Disclaimers: I do not own Naruto or any other world I use as reference. I only owe my main OC and any other OC I may create.
Chapter 5: The begin of a legend
In the last week I looked for a place with a forge that I may be able to use. I have found seven such places inside the village, but only three of them produce weapons and only one of them produces products that are used by ninjas. I decided to visit it tomorrow, today I have to go to the opening ceremony for the new academy year.
I neared myself to the front door of the academy and saw that there are at least a hundred kids standing before a podium, with their parents standing around them and a table that was labeled "Registry" to the side.
The chunin that was behind the table was studying the new batch of students and soon to be ninjas, so he didn't even noticed me standing before the table, even more so because I wasn't making any sound while moving. As such I had to knock on the table to finally get his attention and when I did he turned around began to look me up and down whit a confused face.
Most would find that strange, but that was a reaction that I got more than once today. You see, while I couldn't forge anything, I still could sew myself something and with my improved physical body even leatherwork was possible to be done at home. As such I had created my own cloths.
I wore black leather runner shoes, black trousers that were wide enough to not hinder any movement and long enough to go a little over the shoes, a white shirt and a white/blue Assassin's Creed themed hoody – means with a too large hood and a integrated face mask. Furthermore I wore white/blue gloves and as such showing no skin at all.
This weren't cloths that you could find in Konoha, even less so on a child.
"Name?" - The chunin finally asked.
"Yamanaka Hrio"
"Hmm, ah here class 1c room 126." – He said after finding my on the list.
I simple turned to go to the collection of children, waiting for the beginning of the ceremony.
It didn't take long – mostly because I was the last to come – before the Hokage stepped on the podium and began to talk about the "will of fire". Somewhat strange to call the belief that love was the answer to peace that. If I think of fire, I see war, or at least a battlefield, as such if I hear "will of fire" I think about the will to fight and destroy anything that stands before one.
Before I even know it, he had already finished his speech and the children began to walk into their class. I too moved and walked into the room 126, the classroom of 1c.
The class name meant that it was the lowest class. The classes are sorted from 1a - important students and high graduation quota - to 1c - orphan and first to become a ninja from a civilian family and as such a 90% fail quota. There will be most likely only two classes after the second year and one after the third.
The low gradation quote isn't only because of the high fail quote, a few simply chose a different way like the hospital and the likes.
A few pros for being in a 'c' class are that there are no really important people that I have to look for and the teacher will make more theory and history then training and teaching how to fight - they don't want to train people who most probably will not graduate as genin – because of that I can focus myself on other, more important things.
The teacher – a chunin I never heart off – had already started an introducing round, where one had to say ones name, the likes and dislikes. I didn't truly listen to the introducing. I was the last to give a introducing - because I sat at the end of the classroom – and gave a true and sincere introducing, because I know that I still had a shadow following me.
"The name is Yamanaka Hiro, I like to learn new things and to make new things, I hate people who fear changes and I dislike sloths and idiots."
Before I could sit down the teacher began to speak.
"Ah Hiro-kun, would you be so nice and take off you hood wile in class."
I had forgotten to remove the hood - I still can see pretty match everything, even with a part of the hood before my eyes and if I can't see it then I can sense it – as such I removed the hood and face mask after a quick nod.
All kids began to whisper with each other as soon as I removed them. Most were about how strange my cloths where or the color of my eyes – while white hair color isn't too strange, white eye color is-, but a few asked why a Yamanaka had white hair and eye color.
"Now now, be quit and listen." – The teacher began to speak again and explained to us what we will be doing in the next two years. The first year will be mostly history – brainwashing – and learning to think like a ninja – means instead of "how match force has the ball to have to fly X far" the question is "how match force must the kunai have to cut into the heart of the enemy from a distance of X" – and lastly stamina and strength training.
In the second year we will finally learn how to unlock our chakra pathways – this is an open A rank secret – and learn how to use it. Furthermore we will begin to learn the standard katas from Konohagakure and a few seldom held training's matches.
Not that I will participate in many of the things.
The first day didn't last long and was already finished after the explanation of our teacher. I was one of the first to leave the classroom as soon as the bell rung. For the rest of the day I simple wandered through Konoha's streets.
-line break-
Two hoers latter I saw Naruto sitting in Ichiraku and decided to join him. We do meet sometimes like this after the incident on his eighth birthday. Most of the times it's him who speaks about his pranks and I listen, but sometimes he speaks about his training and I help him with a few understanding problems that he sometimes has.
A simple example would be his pronunciation of chakra, as well the definition of it – at least the one you could find in the academy library.
I walked to a stool next to Naruto and sat down.
"Three bowls of miso please.
Only now did Naruto noticed me and began to study my appearance. I was again wearing my hood and face mask as such he couldn't immediately tell that it was me. To make it easier for him I removed my hood and mask.
"Hallo Naruto."
"Ah, hi Hiro-kun."
"Please no kun, simple Hiro is enough. I hate this suffix." – I truly do, I never know which I should use. (SG: same here)
"Haha sure." - He stared at me for a few seconds before he began to laugh shy and acknowledge it for the X time.
"And how do you like my new appearance?" – It was the first time he saw me in this pre genin uniform that I crated.
"Hmm, hmmm. Looks not bad, but nothing like a ninja should look like" – he finally said after studying me again for a few more seconds.
"As if you can speak about it. Nothing says more "Here attack me!" more than a neon orange jumpsuit."
"Hey orange is cool and if you didn't noticed I at least have the right footwear."
"Yea, as if I would ever wear such things."
"Bah, whatever. Far more important, which class are you?"
"1c, why?"
"Hmm 1c that's room 126, no?"
"Yea. And again why?"
"Oh nothing, have only to make sure that none of my pranks misfires and catches you."
"A yea that would be nice, if none of them would hit me."
My three bowls finally arrived. I took two bowls and placed the third on the free seat to my left. We keep quit while eating until Naruto again began to speak.
"Hey now that you joined the academy do you want to train with me?"
"Ah sorry but no, not before I open my chakra pathways, don't want to be beaten only because you can use it and I don't." – Even if I'm pretty sure I could beat him with a fist and a foot tied behind my back.
"Ah, chakra pathways, strange that I never had to unlock them." – Yea sure, if you have the furball in you, opening pathways isn't something you need. Even I have to suppress my chakra nowadays otherwise it may automatically open my pathways.
"Happens. I will go walk a little more around. See you later Naruto."
"Yea see you later Hiro."
After paying for the three bowls – of which only two I ate – I left Ichiraku and moved on.
-line break-
It was the next day that I stood before the shop that sells products exclusive for ninjas, the "Bladed Leaf". The smith there forged tools for chunin and higher and sells quality tools to all Konoha's ninja.
"Welcome to "Bladed Leaf" the place where every ninja finds a blade, how may I help?" – Was said by a rather muscular man after I entered the shop.
"Hello, I wanted to ask if I could be allowed to use the forge and sell a few of my creations via the shop."
"Hmm, catch." – The man looked at me for a few seconds and throws the forging hammer to me, which I catch rather easy.
"You have at least the strength to wield the hammer, but do you know how to smith?"
"Yes, I learned everything there is about smithing from a book."
"To read about something is not the same as to do it. Know what, here is a small ingot of iron, try to forge a kunai. I only just now finished heating the forge." – After saying his part he moved behind the front of the shop to the forge, leaving me and the small ingot of iron behind to follow.
We moved behind the shop where an open forge stood. The forge was already glowing and the smith waited for me to start. And so I began to forge a kunai, it wasn't anything hard, because it was still a metal I already worked with – even if it was in the void. The problem come from my body, while I have trained myself only to use as much strength as I need, I still didn't know how much I needed for forging.
It took me 25 minutes to forge a kunai, 20 minutes more than a perfect time would be.
"Huh, not bad. You technique is good, the only problem I see is that you look insecure about how hart you have to hit, but this is nothing a few hours on the forge couldn't fix." – He finally said after inspecting the kunai.
"But do say, why do you want to smith?"
"Ah, you see I like to create my own thing. The cloths I'm wearing are all self-made. And I want to be a shinobi in the future as such I will have to use weapons and tools of a ninja, and I want to make them myself." – I give him a true answer while showing off my cloths.
"Hm, they don't look like anything that is being sold in Konoha. … Wait a second, if you want to be a shinobi shouldn't you be in the academy at this time?" – He studied my cloths before remembering the time.
"Em. Yes, but there is a rule that allow one can skip class if you hold a score of 90% in all the tests."
"There was such a rule?"- He thought about it for a few second before speaking further - "Let's say you can use the forge, but you have to pay for the materials and have to pay a 10% tax for selling them here and this is only if they are good enough to be sold here. This all is under the condition that you never speak about this rule in front of my daughter. She is already the top kunoichi of her year and I don't want her to skip her classes."
"Sure, only one question, is the quality of the kunai good enough to be sold here?"
"Yea, while it was forged slowly, the quality of the kunai is rather good and can be sold here."
"Good, than I would like to know the price for iron ingots and for how much the kunai can be sold."
"At the moment the kilo iron is at 400 ryō, as for the normal kunai, it can be sold for 120 ryō."
400 ryō for a kilo, that would be ten kunai, 120 apiece makes 1200 ryō for ten kunai and minus 120 as selling tax makes a win of (1200 – 120 – 400) 780 ryō. If I increase the forging speed to near perfection of only 5 minutes apiece, I could make a profit of 936 ryō in an hour. (SG: 1 ryō = 10 yen = 0.09$ - 936 ryō = 84.24$)
And this is only with kunai. I could smith a few blades and sell them for a higher price or make unique weapons, never seen in konoha.
"Then I would like to buy 10 kilo iron and begin to work." – I was about to begin to forge again when I remembered something important.
"Ah, nearly forgot, the name is Yamanaka Hiro, nice to meet you."
"Akindo Kazuki, nice to meet you too."
And so I began to smith nearly eight hours a day for the next few weeks. It took me the first week to reach a speed of only 5 minutes to forge a kunai, after that the time only decreased by a second after every 20th kunai or so.
-line break-
It was six months after the beginning of the academy. I only visited it on Thursdays, because Thursday was the test day. We wrote every Thursday a test and on Friday the scores were announced. I had always a score of at least 98%, only 98% because there were sometimes questions that had no real answer and were graded to the teachers liking.
I was the best of the class, but that is nothing strange if you see that the next one on the list had only a score of 70+-5%. The funniest is that most of the students wouldn't even know who I am if it wouldn't be for the name Yamanaka and strange hair/eye color.
The reason for this is that I only entered the class a second before the test started – and I made it while being completely silent and nearly unseen – and left the room as soon as I finished – which normally didn't took longer than 10 minutes.
But the most progress was made in "Bladed Leaf". Three months after beginning to work there, Kazuki had announced me as an anonym adept smith nearing master level. After that I had a few orders for new chunin. Thanks to that I made enough money to begin to work with chakra molding materials – they were at least 10 times more expensive than the normal once.
This materials where completely new to me – even if I had read about them before- as such I had to experiment with them before I could make something more complex than a kunai.
It took me two months of testing until I could say that I know all attributes of the new materials. After that I began to produce a few weapons for high chunin and johnin. Kazuki said that I had already reached master level – the youngest master smith in history.
He wanted to announce it and throw a party. I had to ask him multiple times to keep my identity a secret and that included not having the party. He finally agreed under the condition that I begin to mark my creations.
It took me long to decide how I should mark my blades and then I had an inspiration. I decided to do something with my Fūinjutsu. It would be the first time my Fūinjutsu sees this world and while a normal weapon would be slowly destroyed if inscribed with a seal, chakra molding metals can hold a seal with easy even more so the kind I planned to do.
The seal that I had in mind will brand the blade with a name the user chooses. Normally a user names his blade after the first blood is drawn, most of the time the blood of the user. And this seal shall brand this name on the blade as if it was always there. After that the seal will lose any effect and be my mark.
It took me three weeks to write a perfect seal, reason being that I had to make sure it could brand everything the user wanted on the blade. At the end I made it so that the seal takes the thoughts of the user and brand them on the blade – means even symbols and the likes where possible.
The finished seal was 134 lines long and 13 lines where there to shrink the seal and let it take on the desired form. As for the form I decided to go with my clothing theme and chose the basic assassin crest only this one with the "Mjölnir" hammer symbol inside the crest.
And so began the legend of the masters smith of konoha, until now only the ninjas of konoha know about him, but that will change in the future.
As for me, I decided to take on the assassin crest after I graduated as a genin – my pre gening cloths didn't had the crest on them. Until then I will make myself a name under this crest. At the end the Assassin's Ceed can be as good used as a nindō for a ninja.
SG: First of all, tanks you all for the positive reviews. I took the last few to heart and decided to decrease the story's speed. I will still make many time jumps until the graduation as a genin, but this one will only be months long and will show more about the changes that Hiro creates on the Konoha 12 and other Naruto characters. As such the academy arc will be more then the at the beginning planed two chapters and may take a little bit longer to wright because I have to rethink a few things.
(SPOILER)
Now to this chapter
I looked everywhere but couldn't find the name of the shop where Tenten worked and nothing about her adoptive parents, as such I had to come up with something (and I'm bad at naming) and named the shop "Bladed Leaf". It was a name that I belief would fit into the Hidden Leaf Village. As for Akindo Kazuki ... lets better not speak about that.
But what I do want to say with that is that I'm sorry if there are true names for the shop or the adoptive father of Tenten. (And that you shouldn't expect unique and original names from me).
Ah and before I forged, should I include Assassin's Creed into the categories of this story if I continue to use so many references to it?