Meetings beatings
I'm back. Now for those who are following this story and any future stories, I will say this. I am an adult, who has to do adult things like working, paying taxes, attempting to find a suitable partner to date, etc.
Updates will not be frequent, nor planned.
I do plan to at least make a chapter for each month, maybe every other month is life gets too hectic. But I will at the very least try to keep my chapters above 4,000 words. maybe shorter if I make an omake chapter or two.
Enjoy the chapter
Hiruzen in an act of what could be called submission, moved out of his office to the front of the kage building. As he walked through the building he had to steadfastly ignore the different workers who were still trying to recover from their busted eardrums, knowing that if he arrived after Feral made it to the kage building, the damage the building would suffer from getting dragged out would be costly.
Surrealism was the theme of the hour as he pushed open the two front doors. This being surreal due to the fact the doors had previously been glass and with the recent events, now had hundreds of shards laying inside and outside the building. Honestly he could have simply walked through the door.
He suppressed a grimace seeing the damage now at ground level. The various ninja were now managing to stand up with pained groans, most holding their ears with a handful having blood seeping through their fingers, likely the ones who had covered them too late to prevent major damage.
Resigning himself to his earned - for the most part- punishment, he closed his eyes and breathed deeply to steel his nerves and to keep himself from flinching. Taking the moment to think, he was regretful that he hadn't made an updated will in the past ten years. Perhaps if he had a few hours of life left after this, he could get someone to grab it quickly so he could dictate a quick change and addition to his current will. He'd definitely leave his battle helmet to his grandson Konohamaru, and leave his pipe to Asuma.
Tilting his head back slightly and opening his eyes his only thought was; I won't have time to alter the will…
In front of him was the snarling visage of Feral's rage, the enormous blood soaked wolf's head loomed over him snarling down at him with a baleful gaze from red eyes that were shining with rage fueled insanity, he felt the hot breath wash over him as it let out a low growl, its lips curling back to display its fangs at him. Another blink, and the wolf was gone, and in its place was Feral who stood a mere six feet from him.
Hiruzen flinched at that, even after all these years he could never sense when this man approached, even if he made it obvious. It was like trying to sense where a particular pocket of air was!
Sucking in a shuddering breath he gathered his courage enough to speak clearly. "You're not pleased with me for obvious reasons... "
"'Not pleased' doesn't begin to cover it boy." Feral's eyes flashed as he spat out the last word like a foul piece of fruit. "You've fallen in your age, you've become weak in mind and body and you've made mistakes by the dozen!"
That confused Hiruzen for a moment. Mistakes? Was Feral concerned for more than his surrogate grandson?
Before he could question that line of thought he was cut off by Feral's growl, something not unlike a wolf as it stared down an enemy.
"Your mistakes are many and for that you will be punished."
Hiruzen stiffened, ready to fight back. It may have been a futile effort but damn him if he didn't at least attempt to resist the cold grip of the Shinigami before he was dragged off to the afterlife!
But instead of the sudden fight to the death he was expecting Feral pointed a finger at him with a slow calm that unnerved Hiruzen.
"You will not die so easily boy, I will not allow you to escape the full punishment you deserve. Instead I sentence you to suffering beyond any you've ever known! I will ensure, with the gods above, the gods below, and the gods in between the two as my witness, that not only will I ensure that the paperwork you do daily triples, but you will never, ever, learn the secret to defeating paperwork! I will issue a village wide ban to everyone to deny you from learning it from anyone that may possibly learn the secret!"
Hiruzen Sarutobi, Third Hokage for the strongest hidden village, the professor, the second God of Shinobi, fell to his knees begging for death.
"PLEASE MERCY!" Sarutobi wailed, tears streaming from his eyes, phantom cramps already forming in his hands as he imagined the increased workload to come. He didn't even know how it would be possible for Feral to pull it off but he long since knew never to question the abilities of this man, he had been witness to Feral getting revenge on his sensei Tobirama when his sensei had cheated Feral in a game of chance. His sensei hadn't left the office for a week and when Hiruzen had gone to check on him, he saw his sensei broken. To this day he'd never forget the stacks of paper taller than his sensei surrounding the desk or sitting on the desk, nor would he forget the stifled sob his sensei let out when one stack fell over.
Feral wasn't done though. "And starting next week, three times a week I will drag you to the Hokage's personal training ground, and beat you. I'll let you fight back don't get me wrong, after all, I wouldn't want you to confuse my methods to bullying. But I will beat you until you are unable to stand and then drag you through the streets and drop you at the hospital for the night."
The hokage was ready to curl in a ball and cry then and there. The only thing stopping him was what was left of his pride and the fact he knew Feral would start the 'sparring' here in public.
Feral rolled his eyes at the frankly pathetic sight of the aged man weeping openly. "Quit your sniveling. Get up, gather whatever man points you have left and get a meeting together with the council so I can do what you apparently didn't have the spine for and clean house. Now get your petting zoo, whoever isn't crying like a little bitch over me raising my voice, and tell them the council is expected to be fully gathered in ten minutes and that if needed they will drag whatever members take too long by their legs kicking and screaming into the council chambers. Get it done."
Without another word Feral faded from view, and Hiruzen gathered his wits to make the necessary orders.
The council had been gathered quickly, the clan heads had surprisingly been waiting for the anbu to confirm the suspected meeting being called before quickly disappearing in various methods of shunshin to get to the council room with all haste.
The civilians on the council were less speedy in their gathering and more than a couple had to be grabbed and shunshined to the room to make it on time, leaving them disoriented and reasonably agitated at being manhandled in such a way, but the anbu had been given explicit orders to get them there at all costs.
The three elder council members were somewhere in between as they too shunshined there but didn't quite feel the need for haste the clan heads did. Danzo in particular had scowled ever since he had to quickly leave the underground root base he had been issuing missions to his agents before the seals he had set up to alert him to someone approaching his home and he had to quickly appear in his house only to deal with the anbu arriving and telling him that Sarutobi had ordered everyone to a meeting ASAP. Looking around the room his scowl deepened seeing the clan heads had a nervous energy about them even as the civilians seemed to be mostly ruffled, likely from being escorted here so quickly. He narrowed his eyes at the various clan heads and saw they all seemed to know what was happening, something that made him scowl deeper as he was without knowledge that may be needed to deal with whatever this wretched meeting was for, especially since he had to go without any root agents to guard him as everyone her were simply too talented to slip them in unnoticed.
The doors opened and everyone looked to see their Hokage rushing in looking beleaguered and frantic, his demeanor relaxed seeing everyone present. With a long suffering sigh of relief he made it to his chair and settled in.
Hiruzen had a moment of inner debate as he reached into his robes and felt his pipe hidden away, glancing at the clock. Would Feral be cruel enough to take his precious vice?
Yes, yes he would.
Deciding to take what would may be his last smoke for awhile he pulled out his pipe and packed the tobacco in before lighting it with a spark from his finger. Breathing deep he let out a long smoke filled sigh as the seconds ticked down the deadline.
"Well well, everyone is on time, excellent, I won't have to waste time hunting."
The clan heads and advisors snapped their heads fast enough to induce whiplash at the voice, away from the Hokage they'd been eyeing in concern to the middle area between the two sides that represented the clans and the civilians, where now someone appeared that hadn't been there before.
Feral was sitting idly in a chair casually sipping what smelled like tea from a mug, looking all the world unconcerned he easily infiltrated one of the most secure rooms in the elemental nations under the noses of some of the most talented individuals the village had.
The head of the civilian council, one Seito Yoshida, an affluent businessman frowned at the sudden appearance and seeming lack of respect from the man currently drinking in front of him. While surprised like the rest of the rooms occupants he thankfully had been semi-trained to not react overtly to 'ninja tricks',having seen them often enough, and so kept a look of calm. Standing up he cleared his throat and ignored the warning looks from the clan heads.
"Excuse me sir but thi- "
Seito was caught flat footed as the cloaked stranger merely pointed at him and made a shushing noise before draining tipping his cup back to drain his drink.
Feeling incensed at the now blatant disrespect from being treated like a child of all things he slammed his fist in anger as he shouted out. "Now see here you impu-"
The cut off this time came in the form of the mug Feral had been drinking from, shattering against Seito's forehead, effectively knocking him out and sending him sprawling with a crash and getting tangled in his chair.
Before panic could set in Feral's voice sliced through the shocked silence like a sword through paper.
"When I shush you, it doesn't mean 'be quiet', it means…" He stretched the word out with a lilt of his voice as if speaking to a young child before his voice dropped into a growl to continue. " 'shut the fuck up'."
When a few of the civilian side looked ready to yell or panic, he jerked a finger pointing at them and made the same shushing sound and stared them down until they were cowed.
Snorting he turned to the rest of the assembled council. "Greetings children, it's been awhile since we've last talked. Now that the insects have silenced their chirping…"
He paused to glare at the few on the civilian side that had mustered some form of courage in their anger at being treated so flippantly, their words died in their lungs at the glowing eyes that glared at them with unrestrained contempt.
Resuming as if he hadn't paused. "Like I said, it's been so long, years in fact. Normally that would be enough to have me visit for a small chat, but with everything that's happened in my absence, I feel we need to have a heart to heart."
Feral's hidden smirk grew seeing the clan heads blanche at that. His last 'heart to heart' had resulted in most of them being hospitalized after they had gotten a bit of ego from the recently won war and he felt the need to burst those pride filled bubbles. Turning his eyes towards the three advisors he scoffed to himself. Why these three were still held with any sort of value was beyond him, another thing he'd assume Hiruzen's lost spine allowed. Ignoring that for the moment he decided to approach the current issue with his usual attitude and panache.
And of course having all the subtlety of two Bijuu fighting each other.
"You have fucked up everything in my absence, and I will be taking the Uzumaki boy under my wing before you screw that up as well."
The clan heads didn't really react, as they had suspected that the blonde Uzumaki had been the reason his ire had been stoked so much. Hiashi Hyuuga however felt a bit of relief and hope enter him, with Feral's return to monitor the boy he could possibly talk with the cloaked man and see if he could conice the man to help uphold a promise his wife held with Kushina.
Seeing Feral heading to the door Hiashi made the decision to act now. "Feral-sama if I may?"
Rolling his eyes Feral turned away from the door to look at the Hyuuga brat.
Emboldened by the lack of violent reaction Hiashi continued. "Feral-sama, given your rather… abrupt entrance to the village, perhaps it would be best to introduce yourself to Uzumaki-san tomorrow? I'm sure Hokage-sama will be making an announcement later to assure everyone that there is no need to fear an attack or anything of that sort, so wouldn't it be more practical to wait for tomorrow where you can collect the young shinobi to be at the academy? After all, with your...outburst, the younger generation will be shaken and not exactly eager to follow what equates to a stranger, bursting in and telling one of their own that you are taking him for what have you."
Feral withheld his growl that came to his throat naturally at hearing the suggestion, knowing that the logic was sound and it would save a headache from having to explain he wasn't a bad person despite sending the ninja forces to the hospital, and causing a mass panic, and looking as Kushina had described his attire and overall appearance; 'shady as hell'. Kami he missed that brat's blunt nature.
Turning to fully face the Hyuuga he quirked an unseen eyebrow at him. "And what do you suggest I do instead brat? I've already gelded and ensured torment to the hokage, and traumatized a civilian with a tea cup. I've had a rather eventful day so far so what are you offering?"
The clan heads had made a quick look at the Hokage to confirm Feral's words and flinched slightly seeing the aged man's look of depression as he was reminded of the piles of paperwork that would be his future.
Hiashi shook himself as he looked back to Feral. "Well Feral-sama I was hoping to invite you to my compound, you see with your return I was reminded of a certain arrangement made that I feel would best be brought to your attention immediately and perhaps introduce you to the one it revolves around?"
Feral nodded, knowing that brat Kushina would have no doubt done some kind of backroom deals with her friends outside his notice. Nothing sinister as that wasn't her nature, but still likely something he would develop a headache over.
Danzo was seething silently in his seat, everything was falling to pieces! He, like Hiruzen knew the power the Uzumaki guardian had physically, mentally, and even worse, politically. It was why the cane wielding man never set his sights on Kushina despite knowing she held Kyuubi within her. Feral's wrath would have made even his sensei Tobirama flinch and that wasn't something he ever wished to experience. But now he had thought he had a chance with the blond Kyuubi container without Feral around,the man having seemingly disappeared from the face of the elemental countries, only for him to return and shred every plan he had with his mere presence!
But he would not panic, no. For now he had an advantage over Feral and anyone who he couldn't persuade normally. He felt a twinge of regret that he'd be using this power so soon, but with the target in question, the returns would be beyond what benefits he had originally planned. With all the clan heads here he would normally be much more careful about using his stolen power, but with Ferals arrival it was a minor boon as everyone would be sufficiently distracted long enough for him to launch the extremely powerful genjutsu within the eye he stole from Shisui for the good of the village.
With a quick build up of chakra he stood and cleared his throat, launching the genjutsu as soon as Feral turned to glare at him. "Feral-sa-"
Pain, that all he felt as he felt his chest seem to compact around something before blossoming along his entire back as he landed on the ground outside the hokage tower. It took everything his aged body had to force his eye open to see the hole his body made in the tower wall, and only a second of time passed allowing him one thought to pass before he felt, more than saw Feral's foot slam into his chest, making him spit out a glob of bloody spittle.
It failed?!
Those eyes, looking at him in silent disdainful judgement, past the man, no monsters leg with the attached foot still grinding into his chest, still looked down at him like a kami on high, like they had all those years ago when Tobirama-sensei introduced him. He hated those eyes, hated how they seemed to peer through his mask with ease and judge his very soul and found him lacking.
"You're damn fool boy." Feral growled with all the emotion his name would suggest as he pushed his foot down, getting a pained grunt from Danzo and another bit of blood to escape his lips. "I knew you'd be a pain in my ass at some point, but Tobirama insisted you had talent needed for the future. I'm so glad I talked him into giving the monkey brat the seat, no telling what damage you'd have caused, what stupidity would result with you in power before I killed you for going too far."
Cracking his eye open to give a glare Danzo could see that Feral had his cane in hand, twirling it slowly in his fingers as those baleful eyes gave him a look he knew all too well after pretending to be crippled. Pity.
"Let's make something clear here. If I was to be forced into making a comparison to what I think of you, it would be like I walked into a dark room that was holding garbage and flicked the lights on to see dozens of roaches scatter to hide away in whatever shadowy corner they can find." Feral lifted his foot before slamming it down, getting another grunt as Danzo felt a couple ribs break. Trying to disguise his intention of unsealing his modified arm he reached his hand as if to make a vain attempt to remove Ferals foot from his chest, his attempt was rewarded by getting his left hand stabbed by his own cane sword. Gasping in pain he felt his hand get moved by his sword currently piercing it over his left shoulder before letting out a pained cry as Feral stabbed the sword further, pinning his hand to his shoulder as the sword dug through the bones through to the ground beneath him. He groaned feeling the base of the sword and handle pressing into the back of his hand, letting him know the sword was fully in the ground.
"That's what I think of you. I am not above you, you are just beneath me. To continue the analogy, you like a roach, serve no true purpose, you are expendable and quite frankly more of a disturbance and unwanted parasite then any real threat. Your value is so low that even if I crushed you underfoot to be rid of you, no one would miss you except your fellow roaches, and even then they can do nothing but hope I don't step on them as well."
Feral stepped off of Danzo's chest letting him see the full council had made it outside and were now watching his mutilation in silence, the civilians who supported him were pale, likely thinking with him dead their power was crippled, and the shinobi side, the clan heads in particular watched with uncaring eyes. Feral grabbed his ankle and tugged making Danzo let loose a reluctant whine of pain as he felt his leg lifted.
"And just like that you will be removed from the living world, and life will continue on as if nothing happened. Like any insect with the nature of pests like roaches, like tapeworms, like ticks you simply have nothing to positively contribute to the world, you have no real impact other than to inspire disgust, and removing you would do no more than to satisfy a primal urge to be rid of a nuisance with a pleasing crunch."
To emphasize Feral slammed his elbow into Danzo's knee, snapping it audibly and making it bend backward. Two of the civilian council vomited at the sight as another fainted.
Dropping the now useless limb and seeing Danzo passed out as the sudden pain had been too much he turned to the Clan heads, advisors and kage who looked shaken at the brutality but had no other real reaction than that. He pointed a finger at Hiashi who twitched before seeing Feral point towards where the Hyuuga compound was. Nodding Hiashi started walking that way as Feral pinned the rest with a stare.
Pointing at the mangled body he said with a voice devoid of emotion, "Leave him. None of you are to help him. This is his punishment for testing my thin patience."
Without a word further he turned to follow Hiashi.
The clan heads were silent before Tsume Inuzuka, the more brash and crude among them spoke up. Taking a long shuddering sigh she shook herself. "I almost forgot how much of an alpha he was, kami above if I didn't know he was married and faithful I'd try to bag him."
Hiruzen got over his own minor shock hearing Tsume's brazen remark. Sighing he looked to them. "Go to your clans and inform them there's nothing to be worried about, explain what you can. I'll be taking Hiashi's suggestion from earlier and making a village wide announcement in a few hours."
Hiashi could only sigh in disappointment at his father. The old former Patriarch had never liked Feral and had shown his dislike on many occasions, especially when Hiashi had opted to take Feral's training when Kushina had offered and the old man had been livid when Feral improved the recently thought 'perfect' taijutsu of the clan.
But still Hiashi had hoped the years would bestow wisdom on his father to not be overtly antagonistic to Feral.
His father's limp body hanging from the wall his head was imbedded said otherwise.
Turning to Ko Hyuuga he sent the young man to fetch the clan medic and to retrieve his daughter to meet a guest.
Turning back he faced his guest who continued perusing the contract that had been the subject of conversation before his father had rudely burst in. Feral's eyes continued to roam the page for a minute before setting it down.
Sighing the cloaked man pinched the bridge of his nose in annoyance, That brat Kushina had made a marriage contract between her son and the daughter of her second best friend Hitomi Hyuuga, Hiashi's wife. From what he could tell the purpose was to protect the girl as while female clan heads were not against any rules or even unprecedented in the history of the clan, they did tend to receive almost twice the pressures the males had to prove themselves worthy of the headship. Hitomi had planned for two children with Hiashi as it was tradition for the head to have two, and when learning of her first borns gender had made the contract with Kushina, enacting an old hidden bylaw about dying clans that even Feral had either forgotten or didn't know about, to save her from the stress and had intended for her second born to hopefully be male and not go through the expected nightmare.
But as Hiashi informed him, the now four year old Hanabi was in fact female and would receive the same stress once she was old enough.
It was easy to understand what the Hyuuga head wanted Feral to do, accepting the contract would ease the stress on both girls as the older would be expected to dominate the younger proving the usual Hyuuga dogma about strength, but with Hiashi's explaining how the girl was much like her mother, it would backfire and the older girl would grow weak between the stress of training, the mental strain from having to fight her own younger sister, the fear of the damnable brand being put on her, and finally having the unrestrained scrutiny of the entire clan, along with her one year older cousins ire for the incident, she would become a shy, introverted, nervous wreck who would be grasping for straws to have some form of control.
Feral scowled at the thought ignoring the medic who just arrived and removed the elder as two more Hyuuga appeared with a stretcher to remove the man. While he could never truly be for a marriage contract, especially between children of all things, he could see that the brat Hitomi and the brat Kushina had meant well with this. He reread a line in the contract and was pleased that the two mothers had left an out. In the case that any one of seven people were to refuse the contract, then it would be considered void, the seven being both sets of parents, of which all four signed, the two the contracts pertains to, and in a strange twist, his own signature would be required to give the go ahead.
He smirked to himself, the brat had hated it, but she was probably glad he had hammered politics and laws into her tomato head. She had gone further to deny the Hyuuga from influencing the young girl should the contract go through, and even made it so that the seal could not be placed onto her until the contract's deadline was up, which was when both fiance's were twenty-one years of age, well past the acceptable time the seal could be placed and cutting her out from getting it entirely in a political middle finger aimed at the elders.
But still that didn't mean that it would happen. But what he was really annoyed with was the part involving him the most with...
He was interrupted from his thoughts as the Hyuuga from before -Ko? Yeah Ko- returned, escorting a small girl with short dark blue hair with twin bangs framing her face and accentuating her eyes that were tinted lavender as opposed to the normal Hyuuga white. Feral could easily see Hitomi's blood running strong within the young thing who had become nervous seeing him. Frowning he knew was appearance inspired no confidence in any young child, but still he didn't enjoy it. That and she probably just saw her grandfather being carried out on a stretcher, and a fresh hole was in the wall beside him...
Speaking softly he tried to soothe her. "It's okay young one, I'm no one strange."
Hiashi had a massive sweat drop at that failure in attempting to calm his skittish daughter. It doubled in size when his usually timid daughter turned to him with a look that screamed 'is he serious?' and had to hide his amusement and slight embarrassment by raising his sleeve to cough into before looking to her.
"He speaks the truth my child. This man is Feral-Sama. He was a teacher to your mother and I for a time and was a guardian for your mothers best friend."
Young Hinata's eyes widened as she turned to look at the stranger with new eyes. Honestly she couldn't see her beloved mother, nor her father having been associated with the man, but she knew her strict father was not one to make jokes like that.
"T-truly? You t-taught my parents?"
Feral chuckled at the slight stutter. It was times like this he could feel his age, seeing Hitomi's daughter having the same slight stutter she had in her youth before meeting and befriending Kushina who proceeded to drag the girl from her small shell
"You remind me of young Hitomi, she stuttered like you, because she didn't have any friends outside the compound. Then she met my ward, who was her first real friend and she became the confident young woman who I had the pleasure of knowing. They became teammates when they became Genin and stayed close even to the day the Kyuubi attacked where my ward died."
Hinata felt sympathy for the man, she could see in his strange yellow eyes that he did in fact enjoy knowing her mother, and felt sadness for his ward's death. She offered her sincere condolences to the man whose eyes crinkled in what she assumed was a smile.
"It's fine young one, but I am not here to talk of that. Your father asked me to come here to see something your mother and my ward had managed to do without my knowledge. You know of what is expected of you being the eldest of the clan head correct?"
She nodded. She had been explained that her training and teachings would be extensive the day after her last birthday. "Y-yes Feral-Sama…"
He waved her off. "None of that, I'm not one for formalities like that from someone so young."
The young Hyuuga was surprised. She never knew anyone outside her fellow students at the Academy who was so lax with suffixes.
Before she could continue that thought her father spoke up. "My daughter, your mother and her friend made an agreement before your birth. The contents are too much to be truly understood for your young age and will be explained in full when you are older, say…" He looked to Feral to confirm. "Genin? After that?"
Feral nodded. "Yes, they should be mature enough by then to understand the intricate parts."
Hiashi nodded before continuing. "You mother and her friend wanted you and her son cared for and treated with respect and dignity, and not as your mother put it 'the unfairness of the elder fools who would expect a child to train as a Jounin would'."
Hinata giggled slightly, remembering her mother would often be annoyed with the elders for various reasons.
Feral sighed catching her attention as he seemed annoyed for some reason. "This brings the reason why I'm here. Part of the agreement would be that instead of the training outside of your clan taijutsu you'd normally receive, you'd train alongside the son of my previous ward under me."
For those wondering, yes the pairing is NaruHina. Those who don't like it, don't read it. I always liked this pairing and honestly never cared for Sakura and every other female pairing outside of Konoha is either nonsensical, out of left field, or need a ridiculous amount of build up that honestly doesn't seem plausible while following the canon plotline like I'm doing. And for any pairings with girls in Konoha I feel don't work for the most part, as 80% of the girls near his age are either obsessed with Sasuke, have an interest in someone else, or too focused in their career. Hinata simply makes the most sense to me, as while she's a serious Kunoichi she still takes time to develop a relationship with Naruto ( in canon after the 4th war ).
Outside of Sakura, Ino, Tenten and Hinata, other characters are simply background noise who literally disappear from sight once everyone becomes genin, and only appear again in flashbacks.
And other females are simply too old for me to feel comfortable with trying to get them in a relationship with a preteen/teenager.
