Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto
Chapter 10: Taking a peek
"Did you have to use paint that is extremely hard to remove?" Choji asked plaintively while scrubbing on a particularly persistent spot.
"Yes. Yes I had." Naruto answered, setting his own brush down. "Look, if we want to observe this summer's graduation exams and team assignments we need a reason to be in the building. There's no way we can sneak around while all the examiners are watching for attempts to cheat, and the jonin are even worse when they show up to pick up their teams. Hence the paint bomb that will take several days for us to clean up and give us an excuse to be here."
"But we aren't supposed to spy on the exams, and our own are three years in the future."
"We are learning to be shinobi. Shinobi are supposed to be sneaky and to cheat. Think of it as training in gathering intelligence that will become useful one day."
Choji reacted only with a grunt, he knew the plan but sometimes his childish side caused him to complain. They had decided to spy on the exams and especially on the team assignments only a few days ago, almost as an afterthought before the beginning of the summer break. While Naruto knew from his stolen materials how the exams were supposed to proceed and from overhearing conversations that the team assignments were a matter of bribes and political influence more than of skill he wanted confirmation firsthand. The plan was surprisingly simple and foolproof.
It relied to a large part on Naruto's enhanced hearing and the time of year. Due to the summer heat the class room windows would be opened, making it theoretically possible to overhear conversations from the outside. Only the outside would be watched to prevent cheating, so it was impossible to simply hide under the windows. The same was true of the neighboring rooms, but not the ones farther away. So Naruto had pranked the strategically placed classroom of one of the more biased teachers with a paint bomb one day before the graduation exam on his last day of school. He had deliberately left a trace leading back to him and Choji, and they received promptly the expected detention and the task of cleaning it up. Shino had originally wanted to participate, but somehow his share of the guilt was never discovered. Hinata had already enough problems with her family without adding a juvenile prank to the list and had regretfully bowed out.
Suddenly Naruo cocked his head. "I think it has started. Quiet now."
"I only hope it is worth all the effort." Choji grumbled under his breath. He had made a bet with Yakumo on which potential teams would pass, but scrubbing paint for more than a week was pushing it.
A week and a half later they were finally finished with cleaning the room, with their plan being a full success. The five friends sat together in Yakumo's house that had become their official meeting place and listened to Naruto's report.
"… and it went pretty much as expected. The practical tests for taijutsu, use of ninja tools and the three academy jutsu are required to pass, but strangely the theoretical test counts the most for the ranking of the students. From the ten teams that were formed only three passed the mysterious second test by the individual jonin-sensei, and as expected…" A giggle from Hinata interrupted him. An abashed Choji was handing a smug-looking Yakumo a stack of restaurant vouchers while Shino's expression remained unreadable. It was good to see Yakumo smile again after her uncle's death. "As I was saying, as expected by some of us these teams have a mix of the most capable graduates and the ones with the most political clout or money. The rest were sent back to the academy into the basic training program."
The first five years of the basic and elite training programs were identical, but only the elite graduates had a chance of being accepted by a jonin as his personal students, usually in groups of three. For the graduates that weren't accepted by a jonin and the students who were enrolled in the basic program in the first place one to two years of additional training followed until they were deemed good enough to survive on their own. After that they were usually employed in the different shinobi divisions under the command of a chunin, but were responsible for their own training.
Needless to say, everyone wanted to get a jonin as sensei. Not only was having a personal teacher considered a far better education than the academy provided, it usually meant a fast track to promotion. A jonin-sensei provided instruction, in-depth knowledge of the secrets of the trade, guidance and protection on missions as well as social and political connections, all things the normal graduates had to find on their own. Additionally, the number of jonin willing and able to take students was strictly limited. Many jonin were needed for the more dangerous and difficult missions; in fact there could never be enough of the necessary skill level. A jonin with a team of fresh genin was practically unavailable for higher-ranking mission for around a year followed by a time of limited availability.
Competition for spots in the elite class was hard, but despite widespread bribery and favoritism it still bore a tenuous relationship with the student's skill. In the first five years there was a lot of student fluctuation between the classes when the duds were relegated to the normal program and the kids with the best skills (or more often those with the richest/most influential parents) joined the elite class. It was possible to repeat the elite graduation test several times, but that almost never happened. Most people gave up after they failed one time, and by the time of the fifth year most people in the elite class had actually the skills to pass the test. The elite graduates that didn't manage to snag a jonin didn't waste their time, even if their genin rank was suspended until they finished the basic program. No, it was seen as an opportunity to forge some ties to the future elite, and the successful exam was taken as a recommendation for greater things in their resume. There was another possibility, namely being taken on as the personal apprentice of a ninja of chunin rank or higher, which was what most kids from the great and minor clans did. Without a blood relation it was almost impossible to get approval for that, though.
Naturally some people had automatic fixed places in the elite class practically independent from their actual skills, like being the heir to a great clan (Shino, Sasuke, Hinata, Choji, Shikamaru, Ino and Yakumo), brother to a clan heiress like Kiba or daughter of one of the civilian council members in case of Sakura Haruno whose mother held the seat for the long-distance traders. Or like himself he supposed, either because he was a jinchuuriki or the Hokage's protégé. Most kids their age were aware of those aspects, but they were never really mentioned by the teachers or anyone else. It was one of those things that weren't exactly secret, but neither was it really spoken about. If he didn't have the teachings of his parents and his overhearing of different conversations he might even have continued blissfully unaware of these things until after his graduation.
Normally it wasn't that obvious, but due to a coincidence of birth the leading families of all great clans had children of the same age. In Naruto's two previous academic cycles it was far harder to determine the elite class, it really only became noticeable by the third or fourth year. The actual team composition was handled by the Hokage, though the jonin could make requests and the Hokage's advisors and the main instructor from the academy had some input. The bet Yakumo and Choji had made concerned which teams would be formed and which would be passed by the jonin.
"By now I should know better than bet against you when it comes to political stuff." Choji said ruefully. His bet had been purely oriented on skill after Naruto had 'organized' copies of the prospective genin' files from the academy, while Yakumo took the status and connections of their parents into account.
Yakumo smiled at him victoriously. "And don't forget it."
"I agree. It appears unwise to go against Yakumo-chan's judgement in political matters." Shino added.
"D-Don't be so m-mean to Choji-kun. He a-always wants to s-see the best in other people." Hinata chided gently.
Choji shook his head. "It's alright. I know the world isn't what I'd like it to be. Better to learn that now then later."
"I did it! I finally did it!" Naruto shouted before he hugged a startled Hinata as well as his parents and began jumping around and pumping his fist into the air. The reasons were two illusionary copies of Naruto standing a short distance away. It weren't very good bunshin, one could clearly see that they were blurry at the edges and wavered sometimes as if behind a curtain of hot air, but they were fully functional.
"Good work, son. We knew you could do it." Daiki said.
"We're proud of you." Youko added.
Hinata had meanwhile recovered from the unexpected hug. "C-Congratulations, Naruto-kun."
"Thanks. Finally I no longer have to worry about that graduation requirement." With a puff of smoke the clones dispelled. "I wonder why that thing is required in the first place; it isn't as if it is especially useful. Attentive enemies can easily recognize it as an illusion, considering that bunshin don't produce sound or interact with their surroundings in any way. And they don't move on their own, I have to consciously control them. What with one's attention capacity limited I wonder if they aren't a net loss in battle and if I should use them." Naruto looked thoughtful for a moment. "They could be a nice diversionary measure if I manage to learn projecting my voice."
Youko shrugged. "Who knows under what circumstances the bunshin landed on the curriculum, let alone became a graduation requirement. Still, your improved control will be useful for other things as well."
Under Youko's tutelage Hinata herself had already mastered all three academy jutsu; it had been very easy thanks to her good and developing chakra control. She didn't have the reserves to use them often, but due to the new exercises her chakra pool was expanding massively. Normally Kawarimi was considered the most difficult of the three academy jutsu, with Henge being of middling difficulty and Bunshin the easiest, but Naruto had ironically had the most problems with the bunshin. Thanks to Youko's chakra running through his system he required massively less chakra for clone techniques… which meant that in the case of the already low-cost Bunshin he couldn't mould a small enough amount of chakra to not overload the technique. His enormous reserves had made it even more difficult to develop the necessary control, but now Naruto had finally managed it.
"Now to the next experiment. Henge!" With a cloud of smoke Naruto changed into a copy of his father. His hand went to his head. "I think it is working. Dad, could you please test it?"
"Sure. Hold still for a moment." The real Daiki walked up to Naruto and carefully put his hand on his head. It went right through it. "It seems double congratulations are in order."
"Yeah, I'm awesome! Let's test it a bit further." Several applications and subsequent dispellings of a henge later Naruto finally found the problem. "It's like a tipping point, if I use far less chakra than the jutsu should require the Henge behaves normal; any more and it becomes a true transformation and the chakra consumption immediately jumps up to around what I think other people have to use for the illusionary henge. And it dispels if someone hits me hard enough, regardless of whether my concentration is broken or not."
Youko looked thoughtful. "Well, the non-illusion henge shares many similarities with a shadow clone, and the illusionary one with the normal bunshin. If you could sense the chakra structure like I can it would be obvious to you, too. It might be that the henge is the basis for a few advanced true transformation jutsu.
"The I-Inuzaka have some jutsu that physically transform them and their partners, e-even combining their bodies into one temporarily. I h-heard similar stories from some summons." Hinata interjected.
"Well, with the amount of concentration it requires to stay stable it is only really usable outside of combat for me. Wait a minute, I have an idea." With a puff of smoke Naruto changed into a log, than a rock and several other different items and animals, including his fox form. Finally he changed back to his human form. "Interesting. It becomes more difficult if the mass differs from my own. I can still somehow feel my own body during the transformation, and I vaguely perceive my immediate surroundings even if the form has no sensory organs. I don't understand why it doesn't change the quality of my senses and my strength, though. Normally I can detect far more scents if you change me into a fox."
"That is because it doesn't really transform your body, son. The technique creates a clone-like chakra construct and uses a normally inactive space-time manipulation component to move your real body a bit out of phase with reality. Quite fascinating, who knew that such a basic technique could become so complicated?" Daiki mused.
A few days into the visit they made a trip to a beautiful lake in the woods quite a distance from the cottage. They made camp inside of a small natural cave overlooking the lake. Hinata was alone inside the cave setting up their sleeping arrangements when a shout from outside caught her attention. "Come out Hinata-chan, the water is great!"
Leaving the cave, she could see Naruto and Daiki swimming in the lake. Their clothing was piled up on a tree stump near the beach, and Youko was currently disrobing. The men were too far out into the lake to make out details, but she had a prime view of Youko's body, causing her to blush.
"H-How c-can you s-swim without swimwear?"
"Why, naked of course. Don't you want to join us?"
Hinata blushed even stronger. "I… I can't. N-Not when N-Naruto-kun could s-see me."
Youko sighed. "As you wish. I will do something to preserve our privacy." She turned towards the rest of the family and shouted her intentions and received an accepting reply. With a wave of her hand a wall of reeds sprouted and grew rapidly, neatly bisecting the beach and creating a visual cover far into the lake. "Good enough for you?"
Nodding hesitantly, Hinata left her clothes beside Youko's and entered the warm water. After swimming a bit she began thinking. How did Naruto look without clothes? Sure, she had looked right through his clothes with her byakugan before, but it just wasn't the same as an unrestricted view. Just a little peek that no one would notice. That was harmless, right?
"Byakugan" she whispered when she activated her bloodline and saw… nothing. The reeds were absolutely impenetrable to her gaze. When she switched to 360 degree mode the phenomenon persisted. Her zone of vision simply ended as soon as the reeds began. The voice of Youko broke her concentration and her bloodline deactivated.
"My, my, what a naughty little girl you are. Trying to peep on my husband and son, but wanting to preserve your own modesty? That's hardly fair."
Whirling around, Hinata saw the woman swimming behind her with an amused smirk on her face. Immediately Hinata became beet red and started stammering apologies, growing dangerously close to fainting.
"Calm down!" The command was issued with quite some power, and Hinata felt her emotions shutting down to a completely calm state. It was the first time Youko did something like this; Hinata hadn't known it was even possible. "You will listen carefully. I'm not mad, and being curious is perfectly normal at your age." She sighed. "It seems you need my special version of 'The Talk', but we will handle that at a later point." An invisible pressure seemed to lift from Hinata, and she could feel her emotions coming back. She turned away from Youko in the hope of avoiding further embarrassment, but suddenly she felt a warm body pressing against her own. "Just relax; I take care of things, my little Hinata-chan." Hinata felt Youko's hands hitting some minor pressure points to force her to relax her muscles somewhat before the older woman gave her a heavenly massage. Combined with floating in the warm water Hinata's pent-up tension melted away. The rest of the trip was much more enjoyable.
It did take until her next visit until Youko approached her about the 'Talk'. It was quite different from the talk she had received from aunt Chihiro and the academy lesson. Instead of 'Tab A goes into Slot B' or 'It is your duty to continue the clan' it focused on questions of affection, love, pleasure and formal propriety, or rather why the latter was largely superfluous when you were among people you could trust.
"Aren't you e-embarrassed?"
"Why should I? There no one I would need to hide my body from and you need to learn these things and get over your shyness. At the moment your body is still too young, but that will change in time. It is better to be prepared beforehand. In your chosen profession such modesty can be very dangerous to your well-being. Besides, your hormones will drive you crazy before long. You don't age and your body doesn't change here in this world, but the mental effects build up. We could suppress that, but it would have other undesirable effects. When the time comes, ask me for advice."
"There are s-some things I have seen, but my clan frowns upon…"
Youko held up her hand. "Don't listen to anything these idiots say. Considering your state when we met it is safe to say that anything they teach that is remotely related to emotions is completely wrong. It is natural to be curious, and your bloodline enables you to invade other people's privacy with ease. It will be even worse when Naruto needs your help in discovering stuff in the village. You will see many things you'd rather not see, and you will have to learn to deal with it." Youko eyed her with a calculating look. "Or maybe you see things that you would like to see more of?"
Hinata's increasing blush was answer enough.
Youko's eyes sparkled with mischief. "If you have some specific questions about something I will be happy to provide answers. I'm quite familiar with all forms of corporeal pleasure. Why do you think we spend so much time in human form, and what do you think do we do during our frequent alone time? There is only one thing a human body is really good for." She breathed into her ear. "Shall I show you?"
The girl's lips formed a silent O before her blush intensified and she fainted, causing Youko to laugh uproariously. A short time later Daiki found them. "Naruto should be busy for the next time with some magical exercises." After he looked curiously at the fainted Hinata he continued. "I see you are finished with the talk. Did you deliberately cause her to faint?"
Youko only smirked. "It's simply fun to embarrass Hinata, she's so cute when she blushes. Naruto's reactions aren't that spectacular anymore. It will help her get over her shyness more quickly." She assumed a thoughtful expression. "If I think about it, it would be quite interesting to find out how many times per day I can make her faint. She doesn't want to admit it even to herself, but her thoughts are remarkably mature and naughty. Though the real fun only begins when she is ready to talk about the particulars of sex. All those interesting methods and positions…"
It had been fruitful weeks, what with him getting the Bunshin working and making his Henge an illusion as it should have been. As a side-project he had acquired some skills in voice projection; he thought it could come in handy in combination with a bunshin. He even managed a breakthrough with his minor illusion spell, enabling him to create arbitrary images in a small, movable spherical zone; but finally the start of the third academy year loomed before them. Naruto was alone with his parents; Hinata already had to leave a few days earlier because she couldn't cope as well with the accompanying mental strain as Naruto could, yet. Currently he was slowly getting out of his bed while yawning.
"Hurry up, son. We have something great to show you." sounded the voice of his father.
Naruto perked up and hastened his efforts of getting ready for the day. "Really? What is it?" he shouted while climbing into his clothes after taking a quick bath.
"Do you remember your father telling you about his mapping out the Kyuubi's unaltered future and indirectly your own?" Youko asked while preparing the breakfast table.
"Naturally I remember. What about it?"
"Well, I finally finished converting it to a format you can understand. After you have eaten we will show you." Daiki answered.
Never before had a breakfast disappeared so quickly in Naruto's mouth. He really wanted to know what could have been his fate.
"I have prepared a special location for this event some distance away. Come along, son."
The three left the cottage and turned towards the woods before they engaged their special travel mode. As usual for his parents mode of travel they seemed to cover an extraordinary large distance in a short amount of time. Naruto tried to figure out how they did it, but as usual was unsuccessful. It always frustrated him to no end when he couldn't understand how his parents did something. The surrounding landscape just seemed to slip away and change despite them walking at a leisurely pace. One moment they were at the edge of the woods in front of the house, the next moment they were already passing a particular spot deep in the forest that normally took hours to reach. After a while the trees and plants became unfamiliar, but they hadn't left the forest once. Abruptly they arrived on a grassy plain with a few sparse trees here and there with a large body of water visible in the distance, possible an ocean. As he looked back he couldn't see the forest they had just traversed anywhere.
Letting out a soft growl, Naruto suppressed his annoyance at his repeated failure to unravel the secret of the so-called 'direct way' of travel. The day was entirely too good to be marred by anything. He quickly ran after his parents who had continued walking. When he reached them, his mother let out a chuckle.
"Still trying to figure it out, kit? Don't fret, some day the understanding will just come to you."
After a few more minutes of walking, Naruto spotted their destination. On top of a small hill surrounded by trees and blossoming bushes stood a structure made out of white stone. It consisted mainly of a solid foundation that rose half a meter from the ground and several columns that ranged in height from two to ten meters. As they ascended a stairway Naruto was able to make out more details.
In the middle of the structure was a round pool of water of indeterminable depth. Several stone benches with colorful cushions were arranged around it, as well as some tables with refreshments, mainly different sort of fruits. An entry to a building hidden behind the trees was now clearly visible. After they sat down on the cushions his father began to speak.
"Now, you have to remember I had to painstakingly extrapolate most of this from memory fragments that the Kyuubi retained in my exploring of its possible futures. There are probably a whole lot of events that never got its attention, so don't be surprised if many things are blurry or some holes appear. The starting point lies some time before the great storm almost seven years ago, as that was when I entered this world. Additionally, there is one group named Akatsuki that shows up often. They are after the different tailed beasts because of their power. Now let the show begin."
Daiki made some gestures, and the water from the pool rose into the air, forming a sphere that was still connected to the water below via a narrow stalk-like structure. Balls of light appeared on top of the columns and sent rays of colored light into the watery sphere. A white light shot out of the sphere and hit Naruto in the head. Something changed, and pictures began to play inside the orb. Naruto didn't know exactly how he did it, but he was able to browse between the events of different timelines. It was much like a bundle of threads. Most stayed in the main flow, but smaller bundles left it if events caused a too drastic divergence. Even so, they often found their way back later when other events brought the errant strands back. Sadly, there were enormous holes all over the place, and most things were blurred. He could discern the generalities, but details often remained beyond his grasp.
All threads started with his childhood at about three years of age. The majority was virtually identical with some inconsequential variations. A few early deaths of his alternate selves mostly by accidents occurred, but he seemed to almost always make it through his first twelve years of life intact. A few times some guys from Akatsuki snagged him early, leading to a painful death. He almost always was enrolled early in the academy and failed the exams almost every time. The rest of his childhood… well, it was nothing to be especially proud of. He lost track of time in his search, but finally he extracted himself from the mental interface of the sphere.
"That… that… that dumb, childish orange idiot would have been me?" Naruto asked after a few minutes of silence.
"Most likely, yes. There are some events with outlandish odds that could have brought some changes like some shinobi befriending and teaching you, but that would be how you turned out in general. Take a moment to think about it. We wouldn't be in the picture, so you would be without persons to acknowledge and teach you, making you desperately crave attention from anyone, even negative one. Hence your frequent pranks. The teachers at the ninja academy would botch your education as they have in your real past, but it would lead to you goofing off and not trying your hardest. Not to mention your probable atrocious study habits; you probably wouldn't even be able to read properly. No one would take an interest enough to even recognize your issues. Without our prodding you wouldn't have befriended the people you did, and poor Hinata-chan would still secretly follow you around. No one would have taught you social skills or about intimate things. You would be totally oblivious to the girl's feelings. The Hokage would take a somewhat more prominent role, but it would lead to nothing productive."
When Naruto thought hard and self-critical he had to agree. That really could have been him. In fact, the likelihood was frighteningly large. Partly that was due to his utter lack of anyone that took an active interest in his life, but with the seal messing with his higher cognitive functions he would be hard-pressed in becoming anything other than an overeager moron anyway. The pranks that his alternate versions did showed quite a bit of ingenuity as did the wild chases in the aftermath, but it didn't seem that he used that ingenuity for anything further or that any of the adults recognized his talents. Hell, nobody seemed to notice that the often displayed inability to create a bunshin was due to his alternate selves' abysmal chakra control combined with the Kyuubi's chakra running through his system and not some inherent laziness. Or that his henge was solid for that matter.
Still, years with no one to encourage him; to hold him when he was sad; to explain things when he didn't understand something; to share his successes; to show him the wonders of the world. It was already hard enough to be without his parents for a week at a time, these lonely years must have been pure torture. Naruto really wondered what had prevented him from snapping and going on a killing spree. Then it hit him. Naturally the damn seal was the answer. Unchecked it would have suppressed the darker parts of his personality and even eliminated a large part of those emotions in preparation for his fate as the prophesized savior. The friendly, laughing mask that he had thought about adopting at the orphanage before that incident so long ago had for his alternate selves become more than a mask of their true personality. It had in large parts become their true one.
A constant in most of the different timelines seemed to be his so-called crush on Sakura Haruno. The real Naruto avoided the pink-haired Uchiha fan girl, but almost all his counterparts were constantly badgering the girl for a date despite the physical abuse she put them through. Not that his counterparts would have known what to do on a date. He had the sneaking suspicion that these beatings were the closest thing to physical contact with other humans that his counterparts ever experienced. The girl seemed to use him as an outlet for her stress and mental crutch that assured her of her self-worth and Naruto's pursuing of her could only be described as obsessive. Boy, was that messed up.
After eating some grapes Naruto felt refreshed enough to continue his survey of what might have been.
If it was one of the few timelines where he had made some close friend that helped to solve him his bunshin problem in any of several possible ways or when he somehow got around the requirement he graduated and ended up on varying teams. He learned the shadow clone technique suspiciously often, but maybe that was due to Konoha shinobi rarely using other clone techniques. With his knowledge of what the technique really did he pitied the poor alternate versions that learned it, even if they didn't have the same vulnerability he did. Uninformed of the dangers the technique posed, he readily abused it in combat, and it showed after a short time. His already low mental faculties didn't take it well, and he became even more of an idiot. Another suspicious thing was that almost nobody seemed to tell him about the technique's value as a training tool. In the timelines where someone did, he inadvertently fried his brain in short order by overusing the technique. His seal-addled self was apparently completely incapable of self-restraint. Sometimes the Kyuubi emerged; at other times he spent a while as a vegetable in the hospital before he died when Akatsuki stole his body to extract the beast.
Otherwise he would fail his last chance at the exam, spend some time in the basic training program and slowly acquire the necessary shinobi skills he lacked. Unfortunately some enemy ninja village with a music note as its symbol frequently staged an invasion of Konoha at varying times and with different allies. Most often it was during the chunin exams some months after the class with the Uchiha graduated from the academy, the same class he was now assigned to. In other cases it took place up to two years earlier or later. Many of his counterparts died in those invasions, more often than not due to suicide-by-stupid-and-reckless-bravery. Generally the same thing happened if he was on a team. Depending on his jonin-sensei his lack of skill and other problems were being corrected with varying degrees of success and speed. Very often he even participated in the exams. Naruto soon lost count of how often he was crushed by the animated sand of what was obviously Suna's jinchuuriki; a psychopathic redheaded boy. Somehow they ended up fighting another almost every time. If he didn't stumble upon the mad boy during the second stage of the exam that was always some survival exercise in the forest of death, they fought another in the preliminaries, the final tournament or he was send after the boy when he tried to unleash the Ichibi. Naruto supposed it made some sense to let him fight against him; after all he had the Kyuubi inside of him. Unfortunately, no one seemed to have bothered to teach him how to correctly use the fox's chakra. More often than not it ended in humiliating and very final defeats for him.
Another thing that caught his attention was that the self-styled super-pervert Jiraiya of the Sannin showed up regularly to get him to sign the Toad contract and train him before the final round of exams, at least when he was on a team that participated. The perverts training methods were rather lackluster in his opinion. The training consisted mainly of accessing the Kyuubi's chakra to summon something, but Jirayia went about it in an ass-backwards way. Really, what kind of idiot thought it a good idea to throw a kid into a chasm to unlock the fox's chakra and use it to save himself by summoning something large enough to break his fall when a genjutsu that made him believe he was in deathly danger would have been perfectly sufficient and much safer? It wasn't like the man couldn't request the help of a genjutsu specialist. More often than not that example of idiocy ended with his death. At least he learned the utmost basics of summoning, even if Jiraiya never took the time to properly explain to him what he could do with them. Naturally, his brain-damaged counterparts never thought to ask.
There were quite a lot of deaths during the extremely variable time between the graduation and the chunin exams. Most occurred when he was behaving like the uneducated moron his alternate selves really were. His skills were often laughable, but that little fact didn't discourage him from rushing headlong into battles that were far out of his league. Akatsuki showed up more often, but was still not a major factor in his deaths. Generally his survival chances were better if he graduated early, as his skills were better due to the timely help he had received. If he graduated in the class with the clan heirs most times he ended up on a team with the Uchiha and Haruno; with the famous Kakashi Hatake as his sensei. In fact, even if he wasn't the dead last he was often assigned to that team, even if he shouldn't have been. That was definitely suspicious. Perhaps Kakashi had requested him?
If he did, Naruto really couldn't see a reason for that, as the man generally taught them hardly anything. His death rate with that team was far higher than with any other. While a very capable shinobi himself, Kakashi was a catastrophic failure as a teacher. Part of the problem was that Kakashi seemed unable to recognize that kids of that age needed someone to kick their ass into gear and to recognize beforehand when a situation was too dangerous for fresh genin, especially badly trained ones. The chunin exam on that team was especially death prone because Orochimaru showed up practically every time to mark Sasuke with some strange seal. If Naruto survived, which was generally due to using the Kyuubi's chakra, the traitorous Sannin shot his chakra control to hell by applying a different seal overlaying his original one. The team generally didn't make it to the tower alive after that with two of them incapacitated. Otherwise Naruto lost in the preliminaries depressingly often, even if he managed to get the chakra disruptor removed. The invasion played out mostly the same, but naturally his death rate was higher for want of decent training.
The invasion managed to kill the Sandaime every time but failed to destroy Konoha although it did major damage, and he was often drafted in the aftermath to find Tsunade of the Sannin together with the pervert. Of course, Akatsuki became really active from that time on, so his survival rate dropped drastically. During their search Jiraiya would teach him a technique of the Yondaime, if one could call the dropping of a few hints teaching. He couldn't even guess how often he managed to kill or permanently cripple himself when the thing blew up in his hands. Unfortunately the vision was too blurred to copy the jutsu, exactly like it had been with all the other techniques.
Somehow they managed to persuade Tsunade every time, but he suspected the pervert had something to do with it. After all, the man claimed to be an expert at seals, and there were countless ways of creating loyalty or controlling one's mind via seals. If Orochimaru had been heavily wounded during the invasion he showed up to recruit Tsunade, and the ensuing fight usually ended with Naruto dead.
After Tsunade assumed the office of Hokage there was some time when the possibilities for different travels and missions were nearly endless, naturally combined with endless ways to get his stupid self killed. One remarkably regular event was the defection of the Uchiha. Depending on who was in the village at the time the search party varied in its composition, but usually quite a lot of deaths happened. If they managed to cause enough trouble to fight Sasuke, he was quite happy to use the power of the curse seal to its fullest and shove some lethal lightning jutsu into someone's body. If that someone was a friend of Sasuke his eyes changed into the mangekyo sharingan. Naruto recognized those from the tales of his mother. In the few cases where they were able to apprehend him, Orochimaru himself or one of his more powerful flunkies showed up on their way back and slaughtered them all. The following time was again relatively vague, but it ended the same way: Jiraiya would take him on a multi-year training journey.
Naruto stopped again, his head swirling with information. Without his parents, his life would have been incredibly bad. He had known that before, but had had no notion of how bad it could have been. He looked at his parents beside him.
"Thanks, for everything." he said earnestly.
Daiki and Youko picked up on his mood and enclosed him in an embrace.
"Don't mention it. We love you, and will do everything to give you a better life."
As he continued watching the training trip, he had to shake his head. Sure, he learned something, but it was a pittance in comparison to what even a seal-impaired version of himself should have been able to learn. More than once he was killed or captured by Akatsuki because Jiraiya couldn't be bothered to pay real attention to his training. Instead the pervert wasted his time with his 'research' a.k.a. spying on woman while they bathed. The checking of his spy network took a miniscule amount of time in comparison. Naruto would have learned far more if he had stayed inside of the village, at least in the cases without Kakashi as his sensei. Additionally Jiraiya did something to his seal that made it far easier for him to accidentally draw more of the Kyuubi's power than he could control. Not a good thing.
After his return to Konoha things really hit the fan. Akatsuki became fully active and captured almost all the bijuu. If his counterparts managed to evade capture long enough, the leader of Akatsuki took it upon himself to hunt Naruto down. He was really dying in droves. It culminated in a direct attack on Konoha by Pain. Usually Jiraiya was dead by that point and Naruto was training with the toads in something called sage mode, but naturally he returned heroically when he heard of the attack. The vast majority of surviving timelines ended there. That Pain fellow with his multiple bodies was really far too powerful, even if Naruto couldn't get a clear look at his techniques besides excessive summoning and some sort of gravity control. Apparently that was one of the downsides of the visions. Combat always caused the images to blur because there were so many close alternatives that could shift the entire flow. Sometimes he went into eight-tail mode when Hinata or sometimes somebody else with emotional significance died for him, causing the specter Minato had left behind to show up.
A few threads still continued, but most were too incomplete to learn anything. Naruto gathered that the villages tried to unite against the threat of Akatsuki. If Pain was still alive he crushed personally the villages and troop concentrations until he succeeded with capturing all bijuu. In the case of Pain's death Madara Uchiha entered the scene and used an army of shape-changing plant men to fight. Apparently someone had learned the Edo Tensei technique because an awful lot of resurrected were running around. In a chain of particular unlikely events he saw that he somehow tried to gain control of the Kyuubi with the help of the Hachibi jinchuuriki from Kumo. In that case Kushina showed up, gave him an account of the events during the Kyuubi attack and helped him bind the Kyuubi. After hearing that his parents had basically needlessly ruined his life his alternate self did… nothing. The poor sap was already well on his way to his savior-role and would probably have forgiven his parents even if he learned of the mind-influencing functions of the seal. It only caused the real Naruto to despise them even more; his contempt for them went beyond simple hate. The very few remaining threads blurred into unrecognizability from that point on.
'Damn, my future looked really bleak.' Naruto thought.
To lighten up his mood he followed a few of the longest surviving strands backwards.
'Wow, apparently I managed to talk Pain into effectively committing suicide on several occasions. That guy is definitely a few shuriken short of a full deck. Talk about crazy, first he personally kills Jiraiya and then he gives up when I read him an excerpt from an old book the man wrote. Pity it has only a one in two thousand chance of working.'
He snorted in laughter when he saw how he had defeated Kiba during the chunin exams in one of the timelines where he was on Kakashi's team. His skills had been abysmal, but a well-timed fart knocked Kiba out. On another occasion he had shoved an exploding tag into the Ichibi's ass, as well as countless other hilarious moments. Although they were far less funny if one considered that many of them were the result of a deliberately inflicted mental handicap thanks to the seal. Aside from the funny occurrences there was a whole wealth of information on what-could-have-been. Naruto was still browsing several hours later when his father's hand landed on his shoulder.
"I think that is quite enough, son."
"But dad, I still need more details to effectively plan." Naruto complained.
"I'm afraid that would be unwise. The visions are far from complete, and you would only paint yourself in a corner. Your mother and I had a pretty much foolproof plan, but the incident in the orphanage derailed it completely. It was completely unforeseen, either the vision was incomplete to begin with, or I caused inadvertently a change that spiraled out of control. Perhaps the storm I created caused some shinobi to take a different path, or a mission was registered late. The possibilities are endless." Daiki answered.
"But then what was the point of showing me all that stuff?"
"You had a right to know what you're up against and what your life might have been. Some generalities may still be useful, even if the introduction of magic and the loss of technology steered reality on a completely different path. For example, you know that Pain is the official head of Akatsuki and is nearly unbeatable, and that Madara is the true force behind him. The other members are impossible to determine with any accuracy, though. Additionally, it gives you a motivation to do your best. We didn't want to burden you with that before, but you are now old enough to deal with the pressure without it dominating your entire thought processes. What have you noticed that seemed always the same in the different threads?" his father asked.
Naruto thought for a moment. "The events leading to my alternate self trying to control the Kyuubi are ridiculously unlikely, which gives credence to your theory that sealing me was a last-ditch effort to create a savior and not planned beforehand. Or at least not at that specific point in time; who knows how long the Yondaime would have needed to perfect his seal. Yakumo isn't present in most timelines, I only meet her much later if at all and she is too weak physically by that point to become a kunoichi, even if I somehow manage to cure her mental problems. Practically never I'm given a good education. It's partly my own fault because of the influence of the seal and lack of basic social skills and study habits. I understand the instructors won't teach the students their best skills, but some of that is ridiculous. Kakashi and Jiraiya are especially bad in that regard. Combined what I've seen from my own real education genin are almost completely unprepared for real shinobi life when they graduate. Heck, most of the rookie genin in the chunin exams had never killed before in their life. It almost constitutes criminal negligence to send such people out on missions. What if they're in combat and discover they can't kill or break down?"
Daiki nodded. "You're right about the training. We have only scraps of evidence and a whole lot of suspicion, but there is definitely something wrong, with your personal education as well as with the village as a whole. It might be happenstance, incompetence or deliberate. There is no way for us to know for certain. That is one of the reasons why we don't trust the Hokage, both the current one and his possible successors. You're important for them in any eventuality. They should have either noticed your lack of training and done something about it, or they are party to a conspiracy to keep you down. Or they could be incompetent, which would be perhaps even worse. By the way, this is another reason why we didn't want for you to do exceptionally well at the academy or act suspicious. If it is a conspiracy, you could be in for a Yamanaka-style mind-rape or memory seal treatment. It's rather farfetched, but we don't want to take unnecessary risks."
Naruto nodded. He was probably one of the most intelligent people in his age group, but he didn't dare to let it show to anybody he didn't trust completely. Sometimes it was quite hard to play dumb.
'Funny thing. Shikamaru's scores are worse than mine and a lot of others, but only he is hailed as a genius.'
A female voice disturbed the silence. "Are you two finished? There is quite a nice beach here I'd like to test."
Apparently his mother had left while he was occupied and gone exploring. She snaked her hands around his father's chest and whispered into his ear. Naruto couldn't make out the words, but from his father's reaction he guessed it was something naughty.
"We're done her. Come along son, time for you to swim in a real ocean." Daiki said.
Much later back in the familiar cottage, Naruto pondered what he would do with his newfound knowledge. In general not much came to mind, his parents had already set him on the most promising path that left him in an optimal position to deal with most events. Theoretically he could hole up inside of the sanctuary permanently, but that would prevent him from becoming a capable shinobi and make him a sitting target. While the sanctuary was relatively secure it was neither completely undiscoverable if someone searched long and hard enough, nor were the defenses impenetrable. Not to mention the problem of learning the higher secrets of the sealing arts to get his parents out.
One thing was certain, he needed additional help. He couldn't really plan for specific events or enemies, even in the original vision there was far too much variation. Even if he met the same person they could have radically different skills or personalities, making it impossible to develop specific techniques to counter them. In the same vein warning anybody would be pointless because there was no telling if specific events would happen at all. Who knew what had changed from the original parameters? There was simply no way for him to develop overpowering skills himself in time that would work reliably against most of the possible dangers, let alone all. If he had reliable allies with sufficient power things became much easier. He couldn't really manipulate the future to his liking; there were too many parameters to consider and random chance to boot. His human mind wouldn't be able to handle all necessary details anyway. Perhaps he could do something about his more promising classmates he had seen?
Sasuke was probably a lost cause. Given time Naruto might be able to break through his shell as he had done in some of the visions, but inevitably Itachi, Orochimaru or Madara would do something to pull him back into the darkness, even if they had to repeatedly mind-rape him. Naruto wasn't about to become even more of a target by befriending the Uchiha who he didn't even like, his life was dangerous enough. There were simply too many powerful people that wanted Sasuke for their own plans. There was also the matter of the mangekyo sharingan that made befriending him far too risky. Additionally, he would have to focus his entire attention solely on Sasuke to achieve anything, and he didn't have the time for that.
Sakura he couldn't do much about. The girl was obsessive about Sasuke, and he knew her parents reinforced that obsession in hope of attaining the wealth of the Uchiha via a marriage. Naruto didn't want to become her punching bag, and pretending to have a crush on her was out of the question. In most timelines it had required several near death experiences, the Uchiha leaving the village and a Sannin as teacher to kick her ass into gear. He simply had no starting point to work on her, and while she had often become an expert medic-nin under Tsunade's tutelage he felt that other people would have made more out of the same opportunity. No, he would spare his time for targets that offered a better return.
Hinata was already in the works. He genuinely liked her as a friend he was growing rapidly closer to. Her family was a problem though. He still couldn't believe that his stupid selves had almost never recognized that the girl was attracted to him, or reacted in some romantic way even if she gave him a full-blown confession. Although it was probably better to keep her ignorant of that fact; it might reinforce her obsessive tendencies otherwise. His parents wouldn't appreciate getting their efforts at psychological therapy set back. There was no telling if the real him and Hinata would ever develop a romantic relationship, and he wouldn't force the issue. If it happened, fine, if not, there were countless other fish in the sea. He was still too young for such things anyway, despite what his mother constantly implied.
Choji was his closest male friend, even if he couldn't reveal all his secrets to him. Shino and Yakumo were close friends as well, and he had already made them improve their skills considerably through his normal behavior alone. They should become far more powerful far earlier than what he had seen in the visions. Kiba was a friendly acquaintance, but he couldn't risk revealing anything suspicious to him, the boy tended to blurt things out without thinking. Maybe he could do something when he was older and more mature. That left Shikamaru and Ino as people from his class that he got a good idea on what they could become. Some other members of his current class he thought could become capable shinobi, but the visions had been silent about them.
He was honestly at a loss about Shikamaru's behavior. The boy was so lazy he literally didn't want to do anything besides sleeping and cloud watching. Only constant pressure kept him doing the absolute minimum amount of work he needed to pass. More perplexing was that he wasn't that lazy even in the worst of the visions. Something had obviously caused a drastic change like with Yakumo, but while in her case it was positive, the Nara boy clearly got the raw deal. Naruto would try, but wasn't optimistic.
That left Ino Yamanaka as the last one with future political power in the village. Currently she ran with the Uchiha fan girl crowd and neglected her training. He would have to do something about that, she could be a great help. Luckily it seemed that her parents didn't do more than tolerate her crush, which meant there were fewer obstacles to bringing her over to his side. Unfortunately she wouldn't take kindly to any attempts on his part to separate her from the Uchiha.
'Perhaps Hinata could do something? No, she still is way too shy.' Then he remembered another fact. 'Yakumo is joining our class next week after she paused her education to be with her uncle during his last months before his death. She already doesn't like Uchiha in general, and with Sasuke's personality there is no question that he will ever win her over. If I set both Yakumo and Hinata on Ino they should be able to make some progress. It will probably take all of next year, though."
If successful, they would be a circle of six friends. Six was a good number, not too large and not too small. More would be too difficult to manage with all the other things on his schedule. Naruto doubted they would be as lucky as to end up on only two teams, but chances were good that some of them would be together. It was obvious that the team composition was a matter of politics, considering that no matter what the clan heirs were grouped together instead of spread out and their teams always passed the second test. Although he would have to somehow make sure neither he nor any of his friends ended up with Kakashi, that man's team was a disaster waiting to happen. Still, he had almost three years left for that. Naruto was sure a solution would present itself in time.
"This is the r-right wall, Naruto-kun." Hinata said while pointing at a completely normal looking section.
"Thanks, Hinata-chan. Here goes nothing." Naruto channeled some chakra into his hand and traced a complex geometric figure on the stone wall. At first nothing happened, but then a seal glowed briefly before the wall slid back, creating an opening. Quickly they entered before the opening closed itself again. A short corridor was leading into the darkness, dimly lit by the lamp in Naruto's hand.
They had been exploring Konoha's underground for quite some time now. Naruto had somehow gained possession of the blueprints of Konoha's original construction, but over the decades they had lost a lot of their accuracy due to several reconstructions. It made finding secret passages much more difficult for him, but now she was here to help him. While even her byakugan couldn't see in the dark it was relatively easy for her to find the seals regulating some of the secret passages and look out for the chakra signatures of potential enemies. Naruto's main interest was finding a backdoor into the shinobi library, but every entrance they could find was either barred, secured by unknown and very dangerous looking traps and seals or the area was in use by someone else. After several months of trying they had given up on this project and tried to find smaller secret rooms that might contain caches of interesting materials.
Currently they were investigating one of those. "There aren't any chakra sources I can see." she said before deactivating her byakugan. While she had much more chakra than only a few months ago it was still not enough by far to keep her bloodline active permanently, and they had to search the room conventionally. The secret room had been a hideout of some sort, but there was nothing of interest left. That was until she stumbled upon a hidden cache of books that was hidden behind a false wall tile.
"'Theory of elemental training', 'Systems of jutsu crafting', 'Influence of hand seals on shape transformation'" Naruto read aloud after she had called him over. "Wow, this is great find. Good work, Hinata-chan."
She blushed at the praise, but hopefully Naruto couldn't see that in the dim light. On further thought, he probably could with that night vision of his. They spent another hour going over the room with a fine-toothed comb, but discovered nothing else. Naruto secured the books in his backpack and they made to leave the room. When the slab of stone that covered the exit rumbled to the side she suddenly came face-to-face with two men wearing cloaks and featureless porcelain masks. Each had a tanto drawn in an attack position, with one of them already descending towards her head.
'I forgot to check the corridor before opening the door.'
Before she could completely assess the situation, Naruto shoved her out into the main corridor and to the left side while he darted to the right. Changing her stumbling into a roll, she sprang back onto her feet and faced the enemies while dodging an attack that bit deep into the floor, leaving a gouge behind. Running away in the long, straight main corridor would only get her a weapon stuck into her back. The larger of the two enemies had turned towards her, his sword already ready for the next strike, while the other one went after Naruto. The sword displayed a curious glitter. 'He channels chakra through his weapon.' She had only a moment to process it before the man attacked again and things descended into the chaotic frenzy of battle.
Hinata was small for her age; she simply didn't have the reach to counter a bigger, adult enemy with a sword. Using her natural flexibility to the fullest she desperately evaded and bent around the strikes coming at her, but she wasn't able to mount a counterattack. She still needed a second of concentration and a hand seal to activate her byakugan, and she couldn't spare time for that. Neither could she retreat or draw a weapon from her kunai pouch. It would be only a matter of moments until one of the sword strikes connected, and that would be the end of it.
"Bringer of Darkness"
Suddenly the enemy before her fumbled and brought his arms to his face in a surprised gesture, thereby creating an opening. Hinata didn't think; she simply reacted. Darting forward, she sent a Juuken strike as powerful as she could make directly into the enemies chest. Her instructors would have chided her for the badly executed form, but here it made no matter. His heart ruptured, the man went still for a moment before falling to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut. A short distance away she could see Naruto standing over his own defeated enemy who had several deep slash wounds from Naruto's knives. Absentmindedly she noted that he seemed to have died from his throat getting slashed open. Naruto's clothing was damaged in several places, but he had worn his sturdy leather outfit. It seemed to have prevented any strikes reaching his flesh.
Hinata's eyes returned to the enemy at her feet while the adrenaline high faded. 'I killed him.' Suddenly her stomach lurched and the world before her eyes seemed to spin around. She could feel a fainting spell approaching. Faintly she heard Naruto calling her name before he said "Shit, she's going into shock." A sudden slap to her face brought her back to reality. She found herself staring into Naruto's eyes. "Pull yourself together, we can't stay here and must hurry. Wait a few meters down the corridor."
Hinata nodded silently and staggered a short distance before she leaned against the corridor wall, careful to keep her eyes from the scene of the battle. She could hear Naruto searching the bodies. Suddenly he stood before her. "Come on, we have to get away. I found some exploding tags that I set to take care of all evidence." When she didn't react, Naruto cursed and pulled her forcefully into a fireman's carry before running away as fast as he could. The entire time only a single thought was running through her mind: 'I killed someone.' The remorse she felt for it was simply crushing, paralyzing her completely. After a while she heard a muted thud as the exploding tags Naruto had placed ignited. She didn't really pay attention where he carried her; even the sudden exposure to daylight didn't really get through. Neither did the damp mist she felt on her face.
It was only when she felt something pull her consciousness away that she realized that Naruto had carried her into the sanctuary despite it being two days too early for their visit. Still, she didn't resist the pull. When she could see again Youko was standing before her before the woman pulled her into an embrace. Warmth spread through her body, causing the dam that had held her emotions in check to burst. Hinata began to shake and sob uncontrollably into Youko's chest.
"What happened?" Daiki asked after he had taken Naruto some distance away from the sobbing Hinata.
Naruto tiredly smoothed his hair with his hand. "We were exploring a secret room in Konoha's underground. When we left we encountered two enemies without warning who immediately attacked us. I hadn't realized the entrance was sound-proof, making my sense of hearing useless for getting advance warning. Additionally, I forgot to remind Hinata to check with her eyes. She isn't as used to this as I am and didn't think of it herself at that moment." He sighed deeply before continuing. "I don't know who these guys with the blank masks are, but one time in the past I overheard them talking about a report to a Danzo-sama. They are probably some sort of secret group or private army that answers to the councilor Danzo Shimura. We just stumbled upon them; they didn't seem to know who we were. Hinata was wearing the black ninja outfit I got for her tenth birthday a few weeks ago that leaves only the eyes visible and my bright hair was covered. It was too dark for them to see my whisker marks. I think they have standing orders to kill anyone who discovers them." Naruto went silent for a moment. "I recognized the younger one. He was with me in the orphanage, but one day he disappeared. From what I heard I thought he had been adopted."
He looked his father into the eyes. "It happened so fast I didn't have time to pull on mom's chakra to alert you. They went after us individually. My enemy was about genin level, Hinata's was better. We were very, very lucky. I was forced to pull out the Bringer of Darkness technique and used it on both of them at the same time, and that decided the battle because it surprised them. I slashed the throat of my enemy before he really realized what was happening. Hinata killed hers with a Juuken strike. To the heart, I think." He shook his head. "I don't think we would have made it if our enemies had been reversed. Hinata's flexibility is simply amazing, I could never dodge and bend like that. My leather clothes were sturdy enough to prevent the genin injuring me, but Hinata's enemy gouged deep incisions into the stone walls with his sword. After the battle Hinata went into shock, so I hid the corpses behind the secret door and used the exploding tags I found on them to destroy all evidence. I brought her to the sanctuary and called you prematurely; I couldn't let Hinata return to her clan in that state."
Daiki placed a hand on his shoulder. "You did the right thing, son. Unexpected things happen all the time." He paused for a moment. "How do you feel about your first kill of a human?"
"I don't know; it happened very fast. It doesn't really feel any different from killing an animal though, it was simply necessary. Is that wrong?"
"Everyone deals very differently with killing, Naruto. Some people wouldn't be able to harm a fly if their life depended on it while others like killing or even find it arousing. I think you are fine if you see it as a thing that simply has to be done. From my perspective the difference between animals and humans isn't that great anyway. Just don't get into the habit of killing frivolously or needlessly. If you feel the need to talk about it I'm always there for you."
It had taken hours for Hinata to calm down, but finally she was able to talk again. Then the words literally spilled from her lips. She told Youko everything; the exploration of the secret passage; the fight; her break down after she realized she had killed a human being. Worst of all was the shame she felt for her behavior; it went against every lesson her clan had taught her. To make matters worse, it had been her carelessness that led them into the situation in the first place because she forgot to check the corridor with her byakugan before opening the secret door.
Youko tried to alleviate her distress. "Don't beat yourself up about that, Hinata. Everyone makes mistakes. Your first kill is always difficult. With time it will become easier. It could have been worse; for example you could have hesitated to make the strike, or one or both of you could have been wounded."
"I-I was o-only able to do it o-out of reflex. After I r-realized what I d-did… it was h-horrible. I d-don't think I c-can k-kill again." Then Hinata noticed something. "Where is N-Naruto? He isn't h-hurt, is he?"
"No, he is completely healthy. My mate is dealing with Naruto's problems. It was the first killing of a human for him, too."
That caused her further shame. Like her, Naruto had never killed a human before, but instead of becoming non-functional he had kept his cool and brought them back to safety. What would have happened if they had encountered additional enemies? The answer was only too obvious: With Naruto forced to protect her and not free to act in battle they would have died. And it would have been her fault. She thought of the future. There was no choice but becoming a kunoichi for her; her clan wouldn't tolerate anything less. No one could protect her from that. That meant she would have to kill again. If she wasn't able to or hesitated her friends and future team mates would get hurt. When she imagined their dead, cold eyes staring reproachfully at her something changed inside Hinata, and she came to a decision.
"I want your help in b-becoming better at k-killing."
Youko seemed surprised by this. "Hinata, my mate and I are probably not the best persons to talk about that. I have laid waste to continents, destroyed entire nations, crushed cities and killed more people than you can imagine. For me exist absolutely no moral inhibitions against killing people aside from those I have a personal connection with. My mate has even more blood on his hands. Now, that doesn't mean I simply indiscriminately slaughter humans, at least not anymore, but there is literally nothing holding me back when I decide someone has to die. I even enjoy killing to a degree. Do you really want for me to become your role model? Not someone else with a more humane mindset?"
Hinata shook her resolutely. "No, I w-want your help. Y-You have taught me more than anyone else, and I t-trust you. If I h-have to k-kill I want to b-be able to d-do it without r-remorse or h-hesitation."
She couldn't read the expression Youko assumed after this statement. "As you wish, Daiki and I will help you deal better with killing. It isn't an isolated thing, though, it will change you as a whole. The first thing we will have to work at is your kindness. It can be a serious weakness. There is nothing wrong with being kind to your friends and people that are neutral towards you to a lesser degree, but you include even people who don't like you and enemies in your heart. The only thing you achieve with that is causing yourself pain. Additionally, you may hesitate when you shouldn't. We will approach this and other issues slowly, and if you are uncomfortable with something don't keep it to yourself." Youko stopped her speech when Hinata yawned. "But that can wait until tomorrow. Off to bed with you."
In the end, Youko had to carry Hinata to her bed. Emotionally drained as she was, Hinata fell asleep almost immediately. She never saw the triumphant gleam in Youko's eyes when she left the alcove.
Shino watched the others from behind his usual mask of impassiveness. It was quite the group Naruto had assembled, four clan heirs and a jinchuuriki. Apparently he and Hinata had found something interesting that they wanted to share. Currently there were no academy classes; the winter break of their third year had begun yesterday. His association with them had proven quite beneficial to his training already; it was so much easier to train yourself when you had people around you that likewise took their training seriously. That was the main reason Shino had approached them over one year ago, most of his other classmates seemed to view shinobi life more as a great adventure.
He had observed Choji and Naruto for a while beforehand. Despite their rather low ranking in class they trained diligently, and that was more important than trivial school grades. Furthermore, Choji was a good political connection, and they were already friends with the Kurama heiress. One day they would assume leadership of their respective clans and would have to work together, making it only logical to create a friendship or at least a working relationship early on. His kikaichu had told him about Naruto's absolutely massive chakra reserves despite his attempts to mask them. Combined with his training regime and determination he was likely to rise quickly in the ranks, making pursuing a friendship worthwhile even without taking his friendship with two clan heirs into account. Their first encounter had begun pretty much with the standard opening when one wanted to befriend an Aburame. Really, how gullible people thought he was? Talking about insects to gain the friendship of an Aburame was just… cliché. Naruto hadn't been the first one who tried it, but he was the first one he had let succeed. There were several reasons for that.
One, Shino had deliberately sought them out on that day. Even if the blond boy had been an idiot he would have pursued a friendship, at least for a time to get a more accurate impression.
Two, when Naruto examined his kikaichu he had dropped his chakra masking technique deliberately for a moment. It had been a shock for Shino when he discovered that his original estimate about Naruto's chakra reserves had been wrong by about a factor of at least ten. Furthermore, it showed that he had noticed his kikaichu inspecting him earlier and that he was good enough to fool them if he chose to.
Three, while their talk about insects seemed normal to people not in the know, the particular species Naruto had chosen to talk about had been quite peculiar. It was obvious for every entomologist, which every Aburame was, that they were deliberately chosen to serve as analogies. Apparently Naruto had been aware of Shino observing them, guessed his intentions correctly and showed his intelligence in a way with plausible deniability and without anyone else being able to listen in. It had impressed him. Well, that and it was interesting to talk with someone about insects who knew his stuff, of course.
Over the months his calculated move had grown into a genuine friendship. They always spent an hour or two after the academy closed training or simply hung out together. It was a bit difficult to find enough time for everything because he, Hinata and Choji were often busy with clan training and family duties while Naruto and Yakumo had to invest a lot of time taking care of themselves. If you lived alone there was no one who did the cleaning, shopping or cooking for you. When Naruto revealed his status as a jinchuuriki Shino had felt honored by the trust placed in him. At the same time he had felt irritation about the way the village treated Naruto; it was completely illogical. Shino liked the people in this group, and they accepted his quirks without problems. Using his kikaichu to gather additional information was almost a reflex, though he tried to bring it under conscious control. It was almost easier to walk around with closed eyes than to forego sending his allies to gather information. Most people reacted rather poorly when they found some bugs crawling on their skin; not that it happened often that they were detected. His friends accepted the occasional bug without problems; and that was something he greatly appreciated. He hadn't been lying that day on the academy yard when he told that some girls had reacted poorly to his presence. Luckily, neither Yakumo nor Hinata showed any adverse reaction.
Hinata's addition to their circle by Naruto was once again a sign of Naruto's political acumen and foresight. She was almost as silent as he was at first, but slowly she seemed to get out of her shell. Somehow Naruto had solved the problem of Hinata stalking him, and the girl's formerly non-existent self-confidence was steadily rising. She had acted a bit strangely a few days ago, but was now back to normal. Shino had noticed some additional changes in the last months, namely that Hinata's chakra reserves were expanding rapidly and that she employed the same masking technique as Naruto. While his kikaichu could detect the masking technique, they couldn't actually gauge how much chakra she was hiding. Shino doubted anyone other than an Aburame would notice, from what he gathered most sensor abilities would be fooled completely.
Naruto clearing his throat interrupted his musings. "What I have to say today is a secret, but it's important for our future careers. A bit of explanation is necessary beforehand. I have been able to feel my own chakra very precisely for a long time. Don't know if it is because of the fox, but I can feel its chakra too. I'm not a sensor though; if it isn't directly interacting with my chakra I can sense absolutely nothing outside of my body. Over time I have developed a series of exercises to help control and increase it. What Hinata-chan here discovered is that my exercises are vastly more powerful than the usual ones. She helped me analyzing them and brought them in a form that we can teach others. In other words: you. You should see results very soon, but it's more about testing the methods."
"How big an increase in chakra reserves are we talking about here?" Shino asked curiously.
Hinata answered instead of Naruto. "I'm not entirely s-sure; it's possible that every p-person reacts a bit differently. Naruto-kun told me he could feel h-his own chakra and that he made up these exercises since w-way before the academy. I think h-his chakra reserves are currently about Kage level, and they are still rising. Part of that is p-probably because of his tenant, though. I have b-been doing the low end exercises for a few months after I f-figured out how to do them, and I am now low g-genin level. My r-reserves more than tripled."
Shino's eyebrows shot upwards. For a student halfway through the academy that was enormous. "What do you want in exchange? Such techniques are extremely valuable; probably on the same level as clan secrets." Yakumo said.
"Nothing specific, but I would like that if someone of us comes across something that would help the others he or she shares it too. I'd like that you to keep the chakra training to yourself, though. I plan to use it as a political bargaining chip in some years for establishing my own clan. Are you all alright with that?"
No one was objecting. Shino wasn't surprised. If that was true, and Naruto and Hinata wouldn't lie about something like this, it would be a truly priceless advantage for anyone. Chakra was one of the most important resources a ninja could have, and there could never be enough. That was especially true for the Aburame. Their allies required a non-negligible amount to simply function, and while they entered a form of hibernation in the case of low reservers or outright chakra exhaustion it was extremely unpleasant. Like suddenly missing eyes or ears; they were interwoven to such a strong degree that he considered them more as a part of his body than an external entity. If these training techniques were what Naruto promised he had just secured the future backing of the Aburame clan. Shino would make sure of that.
Frustrated, Naruto snapped the book closed and threw his hand into the air. "I give up, that stuff just makes no sense."
Daiki, Youko and Hinata looked at him disapprovingly. "Okay, okay, it makes some sense, but our progress is far too slow. There are just too many bits of more intermediary knowledge missing. We need help from someone knowledgeable in chakra and jutsu theory, preferably at chunin level or higher if we want to make our own techniques before Hinata and I make genin."
"Well, that means you somehow have to find one, doesn't it?" Youko asked with a raised eyebrow.
Author's notes: My thanks to my reviewers and to my two betas who don't have an account here.
Regarding the visions of the future: Think of it like viewing the series in fast forward with jumps and scenes missing or in extremely low quality. Or rather an extremely large number of different but equally valid versions of the series, with no indication which is the true one. It will serve less as direct knowledge of what will happen and more of an motivator for Naruto to prepare the best as he can.
Naruto and Hinata get to kill their first human enemies, and the opportunity for a little bit of further psychological manipulation is promptly seized.
Next chapter Naruto will enlist the help of an adult. It will be a canon character, but it won't be Anko, her time will come later. Guesses are welcome, I think it will be quite the suprise.
So long.