Disclaimer: The Naruto's characters don't belong to me besides my original characters.
Tags: Dimension travel, Reincarnation, Overpowered OC, No Kaguya, BAMF Team 7, Good teacher Hatake Kakashi, Good Uchiha Sasuke
Rate: M
A/N 1: Welcome, thanks for checking out my story. I write this story as a hobby so please expect grammatical and spelling errors ;) I'll try not to make the characters OOC.
A/N 2: This is fanfiction so even though I did explain briefly about the illogical you usually question in the other fanfics, I hope you don't expect anything realistic here. Moreover, if you like the story, please leave a review as a reward for me ;) Well, that's all I need to say. Please enjoy your reading!
A BURST OF FLAME I
In the world Maria Walker lived in, it had everything yet nothing at all. Mythical creatures, superhumans, advanced science, and dangerous chemical weapons.
Thus, wars happened. It was no surprise to see humans using their knowledge for their own greed and desires.
It would be strange if they didn't. Consequently, there were at least two wars each year between nations.
Everything had been even until one nation got werewolves into their forces. The move had whiplashed other nations deep in the core.
Continuously, mythical creatures joined in humans' wars like a plague. Maria wondered if they had decided it was a joke and a reason to terminate humans without flaring war between species.
Werewolves ate their enemies, vampires sucked their enemies' blood, dragons spat fire and typhoons, and so on.
In the end, the one that had been damaged the most was humans although they were the ones who started it all. Tragic, pathetic, and arrogant.
Such a small body contained too much greed and knowledge. Soon enough; before the werewolves could eat them all, before the vampires could suck their blood dry, before the dragons could burn and drown them to death; the humans would lead themselves to their downfall.
As her commander stated, Anatolis, their nation, couldn't stand still and let those monsters destroy human races because of our foolishness .
Thus, they secretly recruited child soldiers who would go willingly and join in their experiment (Maria knew first hand it was half true since she and Nicolas were picked like toys against their will from the orphanage).
According to the war law, people at the age of sixteen would serve in the military until they were thirty-fifth.
As a result, her nation's action was illegal and would be charged as an international crime had they been reported.
In the year 3087, the first superhumans appeared, secretly known as Super Soldier (SS) among Anatolis' military.
After three more years, their existence quickly changed the balance of the wars which lasted long after mythical creatures decided to join them.
Maria Walker or A00 was the most successful experiment in the Super Soldier Experiment (SSE) from G.F.A organization which stood for Genetics - Futurity - Advancements.
It was a branch from the military for the human experiment and was kept secret till the point almost no one knew about them, besides the nation's leaders and some who were the head of the military.
There weren't many soldiers who could endure the torturous progress when it came to enhancing their bodies and changing their genes.
Not to mention their child body wasn't made for those experiments was one of the main reasons for the SS's low survival percentages.
Only a few, including Maria, were lucky enough to survive the madness when their bodies were burned, crushed, pierced through, and turned inside out repeatedly by every kind of weapon the military could lay their hands on, which were endless.
After being sure they were indeed successful in making another few dozen Super Soldiers since their first successful one - A00, those soldiers were thrown into the war without their sayings.
No matter how human their appearances were, the military knew first hand they were all monsters fighting for their master's victory.
Each of them was given a special ability after their genes were changed, and it was the reason why the military wanted to control them and was scared of them at the same time.
They were too powerful for a soldier who acted under command, but the military of their country didn't have any choice but to use them to the fullest.
Years went by, in 3095, many nations all over the world came to an acceptance that their forces were outpowered by the Anatolis' superhumans force.
Most mythical creatures had returned to their places, seeing how superhumans could tear them in half without batting an eye was an effective way to tell them fucked off.
The wars slowly calmed down, yet the peace treaty was still on hold.
In 3097, some other nations weren't pleased with Anatolis' force being the strongest.
On March 14th, Synnefo, Ouranos, and Nero gathered their forces together to declare war on Anatolis and other nations that allied with it.
On April 1st, war happened. No one would have known it would last for another two years.
In the early May of 3099, Nicolas Miller had died while trying to save a comrade. Maria was too late.
Six months later, Nick Bruce, the commander of Anatolis' forces died, leaving Maria Walker, secretly known as A00, in command.
On April 1st year 3100, the international war had come to an end. People congratulated war heroes and soldiers who had sacrificed themselves to fight for their home nations.
Even though no one knew, the SS were still honored for sacrificing their lives for the Anatolis' good, which was kind of ironic because they were forced into the war against their will from the beginning.
In a sense, the military had kind of cheated their way to victory considering their successful SSE meant they had gone against the war law, said Nick, her commander.
Then again, a person had to stop at nothing to be the hero, which was also stated sagely by the man.
All in all, their nation had saved the human race and ended the wars before things got worse with other species.
On May 17th, the peace treaty was signed between nations and species, the SS were never used anymore, and as a result, the superhumans simply vanished from the public's eyes.
They were still under the military, had there anything been wrong they would act right away, but most of them choose retirement as their way to leave the war behind. Maria was one of them.
Ever since the war had ended, she couldn't have a peaceful sleep without being woken up by nightmares.
She was a war veteran and without fighting or killing, her SS abilities had no use in the peaceful age.
Maria was freaked out in the first few years, she had been always on standby and readied to face dangers for most of her life.
Therefore, when she was safe and sound, when she finally could sleep on a soft warm bed, eat delicious food, wander about without fear of being killed, she was restless and couldn't settle down at all.
Fortunately, her soldier training taught her how to sleep in a short time and gained full energy after waking up, and although it had been years, she still kept that sleeping habit.
In some sense, it helped because she wouldn't have nightmares if she didn't sleep a full night, right?
On the other hand, she had been attending therapy sessions ever since then because the nightmares kept driving her on edge.
Well, another strange thing was she could see Nicolas - her brother in all sense but blood-related. No, Maria wasn't insane, thank you very much.
In their world, besides the evolution of science, they also studied the spiritual field. Such as souls, ghosts, and things alike.
Therefore, she could understand why she was able to see Nicolas-urgh… Nicolas's soul or a ghost called Nicolas at this point. Since Maria knew she had some useless abilities, which might be this one.
A scientist had once stated, humans' souls (or ghosts some might call them) were just images that we couldn't see because they appeared under different wavelengths of light, which our eyes' nerves couldn't receive.
That meant, her eyes were able to see more light spectrums than a normal person.
o0o
"Look, within a week, the military will come here and execute you." Nicolas, as usual, popped out of nowhere and informed her about his vision.
It wasn't rare for Maria to have this kind of visit from him, but it was a surprise that he had a vision about her being harmed.
Simply put, it wasn't every day for A00 to be concerned about such things.
People would be concerned about being killed by A00, not the other way around.
And there was Nicolas, who just stated the exact impossible but not possible thing to her as if Maria didn't have a death wish already.
"Why?" After a moment of silence, Maria was mostly sighing in relief about this outcome.
Since she didn't want to wait for so long until she could touch Nicolas again, and she also didn't want to commit suicide herself.
Though, she was still perplexed as to the reason the military preferred getting rid of her than using.
"Someone else rather than the military knows about SSE. They are now caught red-handed at experimenting on humans." Nicolas offered helpfully.
"They don't want the secret that we're war veterans out of the bag, since the military would be in serious trouble, international one." Maria nodded at that.
"Not that they wouldn't be charged for experimenting on humans. But you know as well as me that our nation's victory is the reason that ended the wars, so they only have one option." He explained.
Which meant they would dispatch the SS who were veterans, the ones that didn't make it to the military because of their useless abilities would be fine as long as they didn't turn Anatolis in, Maria smirked.
Obviously, with the SS being illegal experimental products, Maria wasn't surprised at all.
She had known a long time ago, their existence would be whipped clean when the time came.
As her commander had always said, humans were the most intimate creature yet also the cruelest.
Anatolis had honored them in secret right after the war ended, and now they would be executed silently by said nation.
It wasn't a problem of whether she was ready or not, it was more about the fact the military chose to get rid of them all.
Ridiculous as it was, the SS, which were known publicly as superhumans, had made quite an impact that Anatolis would be damaged deep in the core if the truth was out.
Their commander, Nick Bruce, flashed through her mind. Even now, his wise words still echoed in her mind and Maria was glad to have him as her superior and mentor.
Part of her was relieved that this mess wouldn't happen to him because he had long been gone just like Nicolas.
Another part was a bit sad to know that she was the last of them.
Oddly enough, Nick, Nicolas, and her had unofficially formed a close-knit team.
Nothing serious was involved, just them being themselves not a level-head commander, not A00 or B013, not the deadly combat team, just the three of them.
Some nights, they would spare their tight schedule to gather in someplace to at least breathe a little.
Brief but enough to pull themselves out of the fight-or-die headspace a moment to remind themselves they were human, after all.
A huff came out of Maria. Nick was shot straight through the head by a sniper in the middle of their last fight of the war and left her in command.
Until she caught sight of Nicolas that she knew, Nick was truly gone without any regret. It was what made him their respectable commander.
Never regret yesterday, always look toward tomorrow.
After some minutes passed by, Maria glanced at the fidgeting Nicolas.
His outfit was still the same as the day she first met him, a white T-shirt paired with military pants and boots, which embraced his toned figure to its finest.
Nicolas had always been the optimistic one, even when he was dying with half of his body crushed, he still smiled brightly at her.
And one year later, he appeared beside her as if nothing had happened.
Maria wasn't stupid, she knew something had kept Nicolas from going to the afterlife and she wouldn't complain if it was herself.
"Now what?" Maria raised her eyebrow at Nicolas. She was ready to let things turn out as they should be.
No matter what the military's first intention in creating SS, they still went against the international war law by recruiting underage soldiers and experimenting on humans.
From the beginning, SS or superhumans shouldn't have existed. Now, Maria would sit back to let the military end what they started.
"Maria, you should know by now that I won't let you die that easily. Especially with my ability." He grinned at her and his expression turned slightly darker at mentioning his ability.
Maria knew Nicolas could see the future and hers were anything but useless.
Then she eyed his high and tight head and decided that his all teeth grin was one of the many reasons she let him slide with his mischief.
Even when he decided to prevent her death wish from coming true.
Truthfully, her abilities were a two-page length list since she was A00.
Being the first and most successful experiment meant that she was a super duper vessel where those psychopaths called themselves scientists went batshit crazy at dumping gross fluids into her veins as much as possible.
Those fluids would give the SS their genes enhancement and special abilities (if they came out alive).
After her, there were many failures; A01, A02, A99… Until B013, Nicolas Miller came to them.
His ability was one of their best besides Maria's, so they were ordered to work together right when he was ready to be thrown out to the War-field.
That was why they were a deadly team on the battlefield. No one could defeat them if they weren't A00 and B013, and with their abilities, the two of them were undefeatable.
Oh, had she mentioned the irony between his ability and the G.F.A's name, yet?
Apparently, whilst most of the SS's abilities were matched with G (Genetics) and A (Advancements), Nicolas' was the only one that had ever matched with their F (Futurity).
That might be the reason he was their miracle since his ability had a hand in making their nation come out victorious.
Sometimes, she would wonder if the "F" also made him the most fucked up one (no pun intended).
And now, he would use it against them for her good. She bet if they had ever known about it (not that they would, anyway), the military would be furious.
"Maria, have you ever wondered what can I do besides seeing the future before?" Nicolas sat down beside her where she was relaxing and reading some books a moment ago.
"Oh, so what else can you do?" She wrinkled her nose.
Maria had never been interested in learning more about the SS's abilities since she couldn't bring herself to care and whatever those soldiers were capable of, she could always defeat them.
The truth was, she couldn't look them in the eyes and ask them about all of those things. Their eyes were haunted, it was rare to see a stable SS and not a fucked up one.
Nicolas, on one hand, was the most stable among them, on the other hand, he was also the most fucked up SS she had ever seen.
Being his partner, she knew that his ability played a big part in his messy mentality.
Imagine seeing people and comrades die every time your ability activated and couldn't do anything about it because it was fate .
Even Maria would blind herself so she would never have to see those things again.
Contrary to her, Nicolas had always been a nerd. He would ask many questions about the SSs' abilities, the world, hypotheses, and truths about his ability and SSE, he would spend hours just to satisfy his curiosity.
And that, she could give him the credit for his eagerness at learning everything. It was one of many things their commander liked about him.
With knowledge, you would be unstoppable. That was the reason their commander encouraged the SS to keep learning and sharpening their skills.
No one would understand themselves better than the SS, so with knowledge, the possibility of them finding out more uses of their abilities was bigger.
As people could see, Nicolas was the one who had the most knowledge about SSE so he was once again the military's best asset when it came to the SS.
Because of that, his death was their biggest loss at that time.
Nick had mourned for him for two days before he got himself together again. That was enough for Maria to be grateful to the man.
Because she understood the weight of the war; that it would be too risky to be distracted by anything else, that the soldiers had no time to mourn for their comrades, and she knew she couldn't do anything but keep going.
Thanks to Nicolas, at least, she could be nerdy as a way to mourn for him when she had time to spare.
"You see, the world we're living in has several dimensions and at some points, everything we do will get us to different futures with different outcomes." He had the mischief gleam in his eyes.
"And my ability allows me to see the most possible future where our actions have the most effect."
Nicolas looked at her with his deep blue eyes, she was in awe with them when they first met.
Sometimes, he would have this knowing look and she could tell that her secrets weren't secrets anymore.
These ocean eyes of his always had a way to look underneath every cover no matter what people tried to hide.
To think he care for her too much to go to the afterlife somehow made Maria feel blessed.
"My ability isn't limited to seeing , it also allows me to bend reality at some point." He winked.
"So that was why you could run as fast as me at that time, huh?" Maria raised her eyebrow in amusement.
Suddenly, those physical books she had read appeared in her mind.
Bending space and teleportation wasn't new to their world, but to be born with or in their case, given those abilities was rare.
Maria didn't know her brother had that kind of trick in his sleeve.
"Yeah, you're the infamous A00 that no one could defeat or match up with so I must have something special to be on par with you, don't you think?" He cocked his head to the side.
"Plus, being your partner meant a strength that was out of this world, so my ability, conveniently, is just that." His words caused her a humorless laugh.
To her, it wasn't new when Nicolas brought up something stupidly mind-blogging, but this? Well, let's say she could get used to it.
"Nicolas, you don't have to because I…"
"Yeah, you won't fight because you have nothing to fight for anymore. I know, Maria." The guy said with a long-suffering sigh and fondness.
"Look, I understand, but you're the A00. I can't let you die that easily, especially because it's those bastards' fault." Nicolas scowled.
"A good warrior like you should go down with an honorable fight, not with a gun point at your head." He gave her a gentle look.
"Good thing that I can bend space so we can go to another dimension. As long as we're not here, the military wouldn't give a fuck about our whereabouts." Nicolas said with his victorious grin.
"Wait, you're a ghost, right?" At his nodding, Maria raised her eyebrow. "So how could you have enough power to do all of that?"
"Well, let's say I have my way and you just have to trust me is all." Nicolas winked at her.
"Right, I have nothing to lose, the worst is I'll be dead," and that's exactly what I've been expecting the most went unsaid, and Maria knew Nicolas understood it too.
Maria knew his reason was weak, almost nonsense, but she also understood herself as well as him.
The thing was, she couldn't ignore his wishes no matter how childish they were. She wondered if every brother out there was as spoiled as him and she would do anything to give him the best.
Thankfully, Nicolas was a good brother so she had even more reasons to allow his wishes to come true.
"Okay, shall we do it?"
"Wait, right now? You don't have to prepare anything?"
"No, everything I need is all here. I advise you to close your mouth, as tight as you can since the transition between dimensions would be messy and you wouldn't want your mouth to catch random things that fly around those dimensions, believe me."
His expression was too serious to be a lie and she had trusted him as a habit so it was easy to do as he said.
"Ready?"
At her nodding, Nicolas' transparent hand clasped with hers and she immediately felt the air surrounding them became thicker the second went by.
Until the darkness claimed her eyesight that she started pursing her lips tightly.
"Oh, another thing I forgot to tell you. This is my first time using it on such a large scale, so bear with me if I make any mistakes, okay? And don't worry, I already see this future, you'll be fine, my little sister."
Nicolas' last words floated into her mind and the only thing she could do was whisper weakly to herself.
"What?"
o0o
That was four years ago when Maria first came to this world or dimension as Nicolas said so. Funny that she was the only one here, no SS, no her home nation, and no Nicolas.
At first, things were a bit rocky (yeah, she tried to put it easy), without Nicolas, she panicked. What frightened her, even more, was her child's body.
The cost of traveling between dimensions was bigger than she had expected. To be frank, this body wasn't hers, it was Hinode Kaeri's.
A child that had lost her parents from the Nine Tails' attack on the Hidden Leaf village, Kaeri would die instantly if not for a man who came in time and saved her from being crushed under the giant tree.
Then, she soon realized that the house had been on fire and Kaeri had been dead for five minutes because she had breathed in the smoke.
Even if she wasn't crushed by a giant tree, she would still be burned to death.
The thought made her feel less guilty about stealing someone else's body, but it still wasn't comfortable to acknowledge that she was in a dead child's body. She almost laughed out loud at the twist her life had taken.
Two lifetimes, not only her life was miserable once again but also her parents were still as dead as new. That wasn't alright but she had to live with it anyway, so didn't need to make a fuss about it.
As long as Maria was alive, she wouldn't complain about what life threw at her, she just had to continue until she could understand the injustice that called her life.
She had long learned that no matter how frustrated and desperate she was, life still went on. Therefore, it was useless to keep throwing a fist.
Then again, she would curse this life forever for taking Nicolas away from her.
For the first few years, Maria was weirded out with the way people behaved and especially, the language!
She couldn't understand what they were saying at all for the first two years she came here.
Fortunately, she was an infant and by the time she turned four, she could understand the language completely fine.
During the time she grew up, Maria noticed one thing.
From her few years spent with Nicolas to learn everything he could set his hands on, this language was similar to Japanese but in some ways, it was all different and harder to learn.
It must be because of the difference between dimensions that caused such confusing things.
As a four-year-old child who lived in the orphanage, Kaeri had all the time for herself.
Besides self-training (because she needed to get in shape for her ninja career), and helping the orphanage's babysitters do some chores, she spent the rest of her day reading since she had to learn more about this world as soon as possible.
Sometimes, Kaeri felt like she was mourning for Nicolas in her productive way. Since time was what she had, and it was best to use what she had rather than waste it.
She was in the Land of Fire. This world also had several nations that were named after the nature of their places. At first glance, it wasn't as modernized as her world.
She soon learned that the technology wasn't too backward as she first thought, judging by their costumes and the lack of transportations.
They didn't know what a smartphone was but they did have telephones, and used birds or in some special cases, summon animals for fast mailing.
They also had other electronic devices, but they still wrote letters by hand, which had been rare in her world since the birth of electronic communication devices and the internet.
In this world, ninjas were the main source for military forces and a career that everyone took seriously.
Back in her world, ninjas were long forgotten on the face of advanced weapons like guns and chemical nuclear.
They were still well-known for their stealthy and deadly competence, but they weren't as good as modern assassins because of their old-aged mindset.
And eventually, ninjas weren't that cool when humans came to know about mythical creatures.
Kaeri stared at the thick book in her hand, she couldn't describe her conscious thoughts when she first saw a man casually hopping from roof to roof as naturally as breathing.
Seeing werewolves did it was one thing, but seeing a human did it was another thing.
It wasn't weird considering everything she had been through, but it did alert Maria about the possibility of superhumans in this world even if it didn't have the SS.
Later, she would learn it was because of chakra.
Though this world was more peaceful and calmer than her old world, she still knew it was at war.
Not that she needed to hear the roarings, the gunfire, the bombs to be sure with herself. It was because a veteran should know a war like the back of their hand.
The Maria in her could almost taste the thick tension in the atmosphere, could smell the blood every night someone hopped past her room's roof, could see patrol teams subtly hiding on the trees and shadows that lurked behind buildings.
By the time she was five, one year after she started learning about this world, Kaeri knew about chakra and how powerful it was.
Humans in this world were born with a chakra core inside of them, based on the size and potential of it, they would decide if ninja was suitable for their career choice.
Based on books and her observations, chakra was what made ninja in this world more superior than in her world.
It could enhance its users' senses to the highest sensitivity level, it allowed its users to perform any attack forms that needed high speed, super strength, or something like special abilities that the mythical creatures always used in her old world.
The thing that truly made chakra seem unreal was it could heal one's body. With the skill medic-nin, the wound would leave without a traces.
Back when she was A00, it was thanks to her generating ability that her body didn't sustain any severe damage due to her everyday battles in the Warfield.
The other normal soldiers had soon died when they were injured with burns caused by dragons' fire since the fire couldn't be stopped and kept eating their victims to death.
However, it wasn't easy to be a medic-nin and even harder to find someone suited to be one. Being a medic-nin, one needed to be highly intelligent and have excellent chakra control.
From what she had read, the latter was harder to find and train. Thus, it seemed even if a ninja was burned badly, then an average medic-nin could only heal enough to prevent death.
If Maria was a laboratory soldier made of chemical fluids, then a ninja was a chakra-powered one with practices and, occasionally, their bloodline added into the tray.
After many observations and readings, Kaeri concluded that the SS from her world was stronger than the ninja here.
Even with chakra enhanced their senses, the SS's inhuman skill sets would surely take them down in a few hits.
Not that the A00 in her underestimated them, it was an objective view in comparing the ninja and the SS's abilities.
Truth to be told, the SS had much more diverse skill sets than the ninja since they weren't natural-borns.
While the ninja worked hard with what they were born with and success in their way, though without chakra they would be nothing but strong martial artists or swordmasters.
Then again, chakra was the core of this world's function.
Most of their works were done with chakra enhanced strength, most of their transportations were run by chakra which was activated with a few basic hand signs, and their military forces were full of ninja.
In a sense, chakra might be the reason that caused their science underdevelopment. On the other hand, chakra helped them become more powerful with impressive strength and speed.
Kaeri understood she wasn't A00 anymore, she was now a normal girl, who was too weak to be anything.
That meant she had to become stronger and deadlier not only for herself but also for Nicolas.
If Maria could survive the SSE by sheer will, then Kaeri could become more than that.
At the age of five, Kaeri decided to become a soldier again even if it meant she had to start from scratch with no genes changing nor special abilities.
It terrified her, the Maria in her admitted, to have all her power disappeared, leaving her with a defenseless weak body and paranoias that caused her nightmares.
Even worse that she didn't have Nicolas to tell her everything would be better if she tried hard enough.
"Yeah, everything will be better, Nicolas."
Maria smiled to herself, she looked at the little girl with so much possibility ahead yet contained an old and jaded veteran, who just wanted to sleep peacefully.
To be continued…