Genma gave Naruto the idea of going back in time. It was an off-hand remark; he lamented on how he should've hooked up with more women if he knew the future would've gone to hell. They all knew that the future they were living in didn't have a single chance of getting restored to its former glory. But just because they couldn't do anything to change the present didn't mean they couldn't redo the past.

They were given little hope with the idea to make a seal to travel through time, but it was infinitely better than living without hope at all. They had all lived without an ounce of hope for so long that it felt like a much-appreciated breath of fresh air. Living in constant despair and hopelessness was exhausting, and none of them realized how much it weighed down on them until that weight disappeared.

He and Shikamaru worked tirelessly. Time was something they all took for granted, but now that they were being hunted down by Kaguya and the army of White Zetsu, it became a luxury. Half the time, Naruto and Shikamaru had to be carried by one of the other survivors because they were so sleep-deprived, spending most, if not all, of their time trying to design the seal. It was dangerous, suicidal even, to throw all caution aside and forsake their sleep on a seal that might not even work. But everyone was pushed forward by their losses.

Once the seal was completed, and Naruto drew it out on Sai's last scroll with his blood, the look of utter despair that was present in each of their eyes faded just a bit. There was finally hope for them, even if none of them would live to see it through. Naruto didn't have the heart to tell them of the most likely outcome from activating the scroll. Shikamaru told Naruto that there was a high possibility that he wouldn't be going back to their past, per say, but a parallel world where the differences between the two worlds were minuscule.

What little hope he had managed to gather was ruthlessly crushed by that. Naruto was the one who held on to hope the longest, so when he finally lost his faith, he was overwhelmed by a wave of crushing defeat, hopeless despair, and utter desolation. Even if the seal was successful and he could go back in time, it wouldn't be to his family; Kakashi, Sasuke, Shikamaru, Sai, Gaara, even Genma wouldn't be the same.

The screeching sound of a wailing baby was what reached his ears. It took Naruto a few moments to realize that he was the wailing annoyance. His throat was raw from screaming, and his face burned with heat from the hot tears that welled up from his eyes. His stomach ached horribly, not unlike the time he drank spoiled milk and spend most of his time in the restroom.

His cries were drowned out by the utter horror at the sight of his parents standing before him, hunched over the claw that impaled both of their abdomens. Blood poured out from their wound, and they were coughing up blood. They wore smiles on their faces, sad but genuine as they accepted their fate. Seeing Kurama, unsealed from Kushina—this wasn't his mother; he didn't have the right to call her that when he stole her son from her—and much smaller than he remembered ever since Minato resealed the Yin half of Kurama inside him was mind-boggling.

Since he didn't gather the necessary amount of chakra to travel back at least twenty years, Naruto figured he would've landed sometime near the end of the Third Great Shinobi War. Missing out on five minutes of chakra didn't seem like too big of a margin. But Naruto forgot that space-time seals were finicky things; they were chakra-sensitive and required a specific amount of chakra to activate. Naruto ended up in the hospital every other day back when he was still learning how to utilize the Flying Thunder God seal; Naruto coughed up puddles of blood from internal bleeding when he didn't pump the seal with enough chakra and ended up with third-degree burns when he overpowered the seal. He couldn't play it safe and practice with shadow clones either because they popped halfway, though, unable to withstand the force of traveling through a dimensional void. Since his seal was meant to travel only through time by using the space between it, underpowering the seal wouldn't do anything while overpowering the seal would throw the activator decades back in time.

If he and Kurama were at full power, they could've pumped the seal with enough chakra to throw them back to the Warring States era. But given that they were constantly at less than half their chakra capacity, they had to make do. The seal could only activate with a certain amount of chakra and then some, hence why he had to drain the last survivors of what little chakra they had left. It was a godsend that Kurama had been storing away chakra for half a year. Otherwise, they never would've been able to activate the seal in the first place.

Even though he acknowledged that he had screwed up with the calculations of how far back in the past he would go in the heat of the moment, Naruto wanted to scream and cry at the injustice. Even when Naruto knew that he was going to a parallel world and that he probably wouldn't go back as far as the beginning of the Second Great Shinobi War, he hoped against all the odds that he could've landed before his parents' death. But seeing them sacrifice themselves for him made him steel his resolve. He couldn't save his parents, but he would travel through hell and back to make sure everyone else survived. His precious people showed him the light, so he would make sure that they didn't go through the same pain he went through. He was going to save them all if it was the last thing he did.

"Naruto! Kaa-chan and Tou-chan love you so much. You know that? I'm sorry we're not going to be able to watch you grow up, but I know you'll become a good man," Kushina said with a trembling smile and watery eyes. "Make sure you eat three meals a day. Don't go becoming a training freak like your deadbeat father here. Don't be afraid to try new things."

"Naruto, make sure you don't cause too much trouble for the Third or Jiraiya-sensei. Cherish the bonds you forge with your friends. Those who break the rules are scum, but those who abandon their friends are even worse than scum. Remember those words and live by them. It was one of the last things my student said."

He choked on his saliva. His tears returned with a vengeance. Minato performed the signs for the Eight Trigrams Seal, but instead of sealing the Yin half of Kurama within himself, he instead sealed it into Naruto. Given that he was an infant, Naruto knew that Tou-san chose to seal the Yin half of Kurama in himself because Naruto's baby body wouldn't have been able to withstand the strain of a full Tailed Beast. Naruto figured that it was a parallel world difference to why Minato decided to seal Kurama into his infant body one-half at a time.

Kurama returned with him so while he did impale Minato and Kushina with one of his claws, that was the action of past-Kurama. When Minato formed the seals for the Eight Trigram Seals, he didn't bother moving other than swishing his nine tails to create an illusion of anger and a thirst for destruction. When Minato completed the signs, he sealed Kurama into Naruto. Kurama's Yin half and Yang half had their chakra merged into one within Naruto. When Kurama's body disappeared, Minato and Kushina collapsed onto the ground.

His abdomen burned with fiery chakra that he knew to be Kurama's. He screeched in pain, sobbing inconsolably. He had no pain tolerance as an infant, and if he had to suffer in pain, everyone around him would suffer from their ears. No one had to know that he cried his heart out for experiencing the loss of his parents for the second time. Kurama knew better than to comment when he was aware that Naruto was mourning for his parents and all the people he lost to reach this point now that he could afford to break down and cry.

Naruto woke up bundled up in a soft blanket that warmed him up to the bone. He let out a sigh of contentment that came out as a gurgle. Above him, someone chuckled in amusement. When he opened his eyes, the sight of the polished wooden bars belonging to an old crib was what greeted Naruto. Hovering over the crib was the Third, looking at him with warm eyes and a serene smile. At a closer look, there was an undercurrent of sorrow that he didn't mask; there wasn't any need for the Third to remain firm in front of an infant like he had to before the village.

Kurama? Are you awake in there?

There wasn't an answer for a few minutes. And then a familiar groan rumbled in Naruto's mindscape. I feel like Madara used me to fight against Hashirama again. Fucking Minato. If he was going to seal all of me, he should've just done it all together.

Naruto laughed, both in his mindscape and out loud. It was probably because you were a dick before we came here.

Kurama didn't bother replying to that. Naruto didn't blame him. The least he could do was let Kurama sleep in peace. When Tou-san had sealed the Yin half of Kurama within him in the past—or was it the future now that they were both back in the past?—Kurama and Naruto were more in sync with each other. Naruto used the key to unlock the seal, and that allowed a greater influx of Kurama's chakra into his system. Ever since he was a kid, Kurama had also been leaking his chakra through the kinks in the seal into Naruto for years so that he could eventually influence Naruto and manipulate him into undoing the seal. Since Naruto had reverted to infanthood, he didn't have as much of immunity to Kurama or his corrosive chakra. It was only because of the Uzumaki blood within him that he was chosen to be Kurama's host. That and there wasn't anyone else who could be Kurama's host instead of himself.

When Jiji began rocking him back and forth, Naruto felt a wave of sleepiness overcome him. He let out an unhappy gurgle he meant to be a whine. He didn't want to sleep, not when he finally got to see Jiji again. It was one thing to see Jiji, dead but revived by the Second's damnable forbidden jutsu. Seeing Jiji considerably younger and with fewer wrinkles, than he was used to was mind-boggling. It reminded Naruto that he was in the past, that he was going to change everything for the better.

"Naruto, it's time for you to sleep," Jiji said with warm affection. Naruto stubbornly puffed up his cheeks. Jiji laughed and chalked up his reaction to Jiji's rocking. It was an unspoken rule that all babies grew sleepy when someone gently rocked them back and forth. Even if Jiji was known as the Professor, not even he would've expected Naruto to understand his words. There was a limit to child prodigies, and they didn't start straight from infanthood; their brains still needed time to develop.

Just suck it up and go to sleep, brat. You're a baby now. If you don't get enough sleep, you're just going to fuck up your development.

The villagers already stunted my growth when I was a kid, Naruto argued mulishly.

Naruto could practically sense Kurama roll his eyes in annoyance. And that was when you were like, what? Five? Six? You're a baby right now.

Naruto couldn't argue with Kurama's sound logic. For all that he was a Tailed-Beast, he spent over seven decades sealed away first in Mito, and then his mother. He was bound to have picked up things from them. Naruto only hoped that Kurama didn't spend most of his time in rage or sleeping. Mito was bound to be a goldmine of information when it came to sealing and was the one who founded medical ninjutsu. His mother had special chakra she could infuse into her chakra chains, which was why the village and her clan chose her to be the next host. Naruto wanted to try his hand at medical ninjutsu and learn how to use his chakra chains in a more versatile manner.

Focus on being a baby, and then I'll think about teaching you your legacy.

I thought you would've just screamed at Mito and Kaa-chan about how you're going to tear them to shreds and eat their entire family.

I might be petty, but not even I would ignore a golden opportunity to look through their memories. They did manage to seal me away. Of course, I would've looked through their memories. I didn't want to get sealed away again.

You said something reasonable for once!

Shut it, brat. Just go to sleep, Kurama grumbled. By the way, you do remember that you're going to have to relearn everything, right? Good luck with that.

Fuck!