Issei and Naruto stood across the field from each other ready for their spar. Naruto was dressed in his shinobi style celestial bronze armor and wielding his kanabo. Issei was wearing a cold iron mail hauberk with cold iron chausses and wielded two cold iron gauntlets. From what Naruto could see, Issei's gauntlets had been reinforced to act as brass knuckles and the fingers of the gauntlets were formed into sharp claws. They would no doubt give Issei a fair amount of flexibility on attack options even if they did sacrifice the reach that a spear, ax, or even a sword could give.
At the same time, Issei was eyeing Naruto's kanabo with concern. Cold iron was superior to celestial bronze similarly if not quite as big of a gap to how regular iron was superior to bronze. The problem for Issei is that his armor was focused on defending against piercing and cutting attacks. It didn't do nearly as well against blunt force attacks. When one added in Naruto's almost ridiculous strength and the fact that Hera had reinforced the kanabo with seals, well, it didn't paint a very good picture to Issei. Issei still thought he could win, but he knew that a solid blow or two could hand the victory to Naruto.
Rossweisse stood off to the side on the field and calmly looked at the two teens. She then called out. "The spar will begin when I say so. As agreed upon, you will be limiting yourselves to weapons skills with one weapon and innate physical abilities. The match will continue until first blood is drawn, one of you forfeits, or does something to disqualify them. Do you both understand the terms of this match?" Both teens nodded their heads. Rossweisse then said, "You may begin now!"
Both teens immediately assumed defensive postures and started circling each other. Normally in such a situation Naruto would have thrown some shuriken or kunai to distract Issei if he didn't want to use a bunch of kage bunshins. That was why when Rossweisse had suggested this spar to start off Naruto's fourteenth birthday party Naruto had asked for the one weapon limit. Being the top fighter made it harder for Naruto to practice unpredictability in a fight unless he created challenges like this for him. The last thing Naruto wanted when he got back to Konoha was to find out his skills in a fight had degraded because he was so used to being on top. Having a bunch of new jutsus wouldn't be much good if he had forgotten how to fight an equal or someone stronger than him.
After several seconds of circling, Issei thought he saw an opening and rushed at Naruto. Just as Issei was about to strike Naruto dodged the incoming swipe and swung his kanabo. Issei swerved away from the spiked bat missing it by a hair's breath. The perverted anse recovered from avoiding Naruto's attack almost instantly and started to circle around for another pass. Naruto saw his opponent's movements and decided to switch to a more defensive stance. The fact that he wasn't used to fighting defensively made the spar more challenging and thus more fun. Besides, Issei's weapon choice dictated that he had to fight aggressively and the fight might be over too quickly if both of them fought that way.
Several times Issei circled around Naruto, attacked, barely escaped a counter-attack, and retreated to a safe distance. However, it was quickly becoming apparent that Naruto was winning this spar. Issei was starting to breathe harder ten minutes into the spar while Naruto was as fresh as a rose. By the fifteen minute mark of this routine Issei was starting to sweat. Finally, at the twenty minute mark Issei fell to his knees panting for breath. "I yield," Issei called out in between labored breaths.
Rossweisse called out in a calm voice, "Naruto Uzumaki wins by forfeiture." The valkyrie calmly watched as Naruto walked over to her son and helped him to his feet. Once Issei was up, he and Naruto started to talk about their spar. The sight of the duo happily talking brought a small smile to Rossweisse's lips. Raising Issei had always been difficult for the valkyrie because he was her first child and she had to raise him on Midgard. She couldn't raise Issei full time in Asgard because of his mortal blood. Her beloved husband couldn't help out because of the public nature of his death when he was a mortal. Both boys headed into the Hyoudou household to change out of their armor.
Once the boys were out of their armor they got into the car so that Rossweisse could drive them over to Naruto's and Ms. Frizzle's house. Ms. Frizzle had wanted Naruto out of the house for a bit while she did some prep work for the birthday party. That's why the spar was at the Hyoudou house. It was a simple fifteen minute drive over to Naruto's house and most of that time was simple because of them hitting so many traffic lights. Naruto started to frown about halfway to his house. For some reason his danger sense was starting to act up and Naruto couldn't figure out why. None of the perimeter alert seals he had set up around town had gone off. While they weren't perfect, they were based on the same barrier seals that surrounded Konoha. Besides, Rossweisse and Issei weren't showing signs that they were sensing any danger which means that there shouldn't be any danger.
Rossweisse parked her car in the driveway and the trio got out. They headed to the backyard where Ms. Frizzle was setting things up for an afternoon picnic party. Arnold, Arianwen, Sk'elep, Gerd, Fjolnir, and a half dozen different nature spirits were already in the backyard. Hera appeared in the backyard in a swirl of leaves just as Naruto passed through the backyard gates. Naruto smiled when he saw his mother and immediately ran up to give her a hug. After hugging Hera, Naruto walked over and gave his grandmother and uncle a hug as well. He then turned to look at Sk'elep how quickly held up his hands saying, "No hugs for me birthday boy."
Naruto rolled his eyes and offered his hand to his perverted teacher. The coyote spirit quickly accepted the offered hand with a strong handshake. After that handshake, Naruto went to all of the guests and shook their hands while thanking them for showing up. Unlike most people, especially teenagers, at their birthday party Naruto didn't pay attention to the small pile of presents for him sitting off to the side. For him, the presents were not nearly as important as having someone to spend time with. Naruto smiled at everyone and said, "I'm grateful you all decided to come to my party today."
Hera smiled and spoke up. "There is one person who hasn't yet arrived Naruto." For some inexplicable reason, Naruto got the sense of impending danger.
This sense of danger only got worse as Gerd frowned and spoke up, "That's strange daughter. I know of someone who said she'd be at this party. I didn't know that you had talked to her."
A chill ran down Naruto's back when he heard two familiar voices call out, "Happy birthday Naruto." The voices started out friendly and cheerful, but they quickly gained a tense edge to them. Naruto quickly looked around and saw Artemis standing at one side of the fence and Sunna was standing at the other. Both goddesses had a present in their arms and were giving each other heated glares for some reason Naruto could not fathom.
Safely to the side, the other party guests nervously watched as the two goddesses started walking closer to Naruto. It was obvious to everyone else that both Sunna and Artemis had picked up on the other's interest in the oblivious blond and they were not happy about it. While Naruto greeted both of his friends, Hera muttered to her mother, "This could get ugly."
Gerd hurriedly replied in a sarcastic tone, "What was your first clue?"
Sk'elep pulled out a bowl of popcorn and a beer from a seal and started to giggle perversely. It was always good to see two girls fighting over a guy in his book. The fact that he would get to see two goddesses fighting made things even better in Sk'elep's book. Now the only thing that could make this better in Sk'elep's mind was if the goddesses somehow ended up in a mud ring and the Fates guaranteed that some boobs would be exposed.
Artemis and Sunna walked closer together with Naruto in the middle until the three were in arm's length of each other. In an eerie unison both goddesses turned to Naruto and demandingly said, "Naruto, who is your friend?" Everyone except for Naruto could hear the sarcastic quotation marks in the goddesses' voices when they used the word friend.
Naruto obliviously replied in his usual cheerful tone. "Artemis, this is Sunna the Norse goddess of the Sun. She's a good friend of mine who has been taking some time to teach me about monster threats here in the North. Sunna, this is Artemis the Greek goddess of Moon and Hunt. She's also a very good friend of mine and she's been volunteering at Camp Halfblood these past couple of summers as an archery teacher. I'm sure both of you will be great friends once you get to know each other."
Both goddesses looked each other in the eye and the onlookers would later swear they saw lighting cross between the goddess's eyes. It was an understatement to say that both goddesses did not the fact that another goddess who was friendly with Naruto was also after him romantically. Artemis tensely offered Sunna her hand and said, "A pleasure to meet you Sunna." The Greek goddess didn't understand why she was so hostile to Sunna. Sure, she was annoyed that someone was trying to take Naruto away from her. However, she shouldn't be this enraged about it should she? Her tentative betrothal to Naruto was only conditional if he wasn't able to find a way for all of them to get out of her oath unscathed so someone else's interest in him shouldn't be that annoying. Why should it bother her if someone wanted her friend after everything was taken care of with the oath? Subconsciously, Artemis had been suppressing Hera's warning and also ignoring Naruto's suggestions on how he might be able to get them out of their oaths. Naruto wasn't the only one at the party who had a blind spot to matters of the heart.
Sunna took the offered hand and gave it an unfriendly strong squeeze in return. In a challenging tone she replied, "The pleasure will be mine Artemis." Sunna was sizing up her competition and she was not impressed. Artemis might be a potentially troublesome rival to the Aesir goddess if she put her full effort into courting Naruto. All she needed to do was get Naruto out of his admirably infuriating oath and then it would be no contest for her. The solar goddess had never lost when it counted before and she was not about to start now.
Hera and Gerd looked at each other and nodded their heads. Enough was enough. Both goddesses moved to the younger member of their respective pantheons. They quickly grabbed Artemis and Sunna's attention away from each other. Hera and Gerd then led Artemis and Sunna to opposite sides of the backyard to calm them down. Naruto was confused by this turn of events, most of the other party guests breathed out sighs of relief, and Sk'elep started to pout. He wanted hair pulling and clawing with a slight chance of revealing skin damn it!
It was a chilly November morning as Naruto wearing the buckskin jacket Artemis had gotten for him saddled up Bucephalus for a trip. Things had eventually calmed down after Suna and Artemis's near brawl at his birthday party a month ago. Hera had quickly gotten Artemis to agree to keep the existence of other pantheons a secret from Olympus. She could easily imagine all of the problems many of the gods would cause if they found out that some other god shared their domain in another part of the world. After a few days, things seemed to settle out for Naruto as they always did after a major event occurred around him. Things stayed mostly the same for the young halfblood. The only changes he saw were that both Artemis and Sunna had started spending more time with him. Not that Naruto minded this change as he was all for spending more time with his friends.
Once Bucephalus was saddled, Naruto went back into the house and grabbed a large package wrapped in a protective blanket. Naruto wished that he could just seal the package up, but his mother had advised him against doing so for this trip. He gently placed the package on Bucephalus's back behind his saddle and then securely fastened the package onto his steed. Naruto got on his steed after he double checked everything and lead the eight legged horse out of the backyard. The duo quickly headed out of town and then kicked it up to supersonic speed.
A little over an hour later Naruto reached his destination of Ape Cave in Washington. Naruto used his best genjutsu along with his abilities to manipulate the Mist to hide his and Bucephalus's presences from the mortal visitors. Even though he was invisible, Naruto carefully led Bucephalus so that his steed didn't touch any of the other visitors in the cave. Bucephalus soon found an empty section of the lava tube and Naruto felt a strange surge of energy from his steed. That surge signaled Bucephalus's magic activating the horse's most powerful ability.
The cave around Naruto immediately gained a second chamber which he promptly directed Bucephalus to enter. This tunnel had a very steep grade, but Bucephalus was easily able to keep his footing. After about ten minutes of Bucephalus trotting the magically made lava tunnel opened up into a massive underground chamber half filled with black water. Naruto gently patted his steed's neck to reassure the now uncertain horse.
Now refilled with confidence, Bucephalus reared back and then dashed onto the black water. Bucephalus and Naruto took off across the black water at a full gallop. The cavern around the horse and rider kept on getting larger the longer they traveled over the water. Then without warning the cavern grew to enormous proportions revealing that the water Bucephalus was galloping on was a river as wide as the Mississippi.
A large black barge soon came into view as Naruto and Bucepalus continued traveling down the river. Horse and rider came closer to the barge as they traveled down the river. Naruto winced as he heard a storm of cussing come from the barge. "What the Tartarus do you think you're doing you no good brat? Union regulations clearly state that I'm the only one allowed to operate a crossing business over the River Styx. I've paid my dues to the Chthonic Union and I've been to every union meeting. I know you're not in the membership. When the other members hear about what you've done," Naruto managed to ignore the rest of Charon's rants and threats as he headed to the other side of the Styx.
Charon's rants and threats were rather educating to Naruto as he approached the underworld proper. He had been wondering why Hades' realm was so pathetic relative to the various afterlives in the North. In the North you had Valhalla for the heroic warrior einherjar along with Freyja's field of Folkvangr for the einherjar that came from regular soldiers and warriors. Then you had the holy mountain of Hegafjell where regular and undistinguished mortals simply lived again like they had in life. Finally you had Hel's dreary Helheim which contained those who lived mostly bad lives with the subsection of Nastrond reserved for the truly wicked.
That complicated system seemed better to Naruto than what existed in the west. With his Uncle's realm if you were really good or heroic you got Elysium which was supposedly between Folkvangr and Hegafjell in terms of existence. If you were wicked you got the Fields of Punishment. Otherwise, you went to Asphodel which in Naruto's mind might as well be part of the Fields of Punishment. Losing one's memories and identity to just float around for all eternity seemed pretty hellish to him. Why his uncle, who Sk'elep admitted was one of the hardest working gods if not the hardest working in the Olympian West, had let his realm end up like this had boggled Naruto's mind. However, the fact that the other gods and goddesses of the underworld had formed a union explained everything wrong with the current condition of the West's afterlife.
Cerberus started walking towards Naruto growling all three of his heads. Naruto calmly looked up at the monstrous three headed Rottweiler and ignored Charon's jeers about how he was about to be eaten. As soon as Cerberus got within one body length of Naruto the halfblood shinobi called out, "Back off!" To emphasis this, Naruto mixed some of the Kyuubi's chakra in with his own killing intent.
Charon was horrified to watch as Cerberus stopped in his tracks and then his three heads looked at each other. Naruto continued to use the mix of his and the kyuubi's chakra as he calmly lead Bucephalus closer to the underworld's guard dog. In a clear voice Naruto commanded, "Step aside Cerberus because I have no quarrel with you or your master. So step aside because I have no desire to slay you if I do not have to do so." Cerberus lowered his heads in submission and quickly started to back away from Naruto had Bucephalus.
Once Naruto was passed Cerberus he headed towards Hades' palace. Several dozen monsters moved in to attack him during this journey, but they all turned away as they got closer and felt the killing intent Naruto was radiating. It was difficult for Naruto to keep up his little field of killing intent and just use the barest hint of the Kyuubi's chakra. However, the choice was simple for Naruto as the alternative to this would be to kill any monster he encountered. Several of the monsters turned back sooner than the others. Those were monsters that had previously been killed by Naruto and they knew he could quickly kill them if they challenged him.
Naruto canceled his killing intent field when he got to Hades' palace and dismounted Bucephalus. He then unfastened the package his steed had been carrying and picked it up. Naruto walked up the palace steps and watched as the palace door opened up in front of him. Once the doors were open, Naruto walked through them and headed to the throne room where his aunt and uncle were waiting.
Hades looked down at his nephew and said, "You have a lot of nerve trespassing into my domain Naruto Uzumaki. Why have you come here before your time?" Normally, Hades would have thrown in some more threats like he usually did when a halfblood came to his domain on a quest. The reason he didn't this time is because those halfbloods never brought something to him when they came on a quest to get something from him. Persephone was also curious as to what her daughter's ward was doing in the Underworld.
With a smile Naruto replied, "I came here to deliver you some gifts to celebrate your anniversary." Both the King and Queen of the Underworld stared at Naruto with dumbfounded looks. Almost no one celebrated their wedding anniversary outside of the two of them. Occasionally Hera and Hestia would send them a gift. But, that was only if Hera wasn't steamed over Zeus's latest infidelity or if Hestia didn't have to put out an argument in the family. Naruto unwrapped the package and revealed four fluorescent tubes, some seed packages, and a small book.
The shinobi halfblood then started to explain his gifts. "I figured that you both had almost everything you could want so I tried to find something practical for each of you. The fluorescent tubes and the seeds are for you Persephone. The tubes are supposed to mimic sunlight so I figured you could use them to add more variety to your garden down here. The book is for you Hades. It contains notes on how a god or goddess can create multiple copies of themselves and later remember everything the copies did. The minor god I got it from used it for less than noble purposes, but I figured it could be useful for you with all of the work you have down here."
Both Hades and Persephone summoned some skeleton servants which quickly picked up the gifts and took them to the royal couple's private chamber. The divine couple looked at each other for a few moments and then nodded their heads. They then turned to look at Naruto and Hades calmly spoke, "Thank you for your gifts my nephew. My wife and I accept them in the spirit they were given. I would offer you something to eat, but I do not have any refreshment from the living world."
Naruto shrugged and replied, "That's okay uncle. I came here to deliver those presents to you two. Happy anniversary and I will see you two again one day." With that said, Naruto left his aunt and uncle to depart their realm.
The winter solstice found Naruto in Asgard staying with his grandmother Gerd as it was a massive party for residents of Asgard. There had been feasting the likes of which made the ordinary feasts of Valhalla look like a beggar's dinner. Baldr gave away wonderful gifts to all of the housecarls personally sworn to him and his father Odin. Over a dozen of the best metal and rock bands had been booked to entertain everyone all night long. Much to Naruto's surprise, Sunna had roped him into joining her for a few dances during the party.
After around 1 am, Naruto had stumbled back to Gerd's house and crashed on the floor. The fact that Naruto had made it to the proper house was a major achievement as most of the party goers had crashed on the streets of Asgard. Naruto slowly started to wake up around 9 am when the sunlight moved strait onto his face. The sunlight felt friendly and it was almost like it was caressing his face as he woke up. This was very different from the rather harsh sunlight Naruto was used to in the morning when he was in the West. That feeling faded as Naruto slowly woke up and rubbed the sleep from his eyes.
Once Naruto was up he headed for the kitchen and grabbed some milk to drink. He took a quick glance outside and then diverted his gaze. There were several dozen einherjar and valkyries spread out in the streets obviously recovering from an instant drunk sparing match. For a few of the einherjar and valkyries the sparing match had apparently digressed into a drunken orgy. Naruto focused on forgetting about the scene outside and headed over to the cabinet with the hangover medicine in it. Rapid regenerative abilities don't really matter when you've had several barrels of mead because you will wake up with a headache.
Naruto quickly downed a dose of the medicine and sighed in relief as the dwarves mining in his head were evicted. He then put the medicine away and thought about what he should have for breakfast. Waiting for Gerd was pointless as she was with Frigga. The last Naruto remembered seeing his grandmother was her sharing an intense lip lock with Asgard's queen as the duo drunkenly headed to Frigga's chambers. Whatever happened later between the two Naruto didn't know and he didn't want to know. After a few seconds, Naruto decided to have some cereal and quickly got a bowl ready for himself.
There was a knock on the door just as Naruto was about to sit down and eat. The young demigod blinked his eyes in surprise as he didn't figure anyone else would be up at this time since he left the party early. Naruto quickly got up and rushed to the front door. He opened the door and was shocked to see his mother standing there looking extremely upset. "Mom!" Naruto yelled out as he pulled Hera into a hug. Hera was surprised by the hug, but happy to have her son's simple happiness and love at being near her. It helped to take the edge off of her anger.
After a few seconds, Naruto pulled back from his hug while still holding his mother's arms. He looked up and saw the look in her eyes and frowned. "Come inside mom and tell me what's wrong." Naruto stepped aside and let Hera enter Gerd's hall. Once inside he led her to the family room and sat down next to her on the couch.
Hera took a deep breath and said with rage in her voice, "Someone stole my diadem." Naruto blinked his eyes for a second in confusion before they widened in shock. Hera's diadem was her symbol of power and denoted her status as the Queen of Olympus. Naruto wasn't used to thinking about it because she never wore it when she spent time with him. That was because when Hera was spending time with Naruto she was doing it as his mother and not as the Queen of Olympus.
Naruto blurted out, "Who could do such a thing and how did this happen?" Anger started to grow in Naruto at the thought of someone insulting his mother like this.
There was an edge in Hera's voice as she said, "I don't know who did this Naruto. It happened sometime during the winter solstice meeting although I cannot narrow the time frame more than that. However, I promise that I will make whoever is responsible for this insult pay dearly. I've already sent out several gods and goddesses to look for the thief before the trail grows too cold. I've also summoned Thetis's son and the legacy on his CSI team to Olympus in order to process the crime scene. They should be able to find more clues as to the thief's identity if he or she is not caught."
Hera was pulled into a hug by Naruto as he tried to comfort his mother. After a minute he said, "Is there anything I can do to help find your diadem mom? I may not be the best tracker around, but there must be something I can do to help."
Naruto's simple desire to help her brought a small smile to Hera. She knew from the tiny fragment of herself sealed into the Kyuubi's prison that Naruto solely wanted to help her because it was the right thing to do. That was extremely rare in a halfblood because almost all who would volunteer to help a god or goddess did so out of desire for fame and glory. Hera signed and replied, "I cannot think of anything you can do to help me at this time Naruto. However, I may need you to go after the thief if he or she enters an area that the gods and goddesses looking for my diadem cannot enter."
"Don't worry mom. Just tell me where and say the word. I'll do everything in my power to get your diadem back for you."
Author's Note: Well here we are at the start of the Lighting Thief or rather the Diadem Thief in this universe. Some of you might might be a bit confused by the Norse afterlife. The fact is that the Norse ideas about the afterlife are quite varied. The Norse disagreed on where the afterlife was some saying in a mountain, others in the sky, others said across the sea, and still others claimed it was under the earth. You had Valhalla for those slain in battle, but Freyja got half of the slain which she kept in Folkvangr. A few traditions have Valhalla and Folkvangr combined together. Hegafjell comes from some sources while not existing in others. Hel's realm of Helheim is also very nebulous as to its conditions except that it was not a place anyone particularly wanted to end up in. Nastrond is sometimes considered part of Helheim and sometimes is separate from it. I have combined the various traditions as best I could in an logical order for this story's purpose.
As to some people's question about letting others make a characters read story out of this fanfiction, I have given it some thought. I have decided to let others do such a story if they wish with the following conditions. I ask that you try to include a lot of dialogue of your own from the characters reading the story. I also ask that you try to stay a chapter or two behind what I have written or at least wait a week or so before writing the chapter containing my last chapter.