Against the World

"This village is full of lies, but then again, so am I."

-x-

They that you either die a hero, or live to become a monster.

To be honest, I thought of Hidden Leaf as a monster, for all the horrible things it does, for all the lies it tells, for pretending to be the good guys.

But then I realized that I do those horrible things, and I lie to everyone, every day, and I pretend I'm better than them, that I'm good. So if Leaf is as much a monster I feel it is, then so am I.

It's funny though. I didn't live to become the monster, I died to.

-x-

Five

Uzumaki Kushina was an interesting woman, and aside from my mother and Hanako, the first person in this life I can say I genuinely like.

She was a bubbly, happy person and full of energy. I found it hard to believe she ever got tired. She was kind to me, and the way she answered the questions I asked of her that day proved that behind her cheerful exterior was a keen mind.

I was disappointed when Isamu-sensei returned to drag me back to class, but on the bright side it was almost worth it to see his furious expression when he realized that Kushina-sensei (as she insisted I call her) was laughing and joking around with me instead of giving me hell for my "reckless" actions.

I would have liked to see her again soon, but I wasn't holding out much hope.

-x-

Half way through March the new term began, and I became a fourth year student, along with most of my classmates.

The first day of term we went over the syllabus for the year, and it was interesting to note the differences between what we did in third year and what we'd be doing in the coming year.

In class book work was drastically cut back, but we would instead be working on a research project or something like that outside of class, details pending. To my displeasure, most of that time would instead be dedicated to ninjutsu, though I had made improvements on my transformation jutsu, and decided to cut out hand signs all together now that I knew they didn't actually do anything.

What surprised me most though, was the addition of a sex-segregated class once a week. It wasn't something I'd been expecting, and I couldn't help but feel equal parts curious and apprehensive.

Unlike classes in The Before, we didn't spend any time reviewing past material, but considering there was no break between terms, I suppose they didn't see much point.

Instead, as soon as Kago-sensei was finished with the syllabus, we dived head first into taijutsu practice again.

As soon as we reached the training field, Isamu-sensei pulled me away from my classmates.

"Okay, so. First of all, I want you to know I'll be pulling you aside a lot less year, Hoshino-chan. You've improved drastically, and there's no point in giving you private taijutsu lessons anymore. This is probably the last time. Instead, I'll probably be helping you with ninjutsu, since last term showed you struggle the most in that area. But for now, let's have one final spar, m'kay?"

"Yes, sensei." I nodded and shifted into my taijutsu stance. "Ready when you are."

"Well then, begin."

As soon as the words left his lip, I charged at him with my fist pulled back for a punch. Instead of punching him once I was in range, however, I dropped my arm and slipped around him to aim a kick at the back of his knee. He jumped off the ground to dodge, and I hurriedly backed away as he sent a kick of his own towards me.

I wasn't quite quick enough and took a glancing blow that knocked me off balance, and prevented me from dodging the punch that followed. I grunted at the impact, but took the opportunity to grab his arm. I pulled myself off the ground and delivered a double footed kick to his stomach.

I let go of his arm and he doubled over. I took the opportunity to kick at his face, but he grabbed my foot and threw me across the training field. I hit the ground and rolled back to my feet, charging at my sensei once more.

Back and forth we went, for the next hour. I got in a few solid hits, but for each hit I made, I received two more in return.

I grew frustrated, and finally decided that fuck it, it was time to play dirty, and as soon as I got an opening, I kicked him in the groin as hard as I could.

"What the hell, Hoshino!?" He groaned, bent over defensively.

"I think that's my win." I smirked.

"Bloody hell, kid. Not cool. That's a dirty move."

"A dirty move that could save my life in the field." I retorted.

"Fucking brat." he hissed. "Go back to your class. And for the record, you are not to intentionally do this in a spar with me or any of your classmates again, got it?"

"Fine." I crossed my arms and bit back a scowl. What a fucking pansy...

-x-

At the end of the week we had our first girls-only class. An older woman with salt and pepper hair was the teacher, and instead of using one of the classrooms, she led us out of the academy to a field of flowers and had us sit in a circle.

"Hello everyone," she said. "I'm Sarutobi Haruka. You may call me he Haruka-sensei. I'm here to talk to you girls about the unique challenges you will face as ninja, compared to your male counterparts.

"In times of peace, you would have had these lessons throughout all four years, however I'm afraid we don't have that luxury. If we did, we would spend time learning many non-combative skills that are useful for female ninja to know for espionage purposes, as that used to be our traditional role. I like to keep these lessons as informal as possible. Don't think of this as a class, think of it as a gathering of girls and women to share our experiences and wisdom. Any questions?"

I raised my hand, and she motioned for me to speak. "What sort of skills?"

"Nothing terribly exciting, I'm afraid. Things like dancing, sewing and other needlework, cooking, and flower arranging." she smiled wryly.

"Why?" I asked. It sounded like a complete waste of time.

"As I said, women used to primarily be spies. We would often have to disguise ourselves as servants, geisha, and noble women, so it was important to be able to blend in and have skills fitting for the role we posed as." Haruka-sensei explained patiently. It was obvious she was used to that sort of question.

"So what will we be doing instead?" The girl I was pretty sure was a Yamanaka asked, adjusting her blue, thick-rimmed glasses. (Akira or something? Aika?)

"First of all, we will discuss the ways our female biology can affect our careers. Does anyone have any idea how?"

"Um, we're usually smaller than boys?" one girl suggested.

Sensei hummed. "That's one way. Anyone else?"

A few other girls made some suggestions, but I could tell it wasn't what Haruka-sensei was hoping for.

"There are significant differences in bone density, muscle mass and ability to build up muscle, hormone levels, and lung capacity. In addition, females menstruate, and I imagine that has a big impact on things." I pitched in, tapping my fingers on my knee.

"Excellent points, Sekai-chan." She smiled. "Are you studying to be a medic?"

"No, I don't think that path is for me. Why do you ask?"

"I see. It's just that most girls who have that level knowledge at this point tend to have an interest in medicine." she explained. "Now, your last point is the one I wanted to talk about today, as it is arguably the most important. Is anyone unfamiliar with what menstruation is?"

To my surprise, there were a couple of girls who didn't, so Haruka-sensei gave a quick overview of the female reproductive system.

"The reason I say this is the most important topic is because in the past it was the reason women primarily specialized in espionage. Your monthly bleeding can cause many difficulties in the field, especially if you're unprepared for it, or the mission lasts longer than expected. Many ninja, especially trackers, have a strong sense of smell for blood—it stands out to them among other scents. This makes female ninja experiencing their monthlies easier to track. Many women experience severe cramping, which for obvious reasons affects performance in the field. In addition, our chakra grows erratic, and many experience lower chakra levels." Haruka-sensei explained. "Espionage was an area where none of this mattered, as we were passing ourselves off as civilians for long periods of time.

"Even only thirty years ago, nearly three-quarters of female ninja were espionage specialists. The rest of them would eat a special plant every few months that prevented them from bleeding."

"If there was a way to stop it, why didn't more girls do that?" The probably-Yamanaka-maybe-Akira girl asked in confusion.

"Because in many cases it rendered women barren, unable to produce children, Aiko-chan." Sensei explained, which gave me the name of the blonde girl. Aiko, Akira... close enough. "Something that was unacceptable to many clans."

"What changed?" I asked. "Something safer was developed?"

"Correct. About thirty years ago Senju Tsunade developed a jutsu to halt the reproductive system without damaging it. At first this jutsu needed to be applied every few months, but over the decades it has been refined to the point that it only needs to be cast once. The only downside is one much first achieve menarche before the jutsu can be cast. Many of you will be sent out into the field beforehand, and need to learn what to do if it happens on a mission."

The lesson was actually fairly interesting. We were taught what herbs to take with us on missions that short term, would stop the bleeding without damaging our reproductive organs and how long they would work. She covered how long we could use each of them before we risked infertility. She taught how to prepare and store them properly, and those of us that had prepared it properly were allowed to keep them, and those who hadn't were given pre-prepared sachets. (I sealed mine inside the seal on my arm as soon as sensei okayed it.) She also taught us where the different plants grew all over the continent and where to find them if for some reason we didn't have any on hand.

After assigning us homework, which was to collect the correct herbs from the field after classes ended for the day and attempt to prepare them correctly on our own, Haruka-sensei dismissed us.

-x-

To say I was annoyed when I learned that the out of class research paper thing was supposed to be a group project was an understatement. I was pissed.

"...Group six will be Hoshino Sekai, Uchiha Katsuo, and Tominaga Taiki. Group seven..."

They put me with a Tominaga. A fucking Tominaga. Who the fuck thought that was a good fucking idea? Then again, it's not like the instructors are familiar with my family history. I took a deep breath, and told myself that they probably didn't know what they did to my mom and Hanako, or that I might be an illegitimate Tominaga.

Maybe they would let me change groups.

"...And that's all. There will be no trading partners. You are going to be graduating in less than a year. You will have to work with people you don't get along with in the field, where it could be a matter of life and death." Kago-sensei lectured sternly. "Think of this as practice."

Or not. Fuck.

-x-

At the end of the day, Kago-sensei handed out the assignments and gave us five minutes to make plans with our group mates.

"Hello." The Tominaga said as I approached him and our Uchiha partner. From the way they'd been behaving, it was clear they were already friends. "You're Hoshino Sekai, correct?" I nodded. I'm Tominaga Taiki, and this is Uchiha Katsuo."

"Hn." The Uchiha grunted.

"Right well. We've been assigned Yanagikage Hibiki." Tominaga said, looking at the handout. "Apparently he made a name for himself in the second war."

"Anything else?" I asked.

"Nope. That's for us to find out, isn't it?"

"I'll see if any of the textbooks mention him." Uchiha volunteered.

"They don't."

"What?" The Uchiha boy, who's first name I'd already forgotten, narrowed his eyes.

"They don't." I repeated. "I've read all the textbooks. He was never mentioned once."

"Oh yeah?" he sneered. "You probably missed something, it's not like you memorized them all."

"Except I did. Not verbatim, but close enough."

"Please, as if—"

"Katsuo! Hoshino! Shut up." Tominaga interrupted. "Look, Hoshino, there's no harm in him double checking, okay?"

"It's a waste of time." I argued.

"Too fucking bad. Katsuo will look through the textbooks. I'll check my clan library for anything, and you can check yours, Hoshino."

"Are you stupid?" I snorted. "I'm an orphan. I have no clan."

"Fine." he snapped. "Then you check the textbooks again, and Katsuo can see what the Uchiha clan has."

I sneered. "I just told you I have them memorized and there's nothi—"

"Just do it, Hoshino!" Tominaga hissed. "Get off your high horse. Katsuo and me are the ones in charge here, okay? We're older and have more experience, so just do as we say!"

"And yet I'm smarter than both of you put together." I retorted. And older than the two of them put together as well, if you count my previous life.

The two boys traded a look and nodded. "Then write the paper yourself." They said in unison, and stalked off.

I was furious. They were clan brats, they could get away with skipping an assignment. Or more likely, they'd be able claim I refused to work with them, and hand in the paper with only their names on it.

Meanwhile, I'm fucked, because there aren't any books available to me. It really wasn't fair—clan kids obviously had an advantage.

It appeared I'd have to improvise.

-x-

"I know a bit about Yanagikage Hibiki." Hanako said with a secretive smile. "First of all, despite the name, she was a woman."

"What else can you tell me?"

"What do you want to know?"

It turns out asking Hanako was an excellent idea. Yanagikage Hibiki was born fifteen years after the founding of the village, died at the end of the second war, and was the first female ANBU captain.

"How do you know that?" I asked. That wasn't the sort of thing that was common knowledge.

"She was my captain." Hanako replied.

"You were ANBU?"

"Yes. In fact, the mission that crippled me, is the one that she died on. I was the only survivor."

I took notes as Hanako told me all about Yanagikage Hibiki, or at least, the stuff that was declassified.

"Is it really okay for me to put this all in my report?" I asked once Hanako finished.

She chuckled. "Of course it is, I'm the one who created the assignment."

"Wait, what?"

"Things like this are just one of the many jobs available to retired ninja, things that active ones don't have time for. For this assignment, myself and a few others chose the ninja each group was to collect information about based on who they know. Each group has at least one person who knows someone that can give them detailed information."

"Isn't it not fair for you to have answered my questions in this case, though? Since you made the assignment?" I inquired.

"It's fair because I didn't volunteer the information," Hanako replied. "You asked."

-x-

My group mates were clearly unsuccessful in their search for information on our target, judging by their behaviour on the day the report was due.

Since the Uchiha and Tominaga boys were sitting up front, Kago-sensei asked them for the paper first. I was delighted to see their embarrassment and frustration as they admitted that they couldn't find any information on our target.

By the time Kago-sensei got to my row, I was cackling with glee. Well, on the inside, at least.

"Kago-sensei..." I said as I innocently widened my eyes. "Uchiha-kun and Tominaga-kun refused to work with me, therefore I wrote the paper on my own. Is that acceptable?"

"That's fine." Kago-sensei replied with a wry smile. "We were expecting things like this to happen."

After collecting all the assignments, he walked back to the front of the classroom, dumped them on his desk, and crossed his arms. "Okay everyone. Raise your hand if you wrote a report alone."

I looked around curiously as I raised my hand. About an eighth of us had our hands up, and I noticed most, if not all, of us lacked a clan.

"Now, everyone who were unable to write anything, raise your hands." Nearly a quarter of the class raised their hands. "Starting from my right, if you didn't write anything, explain why. Uchiha-kun, you're up."

"Ah, well, Taiki and I checked our clan libraries and academy textbooks, but there was nothing about the guy we were looking for. Or if there was, we didn't find it in time..." My former group mate explained.

The rest of my classmates in same boat as him gave similar answers. Once they had all given their excuses, Kago-sensei spoke. "You failed because the ninja you were to research were intentionally chosen so that there were few, if any, actual documents relating to them."

"But then how were we supposed to do the damn thing?" An Inuzuka boy protested.

"You were supposed to ask people." I spoke up.

"Exactly." Kago-sensei agreed. "This was information gathering, not researching. The best way to get information that's not publicly available is to talk to people. I'm sure those of you who wrote their reports were handed the information as soon as they ask. Next time, this will not be so.

"That said, the second purpose of this assignment was to make you understand that those of you who come from ninja clans and families aren't better than those who don't. Every single one of you who handed in a paper by yourselves aren't from clans, and most of you who handed in nothing are from clans.

"Let that sink in."

-x-

On the Wednesday after we the first group project was due, we were given a second—and more interesting—one, in my opinion.

We were broken up into groups of three again. This time I was partnered with Yamanaka Aiko and some Aburame kid, in Team Twelve. We were given a list of genin who would be wearing red, numbered arm bands around the village, and the times they would be available over the next two weeks. They were our informants. Our job was track them down and find out what they know.

Unfortunately, however, some of our informants had turned traitor. Loyal informants will always tell the truth, and traitors will always lie. (Don't you just love the insinuation that traitors always lie, and loyal ninja always tell the truth? That anything a traitor says against the village is false, that their legitimate issues with the village are just a fabrication?) Our job was to figure out who the traitors were.

We were given ten tokens. For any question regarding other informants, it cost us one token. Once we figured out who was lying and telling the truth, we were supposed to write a paper detailing the correct intel that we gathered from the genin.

While I wasn't exactly excited about working with two little kids again, at least the actual task was interesting.

"Hey, Sekai-chan! Shinji-kun! Over here!" Yamanaka Aiko called from the doorway just after the start of lunch. "Let's eat outside and talk about the assignment."

"Very well." Shinji the Aburame kid agreed, inclining his head.

With a small sigh, I got up from my seat and followed Aburame and Aiko outside. The blonde led us over to the tree I'd been sitting in when she and her friends had been gossiping about me the year before.

"Right, so what's the best way to go about looking for these people?" Aiko said, gesturing to the handout.

"Leave that to me." Aburame said as he lifted his hand, showing us some sort of bug, and then a couple more came out of his sleeve to crawl along his hand.

"Is there a reason you're showing us a bug?" Aiko asked, pushing her glasses up.

"It is a kikaichu, not a bug. My clan has a symbiotic relationship with them—they live in our bodies, and in turn we can control them and put them to use for various tasks. They can search the village for our targets and track them once they're found."

Jesus fucking Christ. That's...

"If you ever put a bug on me I will end you, and your bugs too." I stated blandly. The Aburame kid, who I decided would be Bug Boy from then on, turned to face me. I assumed he was staring at me, but he was wearing sunglasses so I wasn't quite sure.

"Sekai-chan!" Aiko hissed at me. "That's not a nice thing to say."

I gave her a blank stare, and she averted her eyes. "Yes well, bugs aren't nice either." I gave a small shrug. "Moving on, can your bugs find these people based on just a name?"

"My kikaichu cannot find someone unless I'm able to give them a description."

"So we need to gather intelligence beforehand, then." I said. "Any ideas? Would "red arm band" be enough for the bugs?"

"Unfortunately my kikaichu have poor red vision." Does he not realize that the more emphasis he put on the word kikaichu, the less likely I am to use it?

"Intelligence is my clan's specialty. I'll ask some of my cousins, see if they can give any descriptions." Aiko volunteered.

"Then I will write the report and figure out who the traitors are." Because I hardly trusted that those two could do it right. "We'll meet up after school everyday and reevaluate our next move."

With that, I turned my back on Bug Boy and Aiko, and took off for the orphanage.

The first thing I did when I got back was take a shower and make sure there weren't any bugs on me anywhere.

As I scrubbed away at my skin, all I could think was thank fuck I wasn't born into that clan.

-x-

"I have descriptions of five of them." Aiko announced on Friday as she pulled a folder from her backpack and flipped it open. "And I got pictures of two of those five."

Bug Boy took the photos from Aiko, studied them a bit, then passed them to me. I took a quick look, then passed them back to Aiko to trade for one of the descriptions of the remaining targets.

"I'll send my kikaichu out to search for them, and to tag them if they're found outside of their availability."

"Wait." I ordered. "Did you find anything about where they tend to spend their time? I'd assume they wouldn't change things up just to make it harder for us—they'll probably just do what they'd normally do, but get paid for it." Or at least that's what I would do.

"Yeah, Number One likes to hang out at the Amaguriama on Tea Avenue. Number Five likes to spend time at the hot springs, and Number Ten spends a lot of time in the library." Aiko recounted.

"The three of us will go to Amaguriama first, while Bu—" catching myself, I faked a cough to cover up the fact that I almost called him Bug Boy aloud. "Apologies, I must be coming down with something. Aburame can send some bugs—" "Kikaichu!" Bug Boy hissed. "Right. You can send bugs to the other two locations to keep an eye out, and then some others around the village in general." Finished giving orders, I started running towards Tea Avenue. It wasn't far from the academy, it was just across the river, in the merchant district near the south gate.

"S-slow down, Sekai-chan!" Aiko hollered, prompting me to look back. Seeing the other two were nearly half a block behind me, I stopped to let them catch up. "You're really fast, Sekai-chan." Aiko commented, and I gave a small shrug of my left shoulder, then continued on at a slower pace.

Once we reached Tea Avenue, I slowed down to a leisurely stroll, and started to pay more attention to the people around me.

"Over there!" Aiko discreetly pointed to a pair of genin sitting on a bench just outside the entrance to one of the play parks. I nodded, and headed over there.

"Excuse us, senpai. We were wondering if we could have a moment of your time?"

One sighed. "What team are you?"

"Twelve."

"Alright. Here's what I know..." While One shared his intel, Bug Boy took notes and Aiko and I watched him for any signs of dishonesty.

Once he was finished, I handed over one of the tokens.

"At least one of Numbers Two, Three, and Four are traitors."

-x-

Over the next week, we managed to find Five, Seven, Nine and Ten. With only a few days left, I made the decision to just ask some of the ones we'd already found (and tagged with Bug Boy's creepy crawlies).

Aiko managed to suss out that Number One was almost certainly one of the loyal informants, so we used most of our tokens on him.

After using our last token, we had the following statements:

One:

At least one of Numbers Two, Three, and Four are traitors.

Six is a traitor.

Nine is a traitor

Twelve would say "Two Six, and Twelve are loyal."

Five:

Six is a traitor.

Three is loyal.

Seven:

Eight is a traitor.

Nine:

Four would say "Five and Eleven are traitors."

Ten:

Eleven is a traitor.

Seven is a traitor and Eleven loyal.

Starting with Number Ten's contradiction, it was easy to see that Eleven was loyal, and so was Seven, which meant that Eight was a traitor.

If One is Loyal, then Six and Nine are traitors, from which we get that Four and Five are loyal. Since Five is loyal, so is Three. Four and Three being loyal means that Two has to be a traitor. And finally, if Two is a traitor, then so is Twelve.

"I need the intel from Eleven, Seven, One, Four, Five, and Three." I said as we were leaving the hot springs after using our last token on Number Five.

"Wait, what?" Aiko said skeptically. "You mean you figured it out already?"

"Yes. It wasn't like it was difficult. It was a simple logic problem."

"Are you certain?" Bug Boy asked. "I find it hard to believe that you worked it out so quickly."

"Well, I find it hard to believe you can function with half a brain." I deadpanned, causing Aiko to let out a snort of laughter. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a report to write."

-x-

Notes: from last chapter niNRG brand is to be read "nin-R-G", a pun on energy. Also, don't forget the sekai-against-the-world tumblr. It's basically the databook for the fic.

The second group project is based on a logic puzzle I got from a generator.

I find myself looking up the weirdest things for this fic, I tell you. Did you know insects with compound eyes have poor red vision? Also someone should write a short self-insert horror story where the character is reborn into the Aburame clan, but carries their entomophobia (fear of bugs) from their previous life over.

In regards to names and honorifics. Hoshino is the family name, Sekai is her given name. In Japan it is common to refer to someone only by their last name, which is what most people do when speaking to Sekai. Aiko calling her "Sekai-chan" is being slightly overly familiar. Tbh the way honorifics are used in Naruto confuses the fuck out of me, so I'm just going with the way I learned they were used.

Sorry for the delay. I've mostly been working on scenes that will come up in the future, and even wrote the epilogue.

I intended this to be the last academy chapter, but it looks like the next one will be.

Thank you all for the reviews, favourites, and follows!

The Mathemagician