Kakashi found himself feeling paranoid. It had been nearly a week since they'd arrived, and nothing of note had happened. Sure, that in and of itself was a good thing, since something happening usually meant that they were being attacked, but Kakashi couldn't help but shake the feeling that this was the calm before the storm. Strangely, however, he was almost the only one who seemed to think that way. Save for Naruto, who had become strangely distant and untalkative since they'd arrived, a generally good mood had materialized in just about everyone except him.

And by "everyone," he meant literally everyone. The whole town, despite the constant oppression, lack of food, lack of money, and lack of opportunity, was buzzing with excitement. That too was a good thing, except that it seemed unnatural to Kakashi. The jōnin had no idea how to explain his observations, other than that it seemed artificial. Like someone was saying smile, or else.

And when no attack had come by the sixth day, Kakashi left a shadow clone to train his three students and went out into the town. If trouble wasn't going to come and find them, he'd go looking for trouble, just so that they could avoid it.

What he didn't expect to see was a giant. Brown hair, nearly glowing red eyes with vertical slit pupils, looked to be about twenty five, and bore an almost familial resemblance to Naruto — he matched Tazuna's description exactly, and, more importantly, he matched the description in his Person-Of-Interest file that Kakashi had been briefed on. On the giant's back, there was a man-sized bag, that, despite how heavy it looked, the giant was carrying without apparent strain.

Considering that nothing was known about the man other than that he was a smooth-talking thief who might be able to use chakra and was apparently not affiliated with any village, Konoha wanted information. And so, doing what he was instructed to do, Kakashi started looking for information. In this case, that simply meant walking up to him and saying hello.

Stepping out in front of the giant, Kakashi said, "You know, my client told me about a man who looked an awful lot like you." For an instant, Kakashi thought he'd seen the man look surprised. "You wouldn't happen to be the man they call 'Oni-sama,' would you?"

The giant chuckled, laughing deeply in a way that reminded Kakashi of Naruto. "Only when I'm in a partying mood, Shinobi-san. 'Oni-san' or 'Akuma-san,' call me whichever you like. But you have me at a disadvantage; you know me, but I know neither you nor your client. Perhaps he is a friend?"

"The bridge builder, Tazuna-san," Kakashi replied.

"Tazuna, Tazuna... Old guy with glasses? We met, once upon a time. I helped him out, gave him a little gift. How is he doing? Well, I'd hope," Akuma replied.

"Yes, though he told me he wanted to talk to you. Actually, it was about that gift you gave him," Kakashi replied.

"No, don't tell me, he spent it all on sake and wants more? The nerve!" Akuma shook his head dramatically, but his grin gave his remark away for what it was: a joke. "No, but in all seriousness, I was actually heading to the bridge. I know how much it means to these people, and I wanted to give the crew something to bless it with." He reached back and whacked his bag, which made a duller thud than Kakashi was expecting. "I figured it would give them a little more motivation."

"Ah, then I guess I'll walk with you, Akuma-san."

"Wonderful, Shinobi-san. I would love a traveling companion." Akuma started walking at a pace that was slow for him, but easy enough for a normally-sized person to match. Kakashi positioned himself a comfortable distance away, walking mostly beside, but slightly behind, Akuma. "Hey, Shinobi-san..."

"Hm?"

"You're from the Leaf, right? What's it like there? I've been wondering if I should visit."

Kakashi realized that his traveling companion was probing for information as well. A trade for a trade, he realized the game was to be. "It's a beautiful village, much nicer than, say, Iwa or Kumo. The people are pleasant too. Just mind the children, they tend to play in the streets and lay pranks. What, is there something you'd want to see there?"

"Not what, who. The ninja."

"The ninja?" Kakashi echoed.

Akuma nodded. "Yes. I've always been fascinated with what they can do. It's like magic! Breathing fire, walking on water... Can you do that sort of thing?"

"Perhaps. But there's more to being a ninja than ninjutsu... breathing fire and such. It takes years of hard work and discipline, and it's a very dangerous lifestyle. At times, we have to do some very ugly things," Kakashi replied.

"I know," Akuma said morosely. "I haven't got the right attitude for it; I'm too much of a free-spirit to take orders, and a bit too old to begin training."

"Have you never been trained? You walk like someone who knows their way in a fight, Akuma-san, and you're built like a fighter."

"You flatter me, Shinobi-san, but I only brawl, nothing so elegant as a proper fight."

"You interested? I could spar with you, maybe give you some tips. Or, you could spar with my genin students; they are in need of a challenge," Kakashi offered. If the man accepted, it would give him a chance to judge his fighting ability.

Akuma laughed. "No, no. I haven't got the time. There are places I need to be, things I need to do, and most importantly, people I need to be with. I just picked up this boy, Haku, who just lost his master. Without Zabuza, he feels he has no purpose in life; I stopped him from killing himself and talked some sense into him." Akuma paused mid-stride. "At least, I hope I did. He'd better still be alive when I get back. Damn..."

The two of them fell into silence, walking towards the bridge together. Neither spoke again until the bridge was in sight, at which point Akuma broke out into a run. "Tazuna-san? Hey, does anybody know where Tazuna-san is?"

"Why do you want to know?" a construction worker asked.

"I brought the bridge crew a gift, and I remembered that Tazuna-san is in charge. I wanted to give it to him. Tell him it's from 'Oni-sama;' I think he'll remember me."

"Oni-sama?" "It is him!" "Hey, it's Oni-sama!" "Oni-sama's back!" The murmurs quickly grew into shouts. "Go get Tazuna!" "Tazuna-san!"

The man in question made his way down the length of the bridge, drawn by the commotion. "What is — Oni-sama?"

"Hello, Tazuna-san. I brought you something." Akuma pulled the bag off his shoulder and threw it forcefully on the ground.

"I... Oni-sama, I cannot accept your generosity. The last gift you gave us, the money was stolen by Gatō merely days after you gave it to us. I am so sorry that we couldn't protect it better."

"Oh, I know. That's why I got you this instead." Akuma kicked the weighty bag, sliding it to Tazuna's feet. "You'll also probably want this." From the sleeve of his cloak, he withdrew a slightly-damaged dagger and, holding it by the blade, handed it to Tazuna.

"Wha... what's this for?"

"If you've ever lost someone precious to you, you'll know what to do." And with one fluid movement, Akuma ripped off the bag, revealing the object within. Or, more accurately, the person within: Gatō. Bound, gagged, and horribly bruised, the yakuza boss was still very much alive.

Tazuna's knife clattered to the ground, shock overwhelming is features. "Gatō..." He stepped back once, then twice.

The murmuring started. Akuma picked up the knife and held it out to Tazuna. "You dropped this." When he didn't take the blade, Akuma turned to the rest of the men on this bridge. "Listen! This is Gatō, bound and helpless! This is the man that has crushed your freedom and killed your family. Here he is, bound and helpless. Here I stand, offering you a knife. Will any of you take this blade, and take back your freedom?"

Nobody moved, not at first. Then, one furious man came forward. "Gatō, this is really him?" Akuma nodded, and barely a second later, the man snatched up the blade. "This is for my wife and son, you sick fuck!"

The blade fell, blood ran, and as if a spell was broken, the crowd roared. The crowd, now a furious mob, surged forward to beat the helpless, bleeding crime lord to death.

As it happened, Akuma simply backed away and slipped out of the mob. The moment Kakashi's back was turned, Naruto's clone shunshined away.

Kakashi wondered what was happening. The main threat to their client was dead, so that was good. But that wasn't what he was interested in. No, Kakashi was interested in the fact that the hired thugs were slowly vanishing. If they'd stopped being paid, as the sudden return of trade and decline of violence suggested, they would have either left entirely or looted what they could. Yet, if someone else had taken charge, the yakuza would still be oppressing the people. Neither had happened.

Unfortunately, they had no time to investigate; their mission was officially at its end, meaning that they had to return home. Kakashi's curiosity was piqued, and leaving it unsatisfied. His team seemed happy, though. Their first C (turned A) rank was done.

They crossed the now completed Nami's Vengeance Bridge, named for obvious reasons. When they reached the other side, however, the man Kakashi had been hoping to meet again was waiting there. "Yo, Shinobi-san. These your students?"

"Akuma-san."

"You two know each other?" Sakura asked.

"In a way. Shinobi-san didn't tell me his name, Pink-chan," Akuma replied. "Although, as it happens, I do know the blondie."

"You do?" Naruto, in his human form, replied. He found it weird to talk to himself in two different personas.

"Well, know of you, cousin. Say hello to Kurama-jisan for me, Namikaze-kun."

"Cousin?" Naruto and Sakura exclaimed. Sasuke looked intrigued.

"Yep. Wasn't able to confirm the rumors that you even existed until recently, and I had no idea if I'd ever meet you. But here you are!" Akuma closed the gap between them, picked up the human-form Naruto, and hugged him, which felt really weird in their single mind. He was on both sides of the hug, and he could feel his own chakra from an outside perspective. It was warm.

Akuma set his creator down on the ground, then tussled his hair. "I can already tell you're stronger than me, squirt. Be an excellent ninja, or be an excellent demon." Then, he turned and started walking the other way across the bridge. "Later! I've got a party to go to!"

The giant suddenly broke out into a run, faster than most ordinary people could move. As the wind blew his cloak, Kakashi and the rest of team seven saw a club-tipped tail wag back and forth. "Huh. I have a cousin," Naruto remarked.

"He seemed nice," Sakura remarked.

"I thought so too, when I first met him," Kakashi replied. "Then he dumped the broken body of Gatō in front of the very people he tormented. But he did say he stopped a guy from killing himself out of grief. So... bittersweet?"

"And they bought it?" Kurama asked, thoroughly amused.

Naruto, whose consciousness was currently predominantly in Akuma, chuckled. "Hook, line, and sinker." He lifted up another thug to his mouth and drank. Most of Gatō's men were in a stupor, intoxicated by both drink and by jutsu, so they hardly cared about Akuma "downsizing" the group he'd "inherited" from Gatō, even when he did it right in front of them. "Humans can be so stupid sometimes."

Akuma had found Gatō on the first day he'd gone looking; the man wasn't particularly hard to find. Days two through six, he'd spent them drilling the man for everything from bank accounts to hidden caches, which he'd "liberated" from the yakuza boss soon after. Much of that money would find its way back into the economy of Wave, though some of it had been hidden in a scroll he'd passed to his original during their hug.

"Not 'can be.' They are stupid."

Kurama, of course, was amused by the whole venture. He'd offered the idea 'take over a country' to Naruto, and then left the actual execution up to his son, aside from the occasional advice. In the short time his team had been there, including the week or so after the death of Gatō, he'd been integrating himself into the populace. They saw him as something of a hero, a bringer of justice. Between that, the legitimate businesses signed over to him, and the control he'd seized in the local yakuza, Naruto was basically in the same position Gatō was in.

"Not all of them are stupid."

That said, he wasn't about to fall for the same mistakes Gatō had made. From his experiments in the past, he knew that happy people were much more compliant, and if he could make them happy through natural ways, they'd love him even if, for some reason, his powers failed him.

"Maybe, but even that Haku of yours had his stupid moment. Smart people don't try and kill themselves."

Akuma looked over at Haku, who was happily reading a book, despite the carnage happening around him. Akuma had met the young mercenary ninja when Kurama lead him to the boy's because of his extreme grief. What Naruto hadn't known was that his his depression and his belief in being "only a tool" made Haku extremely susceptible to Naruto's more complex manipulations. A simple offer of work and a single dose of happiness and hope had the boy latch onto Akuma fiercely. By the third dose, which should have only left a sense of vague kinship that would fade quickly, Haku was willing to strip for them. Naruto hadn't even manipulated the boy's lust or love.

"But we can agree that Haku wasn't, isn't, in his right mind."

Despite his talk, his suggestions that he could and would bed anything that moved, Haku's zealous devotion had scared him off. Perhaps, when the grief of Zabuza's death wasn't so fresh, Naruto-as-Akuma would let the boy sleep with him, but for now, it was a solid no.

"True. Maybe he'd get in his right mind if you actually slept with him, though. He's begging you, Kit."

"Kurama, no."

"Why? All those people whose emotions you twisted until they couldn't say no didn't bother you, so why should he?"

"Kurama..."

"I don't get you, Kit. Ninja are the only people on the planet where the rape of enemies for fun and profit is not only legal, but encouraged by your leadership. There are shinobi and kunoichi who have killed with their genitals alone."

"Really? Huh..."

And so began the reign of Akuma, yakuza boss, hero of wave, and man-eating demon. For thirteen year old Naruto Namikaze, life was taking its turn for the weird.

Kakashi was making his detailed report alone.

The primary report, done earlier, had been signed as accurate by the three genin, who had been paid accordingly. Since the mission rank had gone up, Minato paid his son that of an A-rank, but then docked the original C-rank's pay. That still was a sizeable sum of money, both in what he'd gained and what he'd lost. It was also a drop in the bucket compared to Naruto's personal funds now, but the Hokage didn't know and didn't need to know that.

After the primary report, Kakashi had cashed Zabuza's head into the bounty office, and had made several million ryō for his efforts. Since Naruto had been the one to disarm Zabuza, at risk to himself, Kakashi had shared a portion of that money too. Naruto had left two million ryō richer, and quite happy.

But now Kakashi was reporting all the little details. He'd done his written report that included everything he could remember, plus all of his speculations, but now he was telling that to his former sensei and current boss.

"Sir, on day six of the assignment, I departed Tazuna's residence after having left a shadow clone proxy. I was acting on a hunch, based upon available information, that the enemy may have been preparing something. Scouting through the town, I found no evidence of such, but I did run into a person of interest, codename: 'Party Demon.' He matches his description perfectly, though I add that he also possesses a tail and small horns that are mostly hidden under his hat. As we were both in public and he was displaying no aggressiveness or hostility, I approached and initiated contact. He identified himself as both 'Oni-san' and 'Akuma-san.' The locals used the former, along with the honorific 'sama,' while I chose to use 'Akuma-san.'

"The POI remained friendly, and expressed a desire to visit Konohagakure, as well as hinting at being well traveled. He expressed an interest in our ninja, specifically ninjutsu, but admitted that he was beyond the age of shinobi training. Curious, I attempted to gauge his chakra reserves, though I could not seem to get a solid grasp on his strength. It had notable similarities to your son's own demonic chakra, though it was far more turbulent. I can best describe it as a mixture of chakras fighting one another. This was apparently normal to him, as he showed absolutely no discomfort. I then remarked on his movement, which was remarkably fluid. He described himself as a 'brawler,' not a 'fighter,' suggesting that he has no formal combat experience.

"Another thing he'd mentioned is that he was now in the company of one 'Haku,' male. Haku was apparently the companion of Zabuza, and was distraught by Zabuza's death. The POI claims to have prevented Haku's suicide, but then wondered if Haku had tried again during the course of our conversation. The continued survival of Haku remains unknown, and assuming that Haku is alive, the continued companionship of the two is not guaranteed.

"We had been traveling to the bridge. Upon our arrival, he was greeted pleasantly by the crew, having apparently brought them a 'gift' before. According to Tazuna, the gift was money. The later loss of the money by the people of Wave did not seem to bother him at all; in actuality, he'd already known. He revealed that the bag he'd been carrying contained none other than Gatō himself. Due to his own presence, I hadn't even realized Gatō was in the bag."

Here, the Hokage interrupted him. "What condition was Gatō in?"

"Bruised. Likely several bones were broken. His limbs and mouth were bound. Almost immediately upon Gatō's reveal, he encouraged the bridge builders to attack the man, offering them a knife with which to stab Gatō. The POI disappeared during the confusion.

"Later, on day thirteen, post mission-completion, we, as in all of team seven, encountered the POI again. We talked briefly, where he revealed that he was Naruto Namikaze's cousin, related by 'Kurama-jisan.' Whether or not this was a figurative or real relationship was unknown. According to the POI, this meeting was entirely unintentional. He briefly hugged Naruto, and then wished Naruto well, before he ran back to Wave across the bridge. That was the end of our encounters with 'Akuma-san.'"

Minato rubbed his chin as he digested the information. "Did you happen to get a chance to use your sharingan on him?"

"No, Hokage-sama."

"And he used no jutsu?"

"As far as I could tell, none at all."

"Did he use any chakra at all?"

"I believe he can enhance his speed with chakra, but to what degree, I am unsure. I believe he might be capable of a shunshin-like technique."

"And finally, is there anything else to report?" Minato asked. Kakashi explained his observations with the disappearing thugs. Minato listened without commenting. When the jōnin was done, Minato said, "Thank you, Kakashi. Please take a copy of your report to the Intelligence office when you leave. Now, off the record, how was Naruto?"

"Immature, at first, but as the mission wore on, he became more serious and more withdrawn. He spaced out a lot, but only to the point that it took a single word to get him to refocus. However, he was competent in his duties and never zoned out while on guard. I think it was just being out of the village for the first time getting to him. Sasuke and Sakura both also mellowed out, so I don't think it's anything to worry about."

"Thank you, Kakashi."

The mattress and bed frame were custom made. That is, the frame was two normal frames hacked apart and nailed together, while the two mattresses were shoved together length-wise. The wood scraps, along with a few other boards, were used to hold up the middle. The bed, as large as it was, had to be shoved up against the wall for there to be any floor space in the room. But such measures were necessary; the bedroom, which had once belonged to Gatō, now officially belonged to Akuma.

One would think that a shadow clone or a chakra construct wouldn't need sleep, and they'd be right. However, Akuma had devoured so many people recently that he'd completely filled himself up. His healing factor, which apparently worked on clones as well, had taken the material he'd consumed and built a body in his image, the image of Akuma. When the clone tried to drop the henge, the chakra dispelled... and that was it. His face didn't change. It was Akuma.

"Of course," Kurama explained. "It's obvious in retrospect. You're a demon, a chakra being. That you have a physical body is just a bonus. Your powers and base form are defined by your soul, but the details are defined by your mind. You held the transformed clone for so long, it became a part of you. You could probably reclaim it and its power if you killed it, or you could transfer completely if it killed your original body. But for now, you have a new body, and if I'm not mistaken, it's a variant of the rinnegan path body."

The upside to it being physical was that it took less chakra effort to do anything with it, as there were nerves, muscles, and bones supporting it. The downside was that it now needed food, water, and sleep. Not that that was a bad thing; all three of those were pleasant things. However, the need for actual sleep lead to the interesting situation he found himself in now.

As he drifted into consciousness, Naruto felt a very solid weight on Akuma's chest. He cracked open the crimson eyes. Haku. The young hyōton user was curled up on his chest, using his bare pecs as a pillow. His hips were just above Akuma's groin, and with his legs spread out as they were, were they vertical, Haku would have been straddling Akuma's morning wood. Meanwhile, Haku's left foot was playing with the demon's tail, hinting that the human was far more awake than his appearance suggested.

They were also both naked. That was normal for Naruto, in either body. Haku, not so much. The Yuki boy had always slept in his clothes, as far as Naruto had seen. This, this was different. "Haku."

"Morning, Master."

That was also new. "Master, Haku? Since when am I 'Master?'"

Haku tried to bury himself further into the mass of muscle that was Akuma. His hips twitched, causing him to grind into Akuma's engorged member. "You've been Master for a while now, Akuma-sama. I just didn't quite realize it until last night. You make me feel safe."

Laughter rumbled out of his chest, causing the smallest of the pair to bounce. "Haku, the boy who feels safe in the company of demons."

"I suppose you're right. But unlike Zabuza, you have yet to push me away."

Naruto sighed with both of his bodies. Akuma's tail curled up and around Haku, while his arms followed suit. Grabbing his butt, Akuma slid Haku up so that their faces were next to each other. "Haku, you seek purpose?" A whispered yes drifted into his ear. "Then, as a person, I ask you to be my tool in my quest for as long as you like. I ask you to share my purpose."

"Yes~"

"Good, Haku. Very good."