He tried getting drunk once. He was twenty in this world, so his promise was kept. Disregarding the one time he accidentally drank a sip, he never had alcohol. That logic in hand, he had never gotten drunk. It couldn't be replicated by dream drink. So, it was a worthless endeavor.
On another occasion, he reimagined moments in his childhood. 'What if' scenarios ran rampant, like what if his parents had raised him. He wasn't a participant, but rather, a spectator. He watched like a silent, and invisible god. Part way, he realized that this person wouldn't have been him. It was also hard to imagine it after a period of time.
He often divulged himself with massive amounts of ramen. Every kind of ramen dish he could think of, he made and ate it.
All of it, were simple pleasures in life. The only limit was his imagination. However, through it all he felt constrained. Limited by the world he knew because he didn't know how something tasted, or how something looked. Whether he knew the parents of a person, or other members of their family.
He decided to explore another avenue.
Naruto watched with abated breath. Whether guided by instinct, or done intentionally, each movement was precise and controlled. A single misstep, or the wrong choice would end in death. The stakes had never been higher.
It was all glancing blows, or blocked strokes. A sweep of a kick that went clear, or a punch that was parried. The stalemate broke, a punch to the face, disorientated, another in the ribs. The victim retaliated with a headbutt.
There was something satisfying about the crack when it landed; He keeled back, a hand clutched his nose, stunned and bleeding. He didn't see the kick, and he was sent away into the brush.
A lapse in a perfect string, it existed only to break the monotony.
The momentary victor in the round, shook his head–wiping the daze away–and rushed in after his attacker.
He followed, unnoticed, it would be easy to change the tide, but he couldn't interfere in things already predetermined. Goosebumps crawled over his skin, and a shiver of delight. This was just how he imagined it.
How both of these individuals looked, the landscape, their skill.
The fight continued, the exhaustion begun to set in between the two fighters. The spring to their steps grew heavier, and the strikes sloppy and slow.
The protagonist jumped away, shuriken being thrown from his hand. Most went wide, and the rest deflected and dodged.
Kunai were brandished by both sides as they met one another, each strike meant to kill, aimed for vitals.
The singing of metal, as they scrapped and clashed. Until the blonde was disarmed; the kunai disappearing in the forest. He was too slow to stop an attack, a gasp, as a knife plunged into his jacket.
A smoke bomb exploded, and the injured one flew into the trees. He knelt against the trunk, with strained and quiet gasps.
"You're still around here, aren't you? Just give up," words shouted from a hunter.
Naruto's hand went to the kunai embedded in the jacket, and pulled it out. The tip of the blade was coated in blood.
"Come on out! Honestly, why do you even try?" The person yelled. "There's no use, it's hopeless. Just give up,"
"How about you give up, on trying to make me give up!"
Everything froze, the two characters still and lifeless. Naruto creased his brows, a thumb going to his tooth and flicking it. The scene reversed, before the character jumped into the trees. It continued again, and the two interacted with one another before he restarted it once again.
They said different things, or did something else.
"That can't be right," he muttered. A frown, and a sigh. The day darkened, but he continued to try and fix it. The hours passed.
He gave up, and seated his back against a tree trunk. Naruto watched the character he was named after, in another scene that he could recall, and another. Nearly all of them had the same troublesome problem; It didn't feel right. Naruto forged on, until the moment it was all over.
"I forgot," he murmured. "I thought that was impossible,"
It seemed so long ago. The specifics lost in his memory. Failing to envision the scene to its exact depiction felt like he sullied the memory. He couldn't properly honor it, not when he didn't possess the material.
However terrible the realization, he could never forget the message inside. He supposed that's where it mattered.
He had to do something else.
The shrill whines woke him. Like a choir that sung in harmony. Repeated by dozens of the rats in the skies. He was going crazy, they weren't synced at all. Then he heard the waves, calmly sweeping along the shore.
He opened his eyes to see a seagull. It tried its best to nonchalantly approach, side stepping and prodding along the ground in an attempt to be stealthy.
Naruto sat up. The sudden movement terrified it. The seagull screamed at him and flew away,
There was so many of them in the skies. Along the shore, on the beach, and on top of floating pieces of wood. There was no sign of his ship, other than the debris that belonged to the hull.
What annoyed him most was his cracked lips and dry throat. His head pounded, and he felt sand stick to his hair.
Groggily, he stood up. A ship wreck of course, in a strange land of somewhere unknown. He watched the foam from the ocean float ashore. The salt water looked mighty tasty to him, but he knew the sea wouldn't parch his throat.
She just felt the need sink the ship. That was not a nice thing to do. It was very rude.
Now he lost everything, or so he thought. Coins clinked together as shook his coat free of the sand. Though, he had little else other than the salt crusted clothes on his back.
With nothing else to do, he walked the shore. Through and natural quarry, he encountered a large bay, shaped like a crescent moon. The tide went lower, and he watched the salt water recede from the bay until it was nothing more than a pool of water in the middle.
Proceeding through, he stayed in sight of the ocean side. It was many hours until he found any semblance of civilization. Hidden away from the restless ocean, and into an alcove. A dock rested with a boat tied to it.
Naruto followed a worn path beaten by years of treks. Hidden deeper above a hill, a small house rested in a clearing. He heard the beating chop of wood being splintered, they clunked together as they were sorted.
The smell of fish was heavy and nearby on a table were freshly caught fish stacked in rows. Naruto went closer to the sound, and he saw the source of the noise. A tall, aging man was in the process of cutting wood.
He was noticed, a grunt as the weighty axe rested on the stranger's shoulder. Wary dark eyes settled on him. He was silent for a while as he was gauged. "I don't get much visitors," he said gruffly.
"I washed up ashore," Naruto replied. His voice coarse. It was surprising to talk to another person.
The man scratched his beard with a calloused hand, from all the fishing and work he done with his hands. "You alone?" he asked, wary but concerned.
"Just myself, there was no one else on board."
"I suppose you're happy to be alive,"
Naruto decided not to answer.
The man dug his axe into a large stump. He wiped his hands, "C'mon, you look rough. The least I can do is help a needing man."
He nodded instead of speaking. He was led to the porch of the cabin, but not inside. Instead he was told to wait while the old man got whatever he needed within. There were a few inklings of the man's life. The trophy of a boar hung above the door, the hide of an animal spread to dry on some contraption in the corner.
This was a man of the wild. Who lived off the wilderness and perhaps reveled in it.
He returned with a plate of food and a pitcher. The man placed the items on a table, and said he could eat. He left again.
The smell of spiced fish and potatoes hit his nostrils, reminding him that he was starving and thirsty. Naruto dug into the food with gusto, though, he eyed the pitcher with interest. There was no cup, but the man returned with a couple of glasses and filled them.
The man handed him a glass that he gingerly took. "Care to tell me of your troubles that landed you here?"
Naruto realized it wasn't water, but wine instead. The heavy smell of something fruity invaded his nostrils. He took a sip, the strange taste of alcohol reminded him of his master accidentally slipping him a flask of wine instead of water. It tasted like rotten fruit.
He was thirsty enough to not be bothered by it too much, and took a generous helping. "There's not much to say. I was alone at sea, when a storm took me by surprise," as well as a certain person.
"Not familiar with the sea?" He asked. Naruto shook his head as he ate and drank more. "Why were you out there then?"
"I wanted to see the world,"
"Then you ought to return where you came from, this isn't a beautiful place."
He shrugged, "there's nothing for me, so I might as well find something."
Naruto had finished his food by then, as there wasn't much to eat. Which left him with the wine.
"What will you do now?" He asked.
"Travel, where is the nearest town?"
"there's a road down that path, take a left and you should arrive in a couple of hours."
"Thank you," Naruto replied. "If I gave you some of these coins, would you be able to give a pack and some supplies?"
"What'd you like?"
"Just a blanket, a little bit of food and a flask for water."
He had a pocketful of coins in this dream; it could be as bottomless as he wanted it. He didn't though, he counted the amount and made sure it was all he had. Pieces of silver and gold. The man took several and went inside.
Naruto sipped on his drink and waited. It wasn't long until the man returned with the items.
"Thank you very much," he replied.
The man nodded, helping himself to another cup of wine. "You're leaving right now?"
"I have something important to do," The man nodded, he was of few words. It was for the best.
When Naruto began his trek toward the town, he realized he forgot to give the man a name. He would get better. He had all the time in the world, even though it wasn't his.
Sometimes, he couldn't sleep. Often, he would stare above him; whether it was the starry sky, or the canopy of trees or anything at all. It was in these times his mind would wander freely. Despite his attempts to focus on doing this action or that objective.
Now, he saw darkness and nothing else, and no matter which way he looked it was all he saw. There was nothing to see, and felt like it invaded his senses. His ears rung in the silence. This was an anomaly.
There were moments, when he imagined her appearing again. Through some fashion when the world bent to her will and change and twist. All the laws he created were made null.
Sometimes, he wondered if that's how she saw the real world. The rules didn't apply to her, instead, they conformed and complied. It was how she expected things to work. He wasn't certain about that, it was only his own thoughts.
Even in this fake world, he needed things to be as similar as to the reality where he still stared at the woman holding him by the neck.
His heart sped at the thought of her appearance. The pervading darkness was unnatural. Yet, that subsided because his mind was free.
He expected her to appear, and he felt the presence. He did not want her here. It would be so easy for her to ignore; to break the mold and reveal herself.
Yet, his vision returned, or all light returned to the earth. He wasn't sure which one it was, if she skirted the edges of his senses or he deluded himself.
He tossed and turned in the simple blanket. It was still dark, the moon shone brightly. The silver rays piercing through the trees.
Time was an important thing. That was one thing he couldn't control whether the sun rose or dipped. He always held doubts, that she manipulated his sense of time. He wouldn't be surprised if somewhere down the line near the end, she would say he wasn't halfway just yet. It was expected, and he wasn't sure if he could ever survive if she deceived him. Sometimes, he wasn't certain how often he thought this, if it was the first or the hundredth time.
Naruto stood and decided to create a fire for himself. He wouldn't get to sleep tonight.
He stared into the whipping red tendrils, crackling and snapping. Fire was important, it drove away the creatures of the night and the darkness itself. There was plenty of firewood to last until daybreak.
He yawned and ate dry bread, it was tough to swallow without a little liquid to flush it down. Naruto leaned back, and stared at the stars for a long while.
He heard the steps first. The dirt crunching beneath his visitor's feet. It wasn't a person at all. No, this visitor was a wolf, large and beastly.
"Hello there," he said. Of course, the beast didn't reply. It stared with intelligent eyes.
With slow movements, he searched for a pouch and dug out a piece of salted jerky. He held it out to the wolf and waited. It stalked toward him, it's mouth inching toward his hand and grabbed the piece of meat.
It ate loudly, and sloppily.
"You know I have more in this pouch, right?" he smiled, "If you stick around, maybe I'll give you more."