Chapter Eleven.
Naruto Uzumaki - Part 4.
(Naruto's Childhood - Part 3: Mirai and Aiko.)
20th of March 1909 - The Ninja Academy:
Five months after his eight birthday and Naruto had no idea how close to death he was on that day. He had also forgotten about Kyūbi, and his desire to leave the village after all the had endured. All he knew was that he came home before any of the drunks got out of the bars, and once he was home, he read some scrolls before going to bed for the night. Nothing out of the ordinary.
But there was something squirming in the back of his mind. He felt like something was wrong, that he wanted to kill the old man. That would be stupid, though. The old man was his friend, he wouldn't hurt Naruto! It was just a stupid thought. He never realised something else was going on.
But when he woke up the next day, he was shocked to see that he had a few gifts in his doorway, something he didn't remember seeing the night before. The first was a bo-staff, with a note saying it was a training bo-staff to use until he had mastered it. There were seals on it to match his size so that as he grew bigger, the staff would resize to fit his height. The note explained it would be a useful tool to have, as not many ninja use them, since they don't seem to be as deadly as other weapons. But they were wrong, in fact, a bo-staff is more deadly than anyone might believe if used right. Many people overlook a bo-staff, people normally see it as an oversized walking stick that can do very little damage. But if someone with chakra could put it into the bo-staff, it can become deadly. If that someone knew how to use seals, the staff would get even deadlier. They could make the bo-staff into an elemental weapon, make it stronger, even make it so that it would be able to store other weapons.
Speaking of sealing, there were a few beginner books on Sealing (from the same person, if the handwriting was anything to go by) with a note saying that he should work on his kanji first, making sure he could write them perfectly with his eyes closed. Making even the slightest mistake when writing the kanji could either ruin the seal if you were lucky, or make you wish you were dead if you weren't. So it was best to make sure you can write kanji in your sleep without mistakes.
The next gift was from someone else. It was a black sleeveless ninja training outfit, the kind the was used years ago. It had the black mask, fingerless Tekoh gloves, and armbands. The note said that the writer was a ninja, but they won't able to help as much as they would like as it would mean they would be treated as an outcast, something they couldn't afford to do. But at the same time they wanted to help him in some way, and so they did it this way.
Along with the outfit there were some pointers. Part of the outfit itself consisted of weights, or rather, weight seals. These would help his speed and strength. They would force him to get stronger if he wanted to move normally, but would also grow in power along with him. The idea was that once he removed the seals, he would be able to move faster and hit harder. Problem being, he had no way to re-apply the seals as he outgrew the outfit. He would either have to find someone that could help or he'd have to figure out a work-around.
The author of the note gave Naruto a few ideas regarding his training, such as pickpocketing, lockpicking, taijutsu and wilderness survival, and more. The author said that he should find someone to help him to train in chakra control, as doing so alone would be hard, because he wouldn't know how to correct himself if he was doing it wrong. But if he couldn't find someone to help him, Naruto should work on the other ideas. Chakra control was very important, but so were the other skills, and most weren't taught at the academy any more.
Pickpocketing and lockpicking were mainly done by jutsu nowadays, and wilderness survival training wasn't as it used to be. So learning pickpocketing and lockpicking would be useful, especially when he'd become a ninja and would get a job where the place he'd go to has good chakra sensors. Learning pickpocketing and lockpicking would open doors for him that would stump other ninja.
In the past, wilderness survival training would have you out doing weekend classes, where you would learn to hunt and forage for your food and water. But nowadays the wilderness survival was mainly about how to defend yourself in a fight against a wild animal.
The author of the note believed that the main reason they haven't done the full wilderness survival course these days was more or less because there was no war. They left out the hunting and foraging part of the class, because there was no need for them. But if they were stuck in an area for whatever reason, they would need to know how to look for food and water, so the author advised Naruto to learn this skill too.
The note went on to say that the author ordered some books for him, but they came from outside of the Elemental Nations and would be some time before they arrived. The books would allow him to learn something about called Ki, a power that everyone has. But this power is learned in countries outside of the Elemental Nations who either have no chakra at all or it is low that they can't do much with it. Only a handful of people knew about Ki in the Elemental Nations, so learning how to use it would give him a huge advantage in battle.
The note went on to say that other than training in these skills, he should start exercising, meditating and eating proper food, instead of eating ramen all the time. Eating only ramen would stunt his growth and possibly cause health problems. So eating healthier and doing the right exercises would not only help him grow bigger, but it would make him stronger. On the other hand, learning to meditate would help when he started to learn Ki and control his chakra. The note said that the author knew it would be hard to gain the money to eat healthier, but that's what pickpocketing and lockpicking were for. He could use pickpocketing to get the money to buy the food he needed and if that wasn't something he was happy doing, he could break into homes and steal some of their food.
Naruto had to admit he wasn't sure about stealing from others. It felt wrong. But as he thought about it, the young boy realized that to become stronger, he would have to do things he wouldn't normally do. It would be different if people treated him nice, but they didn't, and they made it hard for him to live. As he thought about it, if he had to overpay for things, they should help him to pay for it. So he decided he would steal from those who bullied him for no reason.
So over the next five months, Naruto started his new regimen. Before and after the academy, he would do exercises like running, push-ups, squats and such for a few hours, not only to help to build his strength but also his endurance and stamina. He knew that he was weak, only good at stealth and pranking, but if he wanted to be a good Hokage, he needed to become stronger. Naruto admitted that doing this was harder than normal. His new training outfit with the weight seals took more out of him. But that didn't mean that it would stop him, no, it pushed him forward.
But these exercises weren't the only things that he was doing. He was training with his bo-staff. He used wooden logs as training dummies like the rest of the academy. He was training in the forest, where he had set up five heavy logs tied to tree branches, so that when he sent them swinging all at the same time it would allow him to train to dodge.
During the nights, or when he was taking the day off from training to heal, which didn't seem to take as long as others, he was learning to meditate from the books. It was hard at first, seeing that he had to clear his mind and keep still. For someone who was normally active and couldn't stay still for a long time, this was hard. But after a few months Naruto found two different ways which allowed him to meditate.
The first was the Walking Meditation: where he had to move slowly and continuously, but at the same time stay aware of the body and mind. For this form of meditation, he needed a good posture, deep breaths, and to experience the motions of the body. But because the walking movement had to be continuous, he had to find somewhere safe, and with space to roam around, like a large park or field. So he went to the training grounds for Genin teams when they were out on missions.
The second was the Hand Movement Meditation: this one was when he couldn't use the training grounds for one reason or another. It was like the other meditations, where he needed a good posture, controlling his breath and all that. But with this one, he had to allow his hands to move slowly and mindfully.
Whilst it took him a few months to get a hang on the basics of these meditations, Naruto knew he still had a long way to go before he fully mastered them.
Other than meditation, Naruto was working on mastering calligraphy, so he could write kanji while blindfolded. He wanted to learn to do seals soon, because the books told him that he could alter the exploding tags to explode paint and other things, something that could be useful in pranks. But the problem was that he needed to make sure he could write kanji perfectly, and make sure they were in the right order, otherwise it wouldn't work.
From what he understood from reading the sealing book, you needed kanji and some sealing symbols and then you wrote them in a certain order. You couldn't just put them in any order and expect them to work, because if that was the case, anyone would be able to do it. You had to make sure each kanji and symbol is compatible with each other, and that they were done perfectly. Normally, if the kanji and symbols didn't mix, nothing tended to happen, but if they weren't drawn right, the simplest mistake could easily spell disaster. Instead of what you hoped they would do, things might turn explosively violent - if you were lucky. Some unlucky fools often ended up dead. Or worse.
Naruto also read that a Seal Master needed to be able to focus, understand how each kanji and symbol affects what is known as the seal matrix. They needed patience, time and a steady hand. Time and patience, as it takes a long while to create a new Seal. Even when you were just copying an old Seal like the Exploding Tags and the Storage Seal, it took time to make them and they couldn't be rushed. This was where a steady hand came into play. It was possible to self learn the skill, but because it was so dangerous, it was highly suggested that you had a teacher to teach you so you wouldn't make mistakes that could get you killed. It was highly suggested not to attempt to create seals while in the midst of a battle, since making a seal could be very time consuming and could, and most likely would, result in the caster's death.
Because of this, there weren't many people learning the Art of Sealing, as true mastery took too long. Instead, they took the easy route and copied the old Seals and redid them, or altered them slightly, never making up new ones. Which is why Naruto was taking his time to read everything that he could about this subject. It was something Naruto found interesting, because it had a huge amount of pranking potential. No matter how long it took, he would learn this skill, even if it would take him years.
As for his healthy eating, it was hard. To him, ramen was the food of the gods, he couldn't get enough of it. But if he wanted to grow to a good size and become stronger, he would have to eat other food that could help accomplish that. It was slow, but he was getting there.
Either way, it was Saturday afternoon, and Naruto was out on a run before he started his training. Now that he was on break for the next few weeks, Naruto was planning to spend as much time as he could training in order to become stronger. As he was passing the academy, he saw that there were three boys surrounding a girl. The girl had short hime-cut dark blue hair, and from a closer look she had white eyes. From the eyes alone, Naruto knew that this young girl was a Hyūga, and the boys were the same that often bullied him.
Seeing this, he knew that he had to do something. Not only did he dislike bullies, but he knew that if they hurt her, the Hyūga would retaliate. Not only against the boys, but their families too. This was something that he couldn't allow. So he sneaked up to the boys and as he did, he heard that the young Hyūga apologizing to them.
"Hold on, she's a Hyūga girl isn't she?" asked a boy with a baseball cap on.
"Yeah, she got those freakish white eyes." acknowledged a boy with black hair as he took a closer look.
"Then she must be Neji's cousin." the boy with a white bandana guessed.
"You could be right," agreed the boy with the baseball cap, "and I bet she's just as stuck up like him and rest of their family too."
"Yeah, I bet she thinks she's better than the rest of us because of her family and talent." the one with the bandana said, completely ignoring the fact that talent would, indeed, make her better than him.
"I'm not like that at all, I swear..." The young Hyūga girl informed them meekly before she tried to run away.
"Get back here!" the boy with the cap said as he grabbed her.
"Trying to run off before telling us you're sorry, that's not cool." the teenager in the bandana said with a smirk. Naruto was pissed at this, as the young girl did nothing other than saying sorry since he got there.
"Yeah that's right." said the black-haired agreed with his friend with his own smirk.
Then the boy in the baseball cap pushed the girl onto the ground by her head. "Yeah, now come, on apologize!" It would seem that this kid was the leader of the three bullies.
"Yeah and be nice about it too." said the bandana kid.
"Yeah, do it now." demanded the last stooge.
"I'm sorry." The young Hyūga girl apologized weakly.
"Not good enough," said the leader of the three kids, "say it as if you mean it!"
"Now apologize." said the kid with the bandana, as he pushed her head to the ground.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry." repeated the young girl as she began to cry.
"You know, that's not a good enough apology," the teen with the baseball cap told his friends, "but I can think of a good way to make it up to us and show her that she isn't all mighty as she and her Clan make themselves out to be."
"You know, you're right." the teenage boy with the black hair said as he realized what his friend was getting at, as did their other friend who was nodding eagerly.
"Pl, please no." begged the sobbing girl.
This was enough for Naruto, he couldn't stand seeing the young Hyūga girl cry or be treated like this, so he took his training bo-staff from his back and ran out of his hiding spot and knocked the three bullies away from the girl. "Knock it off you three!" he said as he stood between her and the bullies.
"What the hell do you think you're doing,hitting us like that?" asked the bully with the baseball cap.
"I could ask you why the hell are you bulling this girl for." Naruto replied, standing ready to fight.
"Hey wait, it's that kid," the kid with the bandana informed his friend as he remembered where he saw Naruto before. "The kid that's always getting into trouble with his pranks around the village. The kid that everyone hates."
"That kid." the blacked haired kid said with a laugh as he remembered him now.
"Oh that kid, err." as the lead mook also remembered him, as they all begun to laugh at him.
"I'm not that kid, okay?" Naruto shouted at them angrily, not liking been laughed at. "My name is Naruto Uzumaki, and one day I'll be the Hokage. Remember that."
"You the Hokage, yeah right." the one with the baseball cap said with a laugh as the other two laughed with him.
"Some idiot kid like you will never become Hokage!" said the leader as he punched Naruto to the ground.
As Naruto used his staff to get back up, the leader said, "Do you want to fight?"
"You better not, or you'll regret it." said Naruto as he made the ram hand seal.
The bullies gasped as they stood back as the leader asked, "What's that sign?"
Naruto just scoffed as he called out, "Clone Jutsu!" This was a jutsu that Naruto and his class learned the day before they broke up for the holidays.
After two years doing basic reading, writing, maths and the like, the last week they had been doing a chakra control exercise - placing a leaf over an individual's forehead and having them direct all their chakra onto the leaf, using it as a focal point. The problem was that Naruto had problems with this exercise, and one of two things happened. The first was that he sometimes pushed too much chakra, and that would tear the leaf to shreds. The second thing was that he pushed too little chakra, and the leaf wouldn't stay on his forehead. When he asked his sensei for help, they would just skip him and go help someone else.
Then, at the end of the week, they were taught their first jutsu, the Clone Jutsu. This technique was meant to allow the user to create one or more images of themselves to move alongside them. But these images had no substance, and so they were incapable of damaging opponents. However, they weren't meant to, they were meant to confuse the enemy while other attacks were being prepared, or to give the user the opportunity for a surprise attack. When they taught it to the class, everyone was able to create between two to four clones. Some were better than others, and there were just a few odd errors, nothing that couldn't be fixed by practice. But when his turn came, the class ended and the teacher told them that they should practice to make them better.
So when Naruto did this jutsu, it was his first time casting it, and he wasn't sure what to expect. But he thought he could create at least one, enough to save this young Hyūga girl by using his bo-staff to knock them out. Well, that was the plan anyway.
As everyone with a modicum of combat experience could attest, plans rarely survive contact with the enemy. The moment the smoke cleared, there was only one clone. But it wasn't like his classmates, who had near perfect copies of themselves. No, his clone was pale and weak looking, unhealthy, and within seconds of being summoned, it flopped to the ground.
This made the teen boys laugh, as they couldn't believe that he created such a weak and useless clone, calling out how lame it was. Something snapped within Naruto, and instead of going with his plan to knock them out with his staff, he dropped it and ran towards the leader and tackled him to the ground.
Instead of admitting defeat though, he yelled out in anger as he took hold of the teen's shirt and begun to slam the bully into the ground again and again.
"I caught you off guard, didn't I!? You just watch, one of these days I'll become Hokage, I'll show all of you! I'll prove you all wrong!" At this point, Naruto had begun to punch the kid over and over again.
Seeing this, the other teens snapped out of their shock, and called out "Get him!" at the same time. With that, the teens pulled Naruto off their friend and leader and begun to punch him instead, all at the same time.
As they were punching Naruto, the leader said, "I'll make you pay for what you did to me!"
The young Hyūga girl could only stare at what was happening in shock, first that someone who seemed so weak would defend her, a nobody. She was grateful and amazed that the boy would say that he would become Hokage one day. She didn't know if he would make it or not, but she felt that he might if he was willing to defend someone like her, someone who was weak. That's what a Hokage did, protect the weak, no matter what, even if those he was facing were stronger than him.
But when the teen begun to beat her hero, all she could do was look away, feeling ashamed. Whilst this blonde kid seemed to be weak, he was willing to defend her in her hour of need, but when he needed someone to help him, she did nothing. She felt so much worse than she already did, being unable to do anything. All she could do was pray that this would soon end.
Her prayers seemed to be answered, when one of her Clan Members came running, calling out her name.
"Lady Hinata!"
Hearing this, and realizing that they had to go, the leader of the bullies called out, "Come on, let's get out of here." And with that, the three bullies got off Naruto and ran off as a male Hyūga appeared.
"Lady Hinata, are you alright?" asked the Hyūga, but before the young girl, now known as Hinata, could answer, the male spotted Naruto laying on the ground, beaten, and he simply said, "Oh it's that boy. Come on Lady Hinata, let's go, this is no place for the likes of you." He didn't want anything to do with the young boy on the ground, not even making sure if he was alright or not.
"No wait, that boy came and help me." said Hinata, not wanting her hero to be left alone like this.
But the male Hyūga wasn't having any of that. He pulled her to him as he told her, "You mustn't get involved with him. Now let's go."
"No, wait." Hinata said softly. But the other Hyūga wasn't hearing it, as he pulled Hinata away and back to her home. Leaving behind a beaten and knocked out Naruto behind.
o0OoO0o
Naruto didn't know how long he was blacked out for, but when he came to, he found himself behind the academy - the bullies and the Hyūga girl gone. He was feeling upset and angry, the last thing he could remember was someone calling out a name. He hated how people hated him for no reason, and that whoever came left him here for anyone or anything to hurt him if he didn't wake up when he did.
He would train harder so that this wouldn't happen again. He knew that he couldn't do much by himself, but he would try to find those who would help him, no matter how hard it might be. So he had to pick either to train in chakra or taijutsu, along with the other skills he was advised to learn. As he went into the forest where he trained to dodge, he decided to train seriously in taijutsu and the other skills. Whilst they all needed a trainer to help him get to his full potential, taijutsu was the easiest to do alone.
Wanting to get rid of the pent up anger he was feeling, he was planning to punch the wooden dummies. But before he could though, he hear faint yelps nearby. Wondering what it could be, Naruto went to investigate. What he found shocked him.
At the base of the tree were three midnight coloured kitsunes, a mother with seven tails and her two kits with two tails. The mother stood the best she could up and snarled and growled at him for being so close, believing that he was a threat.
He had heard of the kitsunes, they appeared over three hundred years ago when the Kyūbi turned over sixty percent of the foxes in the Elemental Nation into kitsunes. Now whilst most of the other nations don't seem to mind them, the Land of Fire seemingly hates these creatures. Naruto could only suspect this was because of what Kyūbi did to the nation, and so they often kill them instead.
EIther way, when Naruto slowly got closer to the three kitsunes, he saw that the mother was bleeding and the two kits seemed to be hurt a bit. By the looks of it, it was some sort of animal attack that hurt them and not some human. So Naruto held his hands up to show that he didn't mean harm. "Shh, I don't mean you any harm, I just want to help you." he said as he got closer.
The mother kitsune seemed to understand him and stopped the snarling and growling and crawled into a ball around her kits, licking them, trying to heal their small wounds.
"Let me help you, I know of some people that can help." Naruto said as he walked closer, bending down to look at them.
Naruto was thinking of the Inuzuka Clan. Not only were they a family of ninja known for their use of hounds as fighting companions, they were the best veterinarians in the village. The mother of the kits snarled at this, unsure what to do, worried that the humans would kill her and her kits like other humans usually did to her kind.
Naruto could feel this as he comforted her. "Listen, I know that humans don't treat your kind will, but the people I was thinking of won't mind that you're kitsune." Naruto informed her softly, "As long as you're not a threat, if you're injured, they'll treat you fairly. You do want someone to help your kits, don't you? You don't want them to die, do you?"
The mother whined at this. She didn't want her kits to die, so she stood down and allowed Naruto to walk up to her and her kits and pick them up. He took them to the Inuzuka's Veterinary as fast as he could.
Upon entering the place, he saw a twelve-year-old at the counter. She had long brown hair tied in a ponytail, with two locks framing her face over her large, black eyes. She had the Clan's traditional fang-like tattoos on both of her cheeks. She was wearing a grey sleeveless blouse and tan like shorts, with a red jacket tied around the waist. Naruto noticed that she had a softer appearance than the other members of her family, not having slit-like eyes, or wild, shaggy hair.
When he entered the building though, the young girl sneered at him, thinking that he had hurt the animals. "What did you do to these poor creatures?" Sure they might be kitsunes like the Nine-Tailed Beast that attacked their village years ago, but as long as they weren't a threat of any kind, the Inuzuka Clan disagreed with how they were being treated.
"I didn't do anything to them!" Naruto immediately defended himself as he softly placed the kitsunes onto the counter, "I found them in the forest area where I train. I think some sort of animal hurt them."
Upon seeing how badly the mother kitsune was injured, the young girl called out, "Mother! Come here quickly, there's an emergency!"
"What is it Hana?" called her mother as she came into the store. The woman was animalistic looking, with long, spiky, untamed brown hair, vertical slit-like pupils, elongated canines and nails. She also had the clan's fang markings on her cheeks, as well as markings over her eyes and a dark shade of purple lipstick. She was wearing a black suit with the sleeves rolled up, and bandages around her legs.
Upon seeing the injured kitsunes, Hana's mother looked at Naruto and asked darkly, "What happened here, boy?"
"I, I don't know," Naruto admitted fearfully, "I found them at a base of a tree in the forest nearby. I didn't know what to do, so I brought them here to see if you can help."
"I'll do my best, but it takes a lot to hurt a seven tail kitsune." the mother informed Naruto as she picked the kitsunes and hurried to the surgery room to save them.
"From what I can tell, only a powerful chakra beast could do something like that to them." Hana told the young boy, as she watched worriedly. "But I thought the Lord Hokage had portals set up so that they couldn't enter the village."
"What are these chakra beasts?" asked Naruto, as he never heard of them before.
"I don't know much, other than that they appeared about eight years ago and that they are made of pure chakra, and they appear in different forms and sizes." Hana informed Naruto, "The only other thing that I know about them is that when they are defeated, they leave behind their chakra essence for a short while before disappearing. I've heard rumours that some people have found a way to capture this essence and are researching if it can be useful to the world."
For the next half an hour, as they waited to learn what was happening to the kitsunes, Hana and Naruto talked about the different kind of chakra beasts that Hana knew of. Creatures from bugs to skeleton warriors. Naruto found it an interesting experience, he'd never talked to someone like this before. Normally everyone would shun him, call him names, bully him and such.
But Naruto didn't expect this to last for long, as this wasn't the first time people seemed to be willing to talk to him and maybe make friends with him, only for him to find out they won't who he thought they were. They either made friends with him to prank him, or on a dare, or to make fun of or bully him, or they were threatened not to be friends with him. So he wasn't expecting much here, but he was amazed to learn about these chakra beasts that some of the village ninja were dealing with at the time to keep the place safe.
Either way, by the time they were done talking, Hana's mother came in looking despondent. "I'm sorry to inform you young man, but I'm afraid that I wasn't able to save the mother kitsune. She was too injured for me to do anything." she said with sadness in her voice.
Naruto and Hana were both sad at this, Naruto because he brought her here as he thought she could be saved, and Hana, because like her family, she loved most animals - although they cared for canines more than anything else. But hearing that the mother was dead, Naruto had to ask, "What about her kits? Are they okay?"
"Thankfully yes, they are," the veterinarian told him happily, "they were mainly bruised up a bit, nothing that some treatment couldn't deal with. However, without their mother, unless they get lucky, they will only live for a few days to a few weeks." added the mother sadly.
"Isn't there anything you could do to help them?" asked Naruto, they were veterinarians, after all, so he thought that they could do something.
"Sadly we can't." this came from the daughter, "We're allowed to heal kitsune, but other than taking care of their basic needs, we aren't permitted to help them beyond making sure they can survive on their own."
"Sadly, my daughter is right," the mother told Naruto with regret. "The Second Hokage created the law, saying that we can heal kitsunes, but just enough that they won't die. Once they are healed, we have to send them back into the wild. It doesn't matter if they are able to defend themselves or not, once we treated them, we are meant to send them off."
"But why?" asked a confused Naruto, not understanding how the Second Hokage would send off a barely healed creature back into the wild. Anything could happen to them.
"Because of the Nine-Tails," Hana's mother told Naruto, "Lord Second had always had a problem with the Kyūbi because of what it did to the Elemental Nations. He, along with many others in the Land of Fire, saw Kyūbi's creation of the kitsunes as a threat to our Land, believing that they would one day become like Kyūbi, a creature who attacks people like it did for so many years before the First Hokage, Second's brother, stopped it.
"But most in the Inuzuka Clan didn't agree with the Second and the others that believed they're a threat. We know from with our dealings with animals that they don't often attack humans. There are only two times an animal would attack a human, the first is if they are a predator, a creature that hunts other animals for meat, like the kitsunes." Hana's mother informed Naruto when she saw that he was confused by the name.
"Anyway, a predator would only attack a human only if they are unable to capture another animal, and they were really hungry. A predator is normally wary of humans, and only attack one when the human is alone and they are starving."
"And the second reason an animal would attack a human?" asked Naruto.
"They believe that we pose a threat to them." said Hana. "We humans are more dangerous than any animal out there, most of us hunt and kill them without a second thought. So when that happens the animals would defend themselves, if they are able to."
Naruto could understand that if anyone or anything was attacked for no reason, if they were able to, they would try and defend themselves. It was one of the reasons he was training himself to be stronger, he hated being weak and bullied on, so he was training to stop it from happening again.
"And the reason that the Nine-Tails attacked us?" asked Naruto, wondering if it was hunger or it believed that they posed a threat to itself.
"Either out of hunger," the mother told him, "or if it felt we posed a threat to it, and decided to deal with us. Or if it was being controlled somehow."
"What could control something that powerful?" asked Naruto.
"We don't know. Whoever they were, we for one wouldn't want to meet them, as they would have to be someone really powerful to pull it off." the veterinarian informed the young boy, which he agreed with. "Either way, because Lord Second and most of the village feared that these kitsunes could one day be a threat, they took action. While they couldn't kill them outright, they made it so that our Clan and any other who cares for animals in this village couldn't help them other than making sure that, if we find one, all we are allowed to do is heal their wounds so that they wouldn't die and send them back into the wild. Lord Second didn't care that other creatures could kill the kitsunes in their weakened state. And to make sure that our Clan, which is a ninja clan, wouldn't take one in to take care of it until it was fully healed, the Second Hokage made a law saying that no ninja could keep one as a pet."
Naruto didn't like the idea of the Second Hokage making up such a law. It was to protect the village, but still. Only the Nine-Tailed Beast attacked the village, not the kitsunes. They normally stayed out in wild, only coming into the village to search for food.
Suddenly, he thought of something, the law said that a ninja couldn't take care of one, but he wasn't one yet. Naruto realized he was a ninja in training and, before the law, he was still a civilian until he passed the Ninja Exams. He was not subjected to the same laws as the Inuzuka Clan. So he asked, "Can't I look after them, seeing that I'm by rights a citizen of this village, and not a ninja yet."
"I was hoping that you would pick up on that," the veterinarian said with a smirk, but then seriously added, "but you do realize that if you do this, the village will look down on you even more."
"What's the worst they can do to me?" Naruto queried, "They already belittle me, make sure my life is hard in one way or another, and make sure that I don't have any friends. So tell me, what else could they do to me that they haven't done already?"
It is to be noted that these were very bold words from a boy forced to forget his very real brush with death.
Here the girl and her mother had to admit that Naruto was right, there was very little they could do to him that they hadn't already done. "Okay, and thank you for your help. I for one wouldn't feel right to send these young kits into the wild, to their deaths. To help you until they become strong enough, I'm willing to give you enough to look after them."
Naruto was shocked to hear this. They were being so... nice, unlike anyone else in the village. He felt this could be some sort of set up, so he had to ask.
"Is this some sort of trick? If I take these you're not going to report me for stealing, right?" He still remembered the last time that happened. That lady from the grocery store had look so nice and was so kind to him. Until she called the police and accused him of stealing the fruits she gave him in the first place! He didn't trust another young adult shopkeeper after that.
"No? Why would I-" the woman said, a confused look on her face, even as her daughter looked on, curious.
"And you won't break in at night to take it back and leave the windows broken?" He'd just managed to replace them about two weeks ago, he would have liked if they lasted longer.
"Kid, no, that's really-" the mother tried to interject, rubbing her forehead with the heel of her palm.
"And you won't tell people I forced you into helping kitsunes?" Naruto asked while eyeing her up. Sure, there was no way in hell for him to actually do that, but people would take any chances to 'get back at the demon', so he had to make sure.
"You're saying that as if you could, and we both know that's not really-" she tried to say, getting red in the face. Naruto idly noticed that her eye had started twitching. Hana, meanwhile, was watching with something resembling morbid realisation combined with a sudden urge to stop herself from laughing.
"And you won't-" Naruto tried to say, moving down on his checklist.
"NO! Just. No. I won't do any of what you said, are about to say, or have thought of saying. Please. Stop." the woman called out, motioning for Naruto to stop talking. Her eyes were closed now, and she could only massage her temples and mutter under her breath. Hana was hiding her face in her arms, shaking with restrained mirth.
Then a thought came to Naruto. "Do you know why the villagers hate me so much?" he asked.
"Sadly no, I don't know why they hate you so much." she lied, hating that there was a law stopping her from telling Naruto the truth. "Either way, helping you to take her of the kitsune is the least we can do, and after today there's not much else we can offer to help with that.
"As you know, the villagers don't like you for some reason," the mother reminded him kindly, not trying to be mean about it, "but what you might not know is that those who show kindness to you have a harder time of it. They quickly learn that it's best not to be friends with you. Did you ever wonder why you don't have friends?"
"I always suspected part of the reason was because some of the villagers make up up about me and call me a demon." Naruto told her.
"At least you know that," the mother said with a sad smile, "and because of that, and because of those making things hard for people should they be nice to you, many decide not to try and be nice to you in order to make their lives easier. Because of this, after today, we won't be seen helping you, because our office needs customers. Just so you know, unless it's about the kitsunes, we won't be able to talk to you often."
As much as Naruto hated it, he could understand why they couldn't be seen helping him. They had their business to run, and couldn't risk him putting a stop to that. If they were found out, they could lose a lot of work, and that's something Naruto didn't want. So with a sigh he said, "I understand."
"Either way, in the future, if you ever come here and need help with the kitsunes, ask for either my daughter, Hana, or me, Tsume, and we'll be more than happy to help you." the woman now known as Tsume said.
"Thank you Tsume, I appreciate it." Naruto was glad that, while they couldn't do much, they were willing to help where they could. "Is there anything I should know about them? How should I take care of them?" he asked.
"I'll give you a book that should help you take care of them," Tsume informed the young blonde, "as for what you should know about them, let me ask you this first. Do you much about kitsunes?"
"Other than that the Nine-Tailed Beast created them and them being tricksters, I don't know much." Naruto admitted.
"Well in that case there's two main things you need to know for now." Tsume informed Naruto. "The first is that the number of tails tells you how powerful the kitsunes are. Kitsunes are normally born with two tails, but on a rare occasions they only have one, which shows that they are just a normal fox, and they rarely gain another tail in their lives. As for the rest of them, they gain more tails over the centuries, normally up to eight tails. As far as I know, other than Kyūbi, none of the kitsunes got their ninth tail.
"Next, while each kitsune has similar powers, each of them have an elemental power depending on their race, and these two are from a darkness race of kitsune. As they age, not only will they learn their kitsune powers, they'll also learn to control darkness and the shadows."
"Wow." Naruto whispered in shock. He never knew that these creatures had these kind of powers.
"If you want to learn more about their powers and skills, I'll give you a book about them." Tsume told him.
"I'll get it along with the kits." Tsume told him as she left and returned a few minutes later with the kits and books, telling Naruto that they were both female.
After saying his thanks and goodbyes, Naruto left the Veterinary and returned home with the kits. Once there, he set a place for the new kits to sleep, and read up on how to take care of them and what powers they had. By the end of the week Naruto decided to call them Mirai and Aiko, as he didn't like to keep calling them kitsunes. Sure they might not be around for long, but it didn't feel right not to give them names.
It wasn't nice when people ignored your existence, after all. He knew first-hand what that felt like.
And so did Naruto add another part to his life, one that would serve him well in the future.
To be Continued!
Author's Note:Here ends the next chapter of Ninja Overlord - Part 1, I hope that you have enjoyed the chapter. I would like to thank Ibilliss for Beta Reading this chapter for me.