Disclaimer: Not mine.

~Story, Start~

-3 Days Later-

'...Okay Brat, you can stop your pushups now.'

Naruto didn't need further confirmation. As soon as Kurama told him to stop, he allowed his arms to fall away from under him, before turning himself over to his back, taking deep, plentiful breaths.

'You... Sadistic... Bastard!'

'Yeah, yeah, you've said that before. Now go down and do your crunches, and no complaining!'

'Yeah yeah, you freaking slave driver.'

As the blonde did his crunches, he complained to his mental roommate.

'You know, I haven't really seen a difference from the first day until now. Do you think it'll make a difference in 2 weeks, when it isn't right now?'

'Don't worry, Naruto, I know what I'm doing. I haven't begun helping your recovery yet, these first three days were just to measure the limits of your body. Strength, stamina, caloric consumption, all that jazz. I wanted to know what makes you tick, so that I know what exactly I need to change.

I've got a rough feeling about the work that I can truly do now, though, so you don't have to worry about a lack of results. What you do have to worry about is the fact that your groceries are going to skyrocket in price.'

'What do you mean?'

'You'll be eating, a lot. And before you start firing off rockets, it can't be all ramen. Hell, it'll rarely be ramen. You're going to be eating lots of meat, both red and white, fish, poultry, legumens, grain, fruit, milk and eggs. In conjunction with the exercise regimen you'll undergo, my influence and your Uzumaki heritage, you'll recover to what you should have been body-wise had you grown up normally, and even more.

Until your body is stable in this regard, you'll have to be eating constantly to make sure your caloric intake and your blood sugar levels are high enough for you to not spend your entire days as a zombie, or randomly pass out, so I'd advise you to carry around obscene amounts of fruit with you whenever you're not training or sleeping.

Also, your hair and nails are going to be growing and strengthening, so keep a nail file handy.'

'Wait, why are my hair and nails going to grow? That seems so random.'

'With your body constantly consumming and processing nutrients, there will be an increased amount of waste generated. While the thought of you spending 12 hours a day locked inside a bathroom, causing untold amounts of damage to the infrastructure of Konoha's sewer system is amusing, having you spend so much time away from training would be counterproductive. So, I'm going to be directing as much of the excess possible into your hair and nails.'

'Ah. I get it now. Well, I've been feeling hungrier since I started working out like this, so maybe that's not so bad.'

'Glutton.'

'And proud of it, -ttebayo!... Say, can I stop-'

'No, you cannot stop with the crunches yet.'

-5 days after the scroll incident, Naruto's apartment-

The blonde tossed a thoroughly eaten apple core at his now-clean apartment's waste basket, with the basket so full of fruit leftovers that it was about to burst.

'Oh man, if I knew fruit could be so good, I'd have been eating it all along! The first few times I ate fruit they were always sour apples, so I thought that they were all like that!'

'...The idea of blasting this wretched village of hairless apes to kingdom come sounds more and more pleasant with each passing minute.' were the giant foxe's thoughts at that sentence.

5 days.

The boy and the fox had been communicating for all of 5 days, and in those 5 days, Kurama had progressed from someone that cared about their container's strength for the sake of not being bothered again, to someone who care about their container's strength so that his container didn't die a messy and painful death.

5 days were all it took for Naruto's irritating, naive and idiotic, yet sometimes deeply insightful, genuine and honest demeanor to burrow it's way into Kurama's heart. Now, whenever it noticed an instance of Naruto getting shafted, instead of simply thinking something along the lines of 'Tough shit, kid, sucks to be you', his thoughts went directly towards righteous anger on behalf of the blonde.

So, he decided to actively help him.

After all, harboring such deep attachments to the people who've fucked him over, time and time again, wasn't natural. It wasn't healthy. And Kurama wasn't going to accept an unhealthy host.

'Your body's condition has been improving much faster, and more than I expected, so I have to tinker a bit more with your physical values. This means that for today you will not be physically training yourself, or using chakra. No, today you'll be reading this book.'

Which is why Naruto was sitting on his living room table, gazing at a book titled 'Loving yourself: The key to success'.

While normally Kurama would find this kind of self-help 'literature' a bunch of hogwash, concocted by people who want to earn money by writing ambiguous, open-ended bullcrap that allowed people to feel better with themselves despite their many, many flaws and not having to acknowledge that they were trash human beings, with Uzumaki Naruto the situation was the opposite.

The boy had no sense of self-worth to speak of. He talked a big game to hide his insecurities, but in the end he only considered himself as good as everyone else saw him as, which was why he worked so hard to get the acknowledgement of people that actively hated him. That was a dangerous line of thought, which would lead people to do stupid shit. And people who do stupid shit tend not to last long in the shinobi world.

This would not stand.

The first part of his sentence was true, however. Naruto's body really was progressing more than expected. Seems that his Uzumaki inheritage was rearing it's head.

'Should've expected it, really. The Uzumaki were a terrifying bunch. His mother managed to survive me being extracted from her, and then proceed to tie me down with those horrid chains of hers, and throw herself in the way of my claw. And before that, that Mito woman sealed me into her adult body with no negative side-effects.

Speaking of, I should probably introduce Naruto to sealing. With his Uzumaki heritage, and his father's... Expertise... in the art, he probably will be able to use those with his eyes closed.'

While Kurama's thoughts wandered freely, Naruto had, after polishing off another apple - and damn if he wasn't putting them away fast and furious - started reading the book.

'Chapter 1: "Who are you?"

"Who am I?" This is a question that people usually don't ask themselves. After all, you're you, you know yourself better than any other person.

Or do you?

Have you ever taken the time to stop, think, and truly reflect on your identity? On the nature of your existance?

Who are you? What do you want? How do you plan to achieve it?

And, most important of all, "Why do you want it?". Until you manage to answer all these questions, you cannot claim to truly know yourself.'

Tilting his head questioningly, Naruto put the book aside for a second, making his way to his bathroom mirror and looking at his own reflection.

He looked at one side of his face, then the other, taking close care to notice all of the differences from his previous days. His face had lost some of it's baby fat, giving him a bit more of a defined jawline, his cheeks had raised slightly, his eyes seemed brighter and deeper than ever before. His hair was a bit longer than before, somewhat shaggy in nature, but it was also brighter, and fuller. His whisker marks were a tad bit more distinguished in his admitedly more mature face, giving him a bit of a wild look.

He procceeded by taking a step back and lifting his new, long-sleeved, maroon shirt, critically eyeing his body up and down. He looked a bit beefier, with his clean-cut, defined arms and abdominal muscles, and wider shoulders. Lowering the shirt, the boy proceeded to examine his hands, seeing the newly-created calluses from constant push-ups on the rough ground, pull-ups on treebranches and punches, palms and chops on logs, and he had to admit, the Uzumaki Naruto that he thought he knew, was gone.

'What do I want? That one's easy, I wanna be the Hokage!... But, why do I want to be the Hokage?'

The blonde paused in his answer, thinking on that for a bit, remembering the memories of his clones moving around the village under transformations, being welcomed into shops, marts, bookstores, tailors. Recieving cordial and polite treatment, greetings and smiles from people. Walking around the streets without having looks of hatred directed towards him, and on the odd occasion that they bumped into someone, instead of recieving a sneer or a shout, recieving apologies and light admonishments.

'Because I want to be acknowledged by everyone! I want people to stop hating me for having Kurama sealed inside of...'

Naruto trailed off in his answer, before what Kurama had told him in their first meeting came back to his mind.

-Flashback-

' I didn't make anyone hate you. Remember, I've been locked in here ever since you were a baby, I had no way of leaving this place. If I couldn't even leave this place, then I had no chance to go into people's homes at night and whisper in their ears 'Hate Uzumaki Naruto'.

No. People hated you because they wanted to. They chose to hate you, despite the fact that you were the only thing standing between them and their possible destruction.'

-Flashback, End-

'But... Do I want to be acknowledged by people who would willingly aim their hatred at me like that? Ever since I was a kid? Despite the fact that I protect them with every breath I take? Despite the fact that they knew about this, even when I was ignorant?'

Unable to find an answer to that question, Naruto decided to give himself a break from the book and take a walk around the village. Putting on his new sandals, the blonde locked his door behind him out of habit before making his way out of his apartment. Not having a set objective, the blonde simply joined the foot traffic in the main street. At first, everything seemed okay to him. The change in style had people reeling, with no one really knowing whether it was the 'Demon' or not, but after someone passed by close enough to notice his whiskers, the curious looks changed to the usual sneers and glares, or worse, they simply let their eyes slide past him as if he weren't there.

Usually, Naruto would respond by showing his much-too-wide grin and ignore the looks, something that had become a natural defense mechanism for the blonde, but after spending so much time - cumulatively, through Shadow Clones - being acknowledged, and treated well by people, he couldn't really ignore it. First, he became sad. Then, sadness gave way to indignation.

And when a man purposely bumped into him, pushing him to the side of the road - though he rubbed his shoulder at the unexpected resistance - the indignation gave way to anger.

His temper boiled over when he felt, more so than heard, a small stone being tossed at his head. Without even giving it a thought, the blonde whirred around abruptly, snatched the rock out of the air, before levelling his best glare at the thrower and cocking his own arm back, retaliating by throwing the stone back at the man, aiming for his gut. Seeing an adult man go down with a single rock toss to his gut had Naruto admitting to the results of Kurama's training on the back of his mind. The rest of his mind, though, was more immediately focused on the matter at hand.

A friend of the man who tossed the rock helped him up, before turning towards Naruto and sneering at the blonde, before speaking.

"What did you do that for, you fucking brat? What right did you have to throw a rock at my friend?"

If the blonde was angry before, now he was absolutely irate.

"Right?"

The low, dangerous whisper managed to reach everyone watching the scene.

"You are asking me what right I had to throw a rock back at someone who threw it at me in the first place?"

The more he kept speaking, the louder his tone got.

"So your friend decides to attack me, I defend myself, and I'm in the wrong? Is that it? Well fuck that, and fuck you!"

By now the boy was shouting, surprising everyone as he had never retaliated before, not even a glare in response.

"I am tired of this shit! You act like I'm some kind of criminal, some kind of... monster, when You are the group of adults trying to gang up on a single 12-year-old! WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?"

Naruto hadn't even noticed, but by now he was putting out quite a bit of killing intent, freezing everyone in place and alerting some of the patrolling ANBU who simply kept watch of the situation, intending on stepping in only if things escalated beyond words.

"You know what? No more! I'm not taking any more of your shit! I am not going to let you push me around, acting like the bunch of sanctimonious bastards that you are, and simply smile it away. If you mess with me, I'll answer in kind!"

Having finished that, and with a scowl now etched on his face, the blonde turned blindly, before stomping off angrily. The ANBU, seeing that no confrontation would occur, went back to their normal patrol for the most part. The exception was the Monkey ANBU, who was part of Naruto's personal guard when he was younger, and had singlehandedly stopped every single attempt at mobbing the young child. The agent, having gained an attachment to the child, decided to report what had happened to the Hokage, worried that something bad enough had happened to Naruto to do away with his sunny disposition.

-15 Minutes later-

'...I can't believe that I lost my temper like that back there. Where did that come from?... Stupid question, I know exactly where that came from. I thought that the looks weren't that bad anymore, I guess that I was just too used to them.'

The blonde was so distracted in his own thoughts that he didn't notice the puff of smoke that deposited a Monkey-masked ANBU in front of him. He only took notice of said ANBU when he ran bodily into them, bouncing back lightly.

"Oh man, did I run into a light pole or what... ANBU-san?"

The ANBU operative nodded, before speaking in a tone of voice that was muffled by the mask, making it difficult to know whether it was a male or a female under it.

"Uzumaki-san, after hearing of the altercation between you and a civillian, Hokage-sama has requested your presence."

Crossing his arms and scowling, the blonde muttered.

"Of course he has."

He barely had the time to nod in acknowledgement before a hand was placed on his shoulder, and his stomach reached the back of his throat.

As the blonde hunched over with his hands on his kness, trying his best not to spew his guts all over the floor, an older voice spoke with amusement.

"Yes, the shunshin can be quite disconcerting at first."

Glaring at the old man with no real heat behind it, Naruto spoke between gasps.

"You... Suck... Old... Man."

Hiruzen smirked smugly at that, before speaking up.

"And yet, I'm not the one about to lose my breakfast."

Recovering somewhat, Naruto plopped himself on the chair across from the Hokage's desk, knowing that it had been placed there specifically for him as it wasn't a fixture of the office, before speaking.

"You're just mad 'cuz I beat you with my original jutsu."

A massive sweatdrop appeared on Sarutobi Hiruzen's forehead, before the old man cleared his throat and spoke up.

"Hem, well, that jutsu is quite a dangerous, if not unorthodox weapon. Nice clothes by the way, but I didn't think you'd ever ditch the orange."

"Yeah, well Orange may be awesome, but it isn't really a 'ninja' color, y'know?"

"Indeed?"

"Yeah."

The two settled into a silence, before the blonde spoke up.

"Hey old man... What is it like, being the Hokage?"

Pausing pensively, Hiruzen linked his hands hands together and propped his elbows on the desk, meeting Naruto's gaze searchingly. Raising an eyebrow, the man responded.

"Being the Hokage... It means becoming the protector of the village. It means seeing everyone in it as your family, and doing your best to make sure that they live good lives. Safe lives. By taking on this burden, and responsibility, you ensure that the next generation does not need to. You allow them to live proper, carefree lives, unemcumbered by the weight of this life. But seeing the villagers live happy, full lives... It's worth it."

"Family, huh..."

"Indeed. Naruto... Do you have any issues you want to talk to me about?"

"Not realy..."

"Curious... I'd swear I heard a tale about you throwing stones at civillians."

"Well, the guy started it!"

Sighing tiredly, Hiruzen pinched the bridge of his nose, before speaking.

"Naruto, you're now a shinobi. You can't go around attacking civillians."

"He threw the stone first! Was I supposed to just let him do that without repercussions? Or better, was I supposed to simply allow it to hit me? No, not anymore! I won't let people get away with those sorts of things anymore!"

"Naruto, you need to give them time! They don't understand-"

"It's not my job to make them understand! It's not my responsibility to pay for their ignorance!"

"Naruto, you need to be more patient with people. As Hokage-"

"Old man, how were you treated before you were Hokage?"

Hiruzen paused at the non-sequitur, but Naruto continued before he could answer.

"And I don't mean after you were already a shinobi, I mean when you were just a kid in the academy, or even before that. How did the other villagers treat you?"

"...Well. I was liked by my clanmates, my neighbors, my friends. My parent's friends, their children, and many others. I was a well-liked, popular child, one with many friends."

"I see. Then I don't want to be the Hokage anymore."

Hiruzen choked at that declaration, as did the four ANBU scattered around the room. Managing to overcome his surprise, Hiruzen spoke up.

"I didn't ever think I'd see the day where Uzumaki Naruto gave up."

Scowling at the Hokage, Naruto responded.

"Giving up means that you don't see a way to make things happen, or at least one you're capable of achieving. I could make them love me, I could fight everyday and force them to acknowledge me to the point that they'd make me the hokage. I simply do not want to anymore.

Why is it that everyone else gets to be treated humanely from the moment they were born, and yet I have to be a hero to even be seen as a person? I was already sacrificed once, these people aren't entitled to further sacrifices!

No. I'm not going to cry, sweat and bleed, only to be put in a position that could force me to sacrifice myself, or the things that I love, to protect people who would so easily gang up on a 12 year old to verbally assault them in public."

At hearing those words, Hiruzen gained a new understanding of Naruto's perspective of his own life, and he couldn't help but feel a minor sense of disgust at his villagers for their actions against an innocent child. That Naruto, the sunny child who just last week was spouting about being Hokage and taking the hat had decided that he no longer wanted the title that literally every other child dreamed of having showed how much this village wore on him. Managing to push those thoughts aside, Hiruzen let out a sigh before adressing Naruto.

"I see. Then, what do you want to do in the future, then? What are your dreams right now?"

Naruto crossed his arms and leaned back into his seat, closing his eyes as he went back through the memories of his conversation with the old man, before going back further towards his talk with Kurama, and then further and further back. Opening his eyes and setting his gaze on the old man, he spoke with conviction.

"I don't really have a major goal right now. I guess I'm just going to keep getting stronger and search for this goal as a shinobi for now. But I know that eventually I want to find someone more people than just you, Teuchi-jiji and Ayame-nee that truly cherish me for who I am, and not what I can do for them, and protect them with all my strength."

Seeing the renewed fire in the boy's eyes as he spoke of his new goals, Hiruzen felt his guilt assuaged, as his village had not broken the child.

'The will of Fire burns strongly within you, Naruto... You do your parents' legacy justice.'

The old man spared the blonde boy a soft smile, before speaking up.

"I trust you to achieve your goals, Naruto. I will support you as much as I can, and I hope you remember that I'll always be in your corner."

Hiruzen wasn't surprised when the blonde jumped over the desk to hug him. He was surprised, however, at the new, stronger frame of the boy giving his old bones a good squeeze.

He was, however, surprised by the tears that covered his robes.

"Thank you for being there for me, old man. I'll never forget it."

Hiruzen wrapped his own arms around the child, and let Naruto cry himself out. After about 15 minutes Naruto pulled back, wiping his face clean of tears using his shirt sleeve, before giving the old man another hug, and dashing out of the office, making his way back towards his apartment.

Hiruzen, in his office, could only look towards the framed photo of the smiling Fourth, his thoughts firmly on the child that had just left his office.

'No matter how much things weigh down on him, Naruto always manages to bounce back in the best way possible. Unlike the response that most would give to his kind of life, Naruto decides to find love, instead of spreading more hate... Yours truly is a remarkable child, Minato, Kushina.'

-Streets of Konoha-

Naruto once again made his way through the streets, being subjected to glares, scowls and sneers. Unlike his previous actions of pretending not to notice and crafting a close-eyed grin, or blowing up at them and scowling back, Naruto had a small, genuine smile borne out of the fact that he had found a true goal that was worth aspiring towards.

As he made a turn towards his apartment complex, Naruto found the walls of the building covered in graffiti, the words 'Demon', 'Monster' and 'Murderer' being the most proeminently painted on.

Crossing his arms, the blonde shook his head as he clicked his tongue likely.

"This will not do. Not at all."

To the surprise of the watching vandals who smirked happily at the misfortune of the demon and the effort that he'd have to put into taking care of it, Naruto simply crossed his fingers together.

"Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"

15 Narutos now stood where there was previously only one. Turning towards his clones, he spoke up.

"You know what to do."

The clones nodded, before moving off. Some of them went to fetch buckets, water, sponges and other cleaning supplies, others were busy walking around the apartment and noting every possible entry and exit point, plans already percolating through his head of the various traps he'd set to make sure people kept outside of his home.

'Okay, brat, I'm back and I have a better understanding of your body's capabilities now. At the moment, your body is still quite away from it's ideal state, but with me inside of you and your Uzumaki blood, that will be corrected soon enough. As you keep exercising and eating, your body will recover more and more, putting it closer to it's possible best at your age. Your power jumps will be sporadic, and in a few cases, drastic, so you will be eating even more and working even harder, both for development and control. With both your body, mind and skills progressing rapidly, you should've covered enough ground to be, if not ahead, at least at the same level as the best of the best in your class.'

'I see. Well, scrap your projections, Kurama. We're going hardcore at this, I want to be the best. I'll make sure that I can always protect my precious people, and that when I make new ones, I can protect them as well. That includes protecting you from the people after you, so you should know when I'm strong enough.'

'I see. Well, brat, since you volunteered for the bootcamp of hell, who am I to say no?'

Naruto could almost sense the massive, bloodthirsty grin on Kurama's face, but instead of shaking in trepidation, his posture hardened in determination. The old man, Iruka-sensei, Teuchi-jiji, Ayame-neechan, Kurama-sensei... Naruto would protect all of them with his life.

Believe it!

~Chapter End~

Hello hello everyone, FrancoGamerxz here, back at it again. Have thoughts on the story? Think it was good, or sucked? Have suggestions? You can leave all of those in the reviews, it's a very handy tool that FFnet has to allow you readers to make contact with content creators. Make use of it as you see fit!

This was me, signing out!