto-kun………

"My son has no need for weak companions." Discarding her, like everyone else.

If I am weak……Naruto-kun won't need me………

"We will fight and we'll see who the best ninja is, Naruto-kun! It's a date!" That girl, Tenten. She and Naruto had many things in common.

If I am weak……Naruto-kun will have no use for me………

"Naruto-nii-chan, you're the best!" Naruto loves Hanabi's smile. This troubles Hinata, for she knows she'll never be able to smile like that.

If I stay weak……Naruto-kun won't want me………

"………I don't like you." Naruto broke her heart. Turned it into shambles, and then reformed it, stronger and happier than ever.

For that, she was his.

Stronger……must become stronger……stronger……stronger……stronger!!!!

"Stronger." Hinata whispered. In a flash, she was on her two feet, attacking Saya with a low sweeping kick. Saya took a few steps backwards; instinct and shock saved her this time. It also gave Hinata the time she needed to properly stand up.

"Let's become strong. Together."

"Stronger."

Saya gasped. Hinata's speed had suddenly increased!

The heiress jumped for a high knee kick to Saya's face, which the taller woman blocked with both hands. Hinata, still in midair, used the same leg for a second attack, retracting it before making a horizontal sweep which Saya had to block with both arms. Saya had to push the offending leg with one arm while she used the other one to block a second knee kick to her stomach, this time with the other leg.

"Together."

"Stronger." Hinata repeated like a mantra. With both feet back on the ground, Hinata crouched down like a stalking cat before pouncing with a chakra-infused right palm strike. Saya dodged to her left and Hinata immediately followed with a wide swipe using the same chakra-infused arm. Saya moved backwards and Hinata went after her with a left kick to the side of her face, which she blocked with her right arm. Not wasting an instant, Hinata slammed both hands on the ground, using them to support her body so that she could make a powerful 270-degress right heel kick. Saya ducked, and she felt the pull of the vacuum created by the chakra expelled by Hinata's foot.

She's never moved like this before! How did she get this fast!?

"Body Activation." Shiki answered Saya's unasked question.

"What?" Hiashi inquired.

"Your daughter has gotten as close a person can get to open the Celestial Gates without actually opening them."

"Together."

"Stronger."

Ignoring the chill she got by looking at Hinata's hollow pupils, Saya stood up between Hinata's spread-open legs, to which the small girl replied by attempting a scissor kick. Saya jumped over Hinata's body and made an ample spin to gather angular momentum for a powerful heel drop. However, Hinata, who was still using her arms to support the weight of her body, applied more strength to her upper limbs to spin her body away from the incoming attack. Grass and dirt exploded a foot to Hinata's right.

"Hiashi, you must be familiar with the idea of humans accomplishing unusual and extraordinary feats when under extreme stress or when their lives or the lives of significant others are in dire threat. Very few are able to summon that kind of power willingly. I wonder what has triggered it in Hinata-chan……"

Hinata once again dropped her body in a way reminiscent of a stalking predator, before attempting –and succeeding– to knock Saya off-balance with a sweeping kick. While Hinata lunged at the falling body of her opponent for a disabling Jyuuken strike, Saya copied Hinata's actions from a while ago and used her right arm to stop her fall and support her body. Hinata ducked the first backwards roundhouse kick, but she couldn't react in time when Saya suddenly changed the direction of her upside-down spin and slammed her right foot under Hinata's chin, sending her rolling several yards away.

"That's enough, Hinata."

"Together."

"Stronger." Hinata repeated one more time as she stood up, apparently unfazed by the hit, despite the swelling rapidly forming under her left cheek and the line of blood trickling down a corner of her mouth.

Strong enough for Naruto-kun………the strong person I want to become……stronger, stronger, stronger!!!

Hinata smiled gently. It was the demure, elegant smile of a Hyuuga lady.

Combined with the far-away look on her white eyes, it made for quite the unsettling sight.

"……stronger."

With another explosion of speed, Hinata resumed the assault. A rapid high jump left kick was blocked, but Hinata quickly pulled away and fell back on both hands and feet. Saya made an ample circular motion with both arms to the same side. Hiashi and Hinata would have made nothing of it if they didn't have Byakugan active (and Hiashi had seen a similar kata before). They saw the chakra gathering and swirling in between the two arms.

Had Naruto been there, he would have seen the air currents following Saya's wind-nature chakra and feeding from it to gain strength.

"Furyuushou!!!"

The powerful gale knocked Hinata away until her back crashed with a tree. Possessed by strength and will she didn't know she had, Hinata didn't let her body falter. However, a 'thunk' sound caught her attention. A kunai had pinned her pants to the trunk. The time it took her to pull out the projectile was the time it took Saya to close in on her and slam her knee in her gut.

Hiashi stood in alarm at the sound of the agonic cry released by his daughter, soon hampered by the lack of air in her lungs. Shiki narrowed his eyes.

"Don't fuck with me, Hinata, I said that's en-"

"Stronger."

Supporting her hands on the thigh connected to the knee buried in her gut, Hinata propelled herself upwards in a gracious flip over Saya. The older woman growled and turned to hit Hinata on her way back down, but the girl had already turned her body around to face her sensei and attack with a wide left kick. Saya's combat instincts kicked in and screamed a frighteningly clear "DUCK!!!"

Saya gasped when the air over her head exploded. Her head vibrated and she lost her sense of hearing for an instant. The distinct smell of burning wood reached her nostrils.

That……that kick was loaded with Fire chakra!

In an instant, Saya's disgust faded to be replaced with surprise and a pinch of pride. "Hinata, you did it-"

Hinata's left hand clasped Saya's raised right hand (the hand she had intended to use to attack Hinata a moment before) and slammed it on the tree trunk behind her. When Hinata raised her right hand and the few wisps of sunlight that made it through the tree ocean of Training Area 69 shone on the gleaming metal of the kunai she held, the three adults felt authentic fear. Saya, Hiashi and Shiki froze in shock and disbelief. No amount of hardened training and shinobi experience prepared them for something like that.

"HINATA!!!" Saya cried, more of a plea than anything else.

"……stronger."

It was Saya's turn to scream when Hinata impaled the weapon on her own hand, nailing both herself and her sensei to the tree.

Ignoring the tears forming in her eyes, Saya looked down at the shorter girl. Hinata, with bloodshot, teary eyes and gritted teeth, was already poised to strike with her free hand, ignoring the intense pain she was feeling and the pulsating throb of the self-inflicted wound. Saya didn't have Byakugan, but she could feel that Hiashi could see: Hinata's right palm was charged with Fire-nature chakra to the saturation point.

"Hinata……" Saya pleaded again, but the girl showed no reaction.

There was no turning back for Hinata. In her mind, in her eyes, Saya had disappeared. The one in front of her was the enemy. The enemy stood in the way of her path to strength. The enemy stood between her and her Naruto-kun. The enemy wanted to keep her away from her Naruto-kun. The enemy wanted to step on her dream, crush her joy, destroy her happiness.

The enemy was in the way of their promise.

"Let's become strong. Together."

The enemy had to disappear.

---

"Ne, Hana-chan."

"Hmm?" Very naked six-years-old Hyuuga Hanabi uttered. With eyes closed, she allowed Naruto to rinse her hair.

"We are supposed to be training." Naruto winced. A bit of shampoo almost got in his right "eye."

Hanabi pouted. "We play now. We train after dinner, Naruto-nii-chan."

"But I came earlier so that we could finish earlier!"

"Mou, Naruto-kun!" A voice from behind alerted Naruto an instant before a pair of breasts literally engulfed his head from behind. "It's always training, training, training with you! Relax a bit!"

The other ladies at the hot springs giggled as they watched the trio. Naruto looked up at the owner of said breasts, seventeen-year-old Hyuuga Mayumi, an unusually……bouncy member of the "Greatest of Konoha's Great Clans."

In more than one way.

"But, Mayumi-chaaaaaan……." Naruto whined.

"But nothing! Now be quiet, wash Hanabi-sama's hair and let me rinse yours!"

"Haaaaai."

"Really, Naruto-kun, your hair has such a lovely color……you have to let me take care of it properly!"

"Haaaaaaaaaai."

"And you have to be nice to Hanabi-sama. She doesn't have any friends other than you, so she cares for you very very much. Right, Hanabi-sama? You like Naruto-kun a lot, ne?"

"Yup!"

"Haaaaaaaaaaai." Naruto repeated in a droning tone.

"And if you behave, maybe I'll let you wash my body……" Mayumi added; her voice laced with a mischievous tone.

Naruto stopped massaging Hanabi's scalp (much to her chagrin) and turned to look at Mayumi face to face, tilting his head to the side as he did so.

"How is that a prize?"

The other ladies chuckled amongst themselves. Had it been any other male, Mayumi would have probably pounded him multiple times. However……

"Kyaaa, you're so cute!!!"

A second later, an angry Hanabi was struggling to pull out a Naruto who was struggling to breath with his face buried in a pair of F-cups.

---

Saya blinked.

"What is it?"

The woman looked at her husband, who had voiced the question. Ahead of them, Hiashi carried his unconscious daughter to Naruto's room.

"Ah, nothing, nothing……they're tingling."

"Tingling?"

Saya smirked and tapped a side of her head. "Perverted senses."

Shiki rolled his eyes. "Oh."

Saya's smile promptly disappeared. She had been seriously afraid back there. If Hiashi hadn't arrived in time to knock Hinata out with a precise pressure point strike, she would have taken quite the blow. It would have been severely threatening, if not outright lethal.

The three adults shared the same question in their minds.

"I will take my leave now." Hiashi declared after gently placing his daughter on the bed Naruto normally sleeps in. "She should wake up soon. I'll leave my guard around; they will escort her back home."

Shiki followed Hiashi to the entrance, leaving Saya alone with her student.

"Hiashi."

The clan leader stopped and turned to face the young-looking man under the doorframe.

"What are you thinking?"

If there was something Shiki admired about Hiashi, it was the way he had honed the art of concealing his emotions to utmost perfection.

"………I'm thinking………I might not know my daughter as well as I originally thought."

Those were his departing words. Shiki chose not to go back to the room. He guessed Saya could use some alone time with her student. And maybe he would be able to work on that theory for sealing magnetic fields that seemed to elude him………

At about the same time, Hinata woke up with a moan. The first thing she thought as she lifted her body to a sitting position was that if she was going to have to deal with that killer headache, she'd rather stay asleep.

"Hinata."

The girl skipped a beat. As soon as she heard the voice and realized she had just woken up from unconsciousness, she remembered everything.

Saya is no kunoichi. She has no training on reading other people's faces. Her skill in that respect is the product of plenty of years of experience. Besides, reading Hinata's emotions wasn't much of a challenge at all.

The girl was shaking and refused to lift her head and face her mentor.

"You really scared me back there."

It might have felt like an ordinary comment to the ignorant, but Hinata could trace the hint of venom in Saya's melodious tone. Tears formed in her eyes and she clutched the cloth of her dirty and mangled training clothes.

"I'm sorry-"

"Don't fuck with me, Hinata."

Hinata only shivered, still unwilling to look up. Saya hastily closed the door, ensuring the females' privacy. She walked over to the edge of the bed, looking down at the girl with harsh, fierce eyes. No healing smile there.

"You were fighting to kill. You were aiming to kill. You were trying to kill me there, Hinata." Saya consciously opted to omit the rest of her thoughts.

And, fuck damn it, you almost succeeded.

"I'm sorry…I……I……" The girl found it hard to shape words between sobs. Besides, she wasn't really sure of what she wanted to say.

"Why?"

"Eh?" The confusion was enough to make Hinata look up.

"Why did you fight me like that?"

Saya wasn't interested in asking "how." She could tell not even Hinata herself knew how she managed to move like that. She wanted to know why: why Hinata fought with such reckless abandon, such disregard for her own safety……such intent to kill.

Hinata clenched her fists and a phantom pain on her left hand struck her. That's when she remembered she had stabbed it through with a kunai to get to Saya's hand. It had been properly bandaged, and it didn't hurt as much as she would have expected it to.

"I healed it……" Saya explained after noticing the way Hinata had inclined her head suggesting she was examining her injured hand. "……a little. You just tried to kill me, so you can't really expect much kindness from me."

"Ah, I'm so-"

"Oh, knock it off! Besides, it's not like I can be too nice to my student. I have a reputation to maintain. Wouldn't want Himeko to rise from the grave and claim I'm playing favorite, would we?

Hinata blinked. "Wha……what?"

"What what? Ah, right, your mother. Sorry about the bad joke."

Hinata blinked. Wasn't Saya mad at her? "Are you……are we……?"

"You know, I cannot understand you if you keep using fragments of sentences."

"Aren't you………aren't you mad at me?"

Saya chuckled before sitting down on the bed, in front of Hinata. "Girl, when you reach my age……not that you will ever, mind you, but anyway – when you reach my age it's hard to stay angry for long. You either shrug it off or just beat the bastard to death and get it over with."

Hinata shuddered.

"Since, out of respect to your mother whom I loved, I cannot beat you to death, I guess I'll just flush out of my system in some other way. Like sex. Lots and lots of sex. That always works." She winked and grinned at the ten-year-old.

Hinata grimaced. For a second there she had actually believed her sensei was going to engage in a deep, serious conversation with her. She should have known. Of course, the initial chagrin at her sensei's lack of, well, formal conversational skills quickly changed into sheer embarrassment when Hinata replayed Saya's words in her head.

"Besides, crazy as it might sound, it's not the first time I've had a little girl going psycho and trying to kill me."

Hinata's blushed faded a little. "……really?"

"Yeah. Funny story, actually; remind me to tell you one of these days."Especially because it involves ice cream, sake, used panties and the Hachibi. Sweet Kami, I've had one hell of a crazy life!

"Anyway, Hinata, this little scuffle has shown us that you have the fire within you. Now you have to figure out how to draw it out."

"Fi-Fire? Wha……what do you mean, sensei?"

It was Saya's turn to blink. "………you didn't notice."

"Eh?"

Saya slapped her palm on her forehead. "Fire chakra! You used it and you didn't even notice! Why the hell do you think I keep saying you almost kill me back there!? Because of your amazing, godly Jyuuken strikes of DOOM!?"

Hinata tilted her head cutely. She was utterly lost.

"OF COURSE NOT!!!" Saya yelled, exasperated, making Hinata release a tiny "Kyaa!" and inch backwards. "Your Jyuuken SUCKS! It sucks almost as much as Anko after a night hitting the bars!"

Hinata went beet red at that. She was already familiar with the concept of fellatio, after all.

Not that she would tell anyone that she had been secretly reading Saya's smut. After the initial shock, Hinata found the stories quite……amusing to say the least. By the time her tutor at the Hyuuga Compound approached her for "the talk," she was pretty much acquainted with anything the stern Hyuuga female could tell her. In fact, she would say those were the two most boring hours of her life.

On the other side, she was glad her father left the job of her sexual education to a tutor. The idea of her sire talking to her about sex was just terrifying.

On a side note, Hinata couldn't help but wonder about this "Anko" person.

"Girl, your attacks were loaded with so much fire chakra I'm surprised you didn't blow off your own limbs. Tomorrow I'm going to pound you until you figure out how to do whatever you did today."

The Hyuuga heiress shuddered. "Can we somehow skip the pounding?"

Saya smirked evilly. "Consider it payback for today."

"Auuu……"

"Now, since we're both a bit too roughed up to go back to training, why don't you help me with dinner? I have no idea when Naruto will come back home today, though……"

How was Saya supposed to know that somehow, as a consequence of Hanabi's whims, Naruto would end up staying for the night at the Hyuuga Compound?

What she knew, though, was the effect that single sentence would have on Hinata. In an instant, color returned to her face, her back straightened and her expression softened.

"Yes." Hinata stated before getting off the bed as if she hadn't been involved in a terrible battle just a while ago. Saya would later joke that Hinata didn't need a sealed Bijuu to obtain unnatural regeneration. "Naruto-kun will be hungry."

The gears in Saya's head worked quickly. It was already a natural thought process for her. Turning her back to Hinata so as to hide her devious smirk, the Taijutsu Mistress spoke.

"Yes, and he will be tired after a long training session with Hanabi-chan. Tired, hot and sweaty."

Hinata froze. "H-Ho-Ho-H-H-Hot? H-Hot……" Her voice gradually dropped to something barely above a whisper. "……and sweaty?"

"Yup. Have I told you Naruto has this habit of walking around shirtless inside the house?"

"Sh-Shirtless!?" The young Hyuuga squeaked as her cheeks challenged the laws of physics in their attempt to develop a new shade of crimson. "Sweaty and shirtless?"

"Yup." Saya repeated. "A towel hung around his neck, droplets of sweat trickling down his naked torso, tracing the lines of shapely muscles forged with years of physical conditioning……"

"Oh my." Hinata muttered. She was almost hyperventilating. "Oh my……"

"So, after a big meal, he will feel like taking a long bath, so he might say something like………"

Saya knew she needn't say more. Hinata's smut-tainted mind was filling the rest.

"Hina-chan, would you please wash my back?"

The Hinata in Hinata's mind was surprisingly bolder than the original."Only if I get to wash the front too, Naruto-kun."

The Naruto in Hinata's mind was just……weird. "Nuh-uh! Bad Hinata! Did you already forget?"

"Ah! I-I'm terribly sorry………Naruto-sama……"

"Yup! Much better! Saa, let's go!"

"Umm, ano……do I get the front?"

Curiously, the Naruto in Hinata's mind was sometimes more innocent than the original, despite Hinata's mindset.

"Sure! We can wash each other, even!"

Saya nodded to herself and smiled in satisfaction when she heard the lovely sound of an unconscious body hitting her wooden floor. Looking down at Hinata's sprawled form, sporting a grin that would make Jiraiya proud, Saya wiped off a tear off her right eye.

"My purpose in life is fulfilled."

"Na-Naruto-kun, we can wash each other at the same time………" Hinata mumbled to the Naruto in her inappropriate fantasy.

---

Tenten finished fixing up her hair in her already-standard pair of buns, checking her reflection on the mirror to ensure they were properly shaped.

"Alright, now, equipment……"

Two pairs of leg holsters, one on each leg and four scrolls around her waist made for Tenten's "standard" equipment. While she knew it would still be a while before her team got a C-mission (Gai-sensei was quite resolute in this regard), she had already prepared what she called her "field" equipment.

Lots and lots of scrolls.

Naruto's little introduction to storage seals inspired her. By the time she reached her last year and the Academy touched the subject, she was as skilled as her teacher, if not better. When she realized that making arrays was far easier when they were made to store large amounts of one single kind of thing, she hit the jackpot. She was already capable of making 16-by-16 arrays of kunai only.

It helped a lot that, whenever she hit a roadblock in her self-teaching she could always seek Naruto for aid. The boy, she had noticed, seemed to enjoy helping her, answering her questions, offering hints and proposing challenges and possible other ways to tackle a particular problem.

"You seem to like Fuuinjutsu a lot, don't you, Naruto?" She had asked him once. Naruto "looked up" at her with a beaming grin, never ceasing to trace symbols on a large scroll. Since his Senrigan allows him to see in every direction, he had no problem "looking" at Tenten and working on the array at the same time.

"Houraisan Uzumaki Naruto loves challenges! And there's nothing like the satisfaction of a working matrix!"

Yes, Naruto enjoyed Fuuinjutsu……no matter how many foul curses he muttered while he worked on a seal. Needless to say, Shiki was giddy. And Tenten wouldn't say it out loud, but Naruto looked kinda cute when he was all focused on his project work……and stuff. Unlike Tenten, who only cared about storage seals for her many weapons, Naruto was eager to learn everything there was to be learned about sealing techniques.

"And then I'll learn the badass Houraisan sealing techniques, damn right!!!"

Naruto taught her seals. In exchange, Tenten taught him how to throw weapons.

Well, she tried.

He wasn't really that bad. He just wasn't good, either. While he was more precise that any other blind person could hope to be, it still wasn't enough for shinobi standards. She hoped the kid wouldn't stop practicing, even if she wouldn't be able to help him anymore.

She reached for the symbol of her affiliation to the ninja ranks of Konoha, not taking her eyes off the object next to it. Even while she wrapped the headband around her forehead, she was more interested in the single dark blue fingerless glove.

"I'm sorry!!! I-I wanted to make a bigger array, but I had no idea it would be so difficult to put an intrinsic array in a glove! I tried so hard, but I just couldn't expand the matrix in time………I'm so very sorry!!!"

The anguish in Naruto's tone touched Tenten……and confused her. Why did he get so agitated over a glove? Only when on her bed, late at night, after her long, wonderful and surprisingly loud tenth birthday party, did Tenten figure it out.

Naruto was desperate. His troubled mind told him that screwing up might cost him her friendship. He had failed and he thought Tenten would hate him for that.

Tenten caressed the glove affectionately. As if I were that shallow, Naruto.

Theirs was a strange friendship. They belonged to different groups, so they had no friends in common. Then again, she didn't really have any friends in her age group. She wasn't precisely a loner; she hung out with all the girls in her class just fine, she just wasn't really close to anyone. She was too tomboyish to truly be "one of the gals," and she was too feminine to stick around the guys. She didn't really mind her situation, though. She didn't talk to any of Naruto's friends, either. In fact, she wasn't really sure Naruto had any other friends. She guessed there was the Uchiha survivor……and that's it. Naruto, like her, seemed to have an amiable yet distant relationship with his classmates. Tenten did notice the Hyuuga girl shooting odd glances at her more than once. If her suspicions were correct and Neji's relative had a crush on Naruto, well……that was amusing, to say the least. The fact that the Hyuuga girl was jealous of her and Naruto was just hilarious.

She donned the glove on her right hand. She had sworn to herself she wouldn't wear it until she became a kunoichi. She fulfilled that promise three days before. She immediately made another one.

No hand seals were necessary. An instantaneous flux of chakra to her right hand unsealed a single kunai, which Tenten seized with the same hand and clutched fiercely.

She had sworn that, as long as she remained a kunoichi (or as long as the glove fitted her), she would wear that glove every day.

Naruto had offered to improve the 1-by-1 matrix several times, but Tenten had refused, much to Naruto's chagrin and Tenten's amusement at his openly displayed emotions (for an eye-less person, that is). She couldn't care less about the size of the array, or the fact that the glove could only store a single item no larger than a kunai.

She loved that glove. She loved it because it was a true gift. Naruto's appreciation and admiration were embedded on that single article of clothing.

She loved it because it was a gift from a true friend.

Resealing the kunai back inside the invisible array within the glove (Naruto called it an intrinsic matrix; she definitely had to ask him to teach her how to do that), Tenten nodded to herself and left her room.

It was her first day as a Genin of Konoha.

---

"Nee, Shiki-sensei." Naruto whined before releasing a particularly loud yawn. Even if he didn't have eyes, the muscles in that area were still connected to his mediums, so he still felt the awkwardness and heaviness in his head normally associated with sleepiness. He even rubbed his closed eyelids for good measure.

Shiki didn't interrupt his fast pace, which forced Naruto to hurry if he wanted to keep up with him as they crossed the practically deserted streets of Konoha. A corner of his Senrigan's all-around perception caught the glimpse of the thermal signature of an ANBU checking on them from the top of a two-story building before dashing away.

"Yes?"

"Where are we going so early in the morning?"

"So impatient you are, boy……"

"But I could barely wash my face! And I'm hungry! And I left my Pocky box at home!"

Shiki didn't say another word, so Naruto had no other choice but follow and "see" what happened. Five minutes later, their destination was clear to him. Another minute later, they were climbing up the stairs of the Hokage's Tower.

"What are we doing here, sensei?"

"……you are already eleven years old, Naruto. You are about to begin your last year at the Academy."

"Yup."

"These past three years I've regularly tested you to make sure you didn't forget everything I taught you in the year and a half before you entered the Academy, and you haven't disappointed me. In fact, I've been pleased to see you have made further progress on your own. I'm already used to seeing your Kage Bunshin busy at my library."

"Heheh……yeah……" Naruto grinned at his sensei's acknowledgement of his brilliant idea. "It took a while to be able to keep the clones at home while I am at school, you know? I wonder if I should try to extend their range……it could be useful……" Naruto quickly composed himself before he started making plans for even more forms of training. "…but you haven't answered my question!"

"True, I haven't."

"You performance in my examinations isn't precisely perfect, but it's definitely within my parameters of quality. In other words, you are an excellent student. If I didn't know what you are trying to do at the Academy, I'd be more worried about your quarterly reports."

"Hey, you're the one who always talks about deception and stuff. Just like Hinata is pretending to be the same shy, dark weirdo she was four years ago, I can pretend to be the pitiful blind student. The teachers make it easy anyway. Besides, I couldn't pass the written tests even if I wanted to; I can't read the stupid small print."

Shiki nodded. Naruto's inability to read small characters was definitely his greatest liability. The teachers couldn't be blamed of being unfair because it was the print size they had always used. They could be blamed, though, for purposely using small characters on the blackboard, but complaining would be a waste of time. Of course, he had had to stop Saya for trying to enforce her threats on Iruka.

"That doesn't explain why you perform so poorly with thrown weapons."

"They don't let me use Tesabaki!"

"You have to learn to throw shuriken and kunai with your hands, Naruto. Tenten-chan won't be happy."

"It's not like she can help me anymore, now that she's a Genin."

Shiki hid the faint hint of a smile. Was that disappointment he had detected in Naruto's voice?

They had stopped. Naruto could tell they were just meters away from the door leading to the Hokage's office. Two Chuunin guarding the entrance were obviously looking at them, even if Naruto couldn't see their mildly curious expressions.

"Besides that, your notes on Taijutsu are average……"

"Well, it's just those boring Academy katas. If I used Yokazeryuu I'd wipe the floor with everyone……except Hina-chan, of course……and the bastard. He's actually pretty damn good."

"Genjutsu is your worst subject."

"How could I possibly make an illusion if I can't even see reality!?"

"……touché. But what about Ninjutsu, then? The last report says you still have problems with Bunshin and Henge."

"Who needs Bunshin and Henge when I've mastered the power of The Log!? Now that I think about it, scratch the bastard: with Yokazeryuu and The Log he's no match for me."

"First, it's called Kawarimi. Second, you really have to work on those jutsu."

"I know! I just can't get a grasp how to channel the chakra!"

Shiki nodded. "Well, you still have one year."

Naruto was an interesting case. For reasons that have been well documented, his chakra control still remained below average standards. However, for some reason, this only applied to raw chakra. For some reason, it was as if Kyuubi's and the Fourth's seal's presence didn't have any influence on Naruto's skill with nature manipulation. His ability to shape and channel wind-nature chakra was simply astounding. Shiki guessed the Body Circuit had something to do with it, but it just wasn't enough to explain Naruto's nigh unmatched ability to command the wind. He guessed it was just Naruto's natural talent, just like the deceased Uchihas found Fire jutsu particularly easy to learn, just like Hyuuga Himeko had been born with an unnatural ability to understand and master Taijutsu techniques or just like he had a natural ability with numbers and equations which helped him become the seal master he was.

"In any case, the reason we're here is quite simple, actually. I have decided that your performance in my tests merits that I try more……advanced methods to test your skills."

"……so this is another exam."

"Yes."

"On a Sunday."

"Yes."

"Before sunrise."

"Yes."

"A surprise exam."

"Yes."

"I hate you."

"I, too, value our teacher/student relationship, Naruto." Shiki concluded before walking the few steps that separated them from the door, Naruto close behind.

"Hokage-sama is waiting for you, Houraisan-sama." One of the Chuunin declared before opening the door for the two. Shiki acknowledged the two guards with a nod and walked inside the room, where, indeed, the wrinkled Third Hokage received them on his ample chair, a warm cup of tea in his hands.

"Shiki, Naruto."

"Hokage-sama."

"Yo, old man!"

Sarutobi smiled. It made him immensely happy that, despite everything, Naruto was still able to be enthusiastic and joyful like that. He was really thankful to his caretakers. However……

"Shiki, are you sure about this?"

"Very. Be at ease, Sarutobi, he'll do a fine job."

Naruto was smart enough to put two and two together……to a point. "So, what I'm going to do……"

"You will be working here today, Naruto."

"I'm going to help the old man!?"

Sarutobi's eyes narrowed a bit. It would help if Naruto didn't call him old all the time……

"No, Naruto. The 'old man'……" Sarutobi shot daggers at Shiki. Naruto calling him that was one thing, Shiki calling him old was the epitome of hypocrisy. "…here will be helping you."

Shiki felt a strange form of wicked pleasure at the sight of Naruto's frowning face.

"……you'll be Hokage for a day, boy."

---

It was a Sunday. It was the slowest day of the week, which was the reason Shiki purposely picked that day for Naruto's test. Naruto wouldn't have to deal with the workload of an ordinary day, but that wouldn't make matters any easier. The leader of Clan Houraisan had departed already. Naruto was supposed to work with the assistance of Sarutobi only, and it would be Sarutobi who reported to Shiki about Naruto's performance.

That's why the aged Hokage had taken a seat a yard to Naruto's left, so that he had enough desk space to put his drink tea and his dango as well as watch Naruto, who had claimed most of the horizontal surface. Shiki had insisted that Sarutobi's intervention had to be minimal, but the Third remained alert nonetheless. After all, he was leaving the village in charge of an eleven-year-old.

They had been in the middle of a thrift breakfast when the first pile of paperwork was brought by a civilian archivist, one of the first persons who arrived to work on the Hokage Tower, at the same time the permanent guard made their usual shift from night staff to day staff. Naruto's first action of the day was quite the surprise.

"Tajuu Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!!!"

With the instruction of "doing whatever needs to be done," the horde of Naruto clones scattered all over the tower, much to the Third Hokage's chagrin. After all, he couldn't keep an eye on each one of them. He could only hope the damage would be repairable.

At least, that's what he first thought. Naruto quickly faced the first (and greatest) obstacle.

"Ugh! Small print! My mortal enemy……gramps! Read this for me!"

That's when the second surprise of the day surfaced. Naruto was surprisingly methodical. He refused to fill out any paper without first learning everything he could about the relevant subject so that he could make a decision. Besides asking Sarutobi for whatever he could share, Naruto created a small squad of clones strictly dedicated to getting info from the archives for him. While most of the time it was a waste of time and Naruto ended up stamping the paper anyway, it showed Sarutobi that the boy actually took the job seriously and, most importantly, he actually had an idea of what he was doing.

The old Hokage knew that some of the information Naruto was dealing with was a bit delicate, he guessed it wasn't really much of a problem if Naruto read one or two for-the-Hokage-only reports.

What harm could be done, anyway?

Sarutobi decided he had to ask the boy about his interesting laboring protocol when Naruto remained silent for a minute before stamping a paper that approved an increase on the volume of imports of fish and seafood in general from River Country.

"Well, it's spring, right? Shiki-sensei taught me in Economy class that sea fish migrate south around this time, so they don't catch many fish at Wave, Water, Sea and Tea Countries in these months. River actually farms both fresh and salt water fish, so they always have fish to sell. It's obvious that it's more convenient to buy fish from River, at least for this season. Seriously, why don't the other countries do what River does……I guess the weather might have something to do………alright!"

The Hokage watched in utter befuddlement how Naruto created yet another clone for the sole purpose of asking Shiki about aquaculture (of course, Naruto called it "fish farming"). When he asked the boy why he wanted to know more, he got another interesting answer.

"Knowledge is power! It's the first thing Shiki-sensei taught me! I don't really know if I'll ever need to know about fishes, but knowing stuff never hurts, right?"

With that, Naruto went back to the next document ("ANBU Demolition Corps!? WHAT THE HELL!? And they use big kanji!!!"), leaving an astonished Sarutobi to ponder on what he was learning about the young heir of Houraisan.

Kami, Shiki, what have you been teaching him!?

---

"Okay, gramps, who are these Demolition Corps guys, why the hell do they spend so much money, and why in the name of all flavors of ramen I haven't met them yet!?"

"As the name says, they are a small division of ANBU that handles the planning and execution of missions that involve the tearing-down of massive structures. I think the budget claims we've read together show quite clearly why they take a sizeable portion of our budget……"

"You pay them to make things go boom!!! They expend LOTS of money on explosive materials!!! That's, like, the best job EVER!!!! Seriously, I have to meet these guys."

"I do not think the world is prepared for such a meeting."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean no, you're not getting anywhere close to the Demolition Corps."

"Crap……hey, how do you get into ANBU, anyway?"

Sarutobi actually looked afraid. "Kami help us all, you do want to join the Demolition Corps……" A quick glance at the wall clock gave the Third the perfect chance to change the topic. "Oh, it's almost time. Put aside those papers, Naruto."

"What? Why?"

"It's almost time for the mission assignments. All shinobi who are not on leave or in mission will come to get the mission assignment and briefing."

Indeed, it wasn't a minute later when two civilian workers from the Missions Office, wearing the long (and quite impractical) robes of office, arrived with a large stack of scrolls each. They paused for a second at the sight of the blond kid with the orange bandana around his eyes, but decided not to ask. They were used to witnessing all sorts of unbelievable things. The fact that they had just met with six identical copies of the same boy in the Missions Office shouldn't be really that surprising.

It didn't take two minutes to organize the two stacks into four, according to mission rank (which was quickly explained to Naruto as they did so). It was rather easy, considering that the D-Rank stack was significantly larger than the other three. After that, it was mostly a matter of waiting. Naruto used the time to deal with even more papers from the ANBU Demolitions Corps. Sarutobi watched with mild amusement (and notable interest) how Naruto eagerly and surprisingly efficiently (for an eleven-tear-old) dealt with the documents while muttering things like "Ali…alipa…aliphatic nitramines? Sensei didn't teach me that……must be some sort of advanced stuff or something……" or "Heheheh, nitric acid……"

Of course, there was a limit to what Naruto could do. There were some matters that were simply beyond his understanding. Things only the Hokage would understand. Of course, Sarutobi wouldn't be able to get those matters done before thoroughly explaining to Naruto the bulk of them.

Naruto's thirst for knowledge was insatiable.

---

It had taken Sarutobi a while to find Naruto. Actually, he had only thought of going to that place after sweeping the whole tower looking for him. While Naruto's apparent disappearance had drilled through his nerves, his forages while looking for the young heir of Houraisan allowed him to see the full extent of Naruto's work.

For the first time since……well, since ever, there was only one person working at the Missions Office: the place where all mission reports end up and where mission requests first arrive before being delivered to the Hokage and whoever else is in charge of assigning them to a shinobi team. Apparently, half a dozen of Naruto's Kage Bunshin had reorganized the entire archive by rank and date, as well as created a separate archive for those missions whose payment was still pending. The lone civilian girl who remained (who had told the Hokage that she had spent the entire day helping Naruto by reading for him) told him with a huge smile on her face that everyone else was gone because, for the first time ever, the week's (not the day's, the week's) work was done before sunset.

She also asked him when the "cute whisker boy" would show up to help with their work again. He guessed it was a good thing she was too young to know about Naruto and the Kyuubi.

Naruto was standing with is arms crossed at the very top of the Hokage Tower. If he hadn't known of Naruto's blindness, he would have guessed Naruto was looking at the vast landscape of the Village Hidden in the Leaves. It was a windy evening, and the breeze played with Naruto's clothes. The long and wide sleeves of his cheongsam swung wildly by his sides. The lower edges of the cheongsam also flailed a little to the right, following the wind's direction. The sunset light played tricks with his spiky blond hair. For an instant, Sarutobi had a nostalgic flashback of another blond watching the same scenery with a fatherly gaze.

The musings of times past and Hokages lost was abruptly interrupted by Naruto's voice.

"It's a beautiful village, isn't it, old man?"

Sarutobi frowned. It was a worrisome tone of voice; particularly serious, especially for Naruto of all people. He struggled with his loose Hokage robes as the wind attacked them with special ferocity, but, eventually, he made it to Naruto's side. He had removed his bandana, but it was obvious that the lifeless mediums he carried instead of eyes were looking at nowhere.

"I……I don't really remember much of Konoha……how it looks like, I mean. What I remember isn't really special. I only cared about this place, Ichiraku Ramen and maybe the Library and the Academy, just because they're big and easy to spot."

"It's the town I live in, and I have no idea how it looks like. It's pathetic."

"Naruto, don't-"

"Don't. Whatever you want to say, don't bother."

Sarutobi shed a sad look for Naruto, secretly glad that the boy wouldn't be able to see it. He guessed he shouldn't be surprised that even Naruto could have moments like those.

"Maybe one day I'll be able to extend Senrigan from here and feel all of Konoha……maybe not. I don't care much, really. At least I can actually see something."

Sarutobi guessed he had already praised Naruto's Senrigan plenty enough. It was quite the jutsu, after all, and it was the reason Naruto could notice the Hokage's presence in the rooftop on the first place.

"Ne, old man."

"What is it, Naruto?"

"Do you think a blind guy could make it to Hokage?"

Sarutobi blinked. "Do……you want to be Hokage, Naruto?"

Naruto didn't respond. He let his arms rest on the rail, leaning his body forward and dropping his eyelids to quietly enjoy the evening breeze.

"Show me the village."

"……excuse me?"

"Show me what you see from here. Please."

The old Hokage's eyes softened. That young blond never ceased to catch him off guard. But he did indulge him. For the next twenty minutes, Sarutobi would point at places and tell Naruto about what he could see in that direction. Of course, he first told Naruto of the Hokage Monument and the austere looks of the four faces carved in the rock. He showed Naruto the different districts and the lands of every single clan. He mentioned the forests of the Nara Clan at the far northeast, the vast expanses of cleared land seized by the Inuzuka, the elegant noble houses and gardens of the Hyuuga, the single three-level gray and ochre residence of Sarutobi and his family, the clustered city-within-a-city that once housed the ambitious Uchiha Clan and, of course, the sea of trees that concealed the Houraisan Clan buildings, among others. He described the shopping district, which was notoriously empty that day (understandable, being the last day of the week and all). He showed him the main public park, a vast blanket of greenery within the dull tones of civilization, and the low-class residential district where Naruto's old apartment building was located.

Throughout the whole discourse, Naruto remained silent. Sarutobi could only guess what was in the mind of the young boy who could see nothing but shapes and thermal readings. No matter how much Sarutobi explained, Naruto would never be able to see it, only imagine it. Konoha…no, the whole world, was nothing to him but a mirage, a reality with a hazy meaning.

It was hard to just think about it, so the Third Hokage decided to change the topic.

"How was your day as Hokage, Naruto?"

Naruto raised an eyebrow. His lips contorted into a strange smile. Maybe it was a grateful smile.

"You kidding me? This town is one huge mess! Your ninjas are too lazy to fill out a decent report, may it be a mission report or even their taxes. Speaking of taxes, some civilians are paying way more than they should and some businesses are trying to play smartass with their tax forms. And either the Nidaime Hokage was a complete moron or a secretary made a stupid mistake, because according to some contract I read, Marsh Country is milking us for all it's worth. There are also buildings that supposedly belong to dead people, buildings that shouldn't be where they are and buildings that shouldn't even exist! There are some reports from Kusa that you probably never read; there's this widow who lost her husband and older son when Kyuubi attacked and has never received her monthly indemnization……don't worry, already took care of that. Oh, and you still haven't done a thing with the Uchiha District! Seriously, all that land is being wasted. What the hell are you thinking!?"

Sarutobi had the decency to look a bit ashamed. He knew he should have done something about the empty district a while ago. He just forgot.

"So, what do you think we should do, Naruto?"

"I have some ideas. Remind me to tell you later." Naruto smirked. "But, really, do you even know what is going on in your village?"

"I can't keep track of everything, Naruto. That's why I have others to help with all the obligations a ruler must deal with."

"Yeah, and who makes sure they do the job right?"

Naruto looked away from the Hokage and turned his face back to the scenario of Konoha's sunset.

"You know, today……today I had a lot of fun."

Sarutobi chuckled. "That makes you the first person I know who enjoys paperwork."

"Not the paperwork, silly! Paperwork sucks……that's why I had my Kage Bunshin do it."

Sarutobi blinked. "Now why have I never thought of that?"

Naruto chuckled. "Idiot. The mission assignments were pretty cool, even if D-Rank missions suck. I almost feel sorry for Ten-chan and Lee. Not for Neji: he's an asshole."

Indeed, Naruto had the opportunity to meet Team Gai (they were actually Team 4, but the name didn't last 24 hours). Unfortunately (or fortunately, who knows?), Naruto's blindness impeded him from witnessing the complete Maito Gai experience. Actually, the Jounin's loud and enthusiastic attitude actually made a positive impression on the blond. On the other side, Neji and Naruto are not in the best terms ever since the conversation between the replacement Hokage and Team Gai somehow lead to Naruto stating that Hiashi "is a nice guy."

Sarutobi didn't comment on this. Given his connection to the Hyuuga, it was a matter of time before Naruto found out about the conflictive structure of the first Great Clan of Konoha.

The boy's expression softened as he turned back to "look" at the village clad in shades of orange under the sunset.

"I meant, the feeling……the feeling of being doing something truly good, something really important. The fact that I knew I was working to help Konoha, that the things I did would help make it a better place, the feeling of being in charge……it was nice."

"That's why I've decided I want to be Hokage."

Sarutobi blinked. Now that he didn't expect. "……Hokage?"

Naruto nodded. "I'm not stupid, you know. Sensei thinks I haven't figured it out. Politics, Economy, Logistics, Strategy……sensei is not preparing me to be a shinobi. He is been preparing me to be a Kage………or a Feudal Lord, if you think about it."

The Third smiled knowingly. Seriously, sometimes, Naruto's intelligence astounded him.

"I think……I would love Konoha the way you do if I didn't have so many bad memories. But, even with those bad memories, all the things and the people that mean something to me are here. That's why I just can't hate Konoha, either."

"I just wanted to be a kickass ninja that nobody would look down to. I wanted to be respected and acknowledged. But now……now I feel I want more."

"I'm here, and I believe Konoha needs me. It needs me to do what I did today every day. If Shiki-sensei wants me to be the next Hokage, then a damn fine Hokage I will be. He has taught me so much; I will not let him down. I will make him and Saya-kaa-chan proud. I know I can do the job, damn it, I like doing the job! I want to do the job, and Kami knows I will do the job."

Naruto looked up at him, and the old Hokage was struck by a memory. That determined expression; that face which showed absolute certainty, he had seen it before. Even Naruto's mediums seemed to glow with the force of his unyielding and unwavering spirit.

In that moment, Sarutobi knew. He just knew what Naruto already believed with absolute certainty. The boy's words were just an unnecessary confirmation.

"I will become strong, respected and acknowledged. Everyone in Konoha will know that they need me. And then, I will become Hokage. That is my dream."

---

Phantasmagoria of Dichromatic Eyes – END