Chapter 4 – Scouting and Questions

See disclaimers on prologue.

Read and review! Constructive criticism is welcome! BETA NEEDED!

" " – human speech/writing

' ' – human thought

' ' – demon thought

" " – demon speech

A month passed, and Naruto was progressing under Obscuro's tutelage. Under its guidance, the young Uzumaki was becoming more and more proficient in several different aspects of the shadow-demon's teachings. In rituals, he had managed to memorize most of the symbols and shape-matrixes inside the notebook that he was given. He had even managed to draw some basic rituals based on words alone. Yet, he hadn't done an actual ritual yet. For all of the knowledge that he acquired, Naruto was denied the chance to perform what he was learning. This was the subject that Naruto and Obscuro were discussing one evening.

Naruto was reciting the meaning of each shape-matrix when the thought occurred to him. He looked at the board while still keeping a hand on his notes and asked "Hey, why haven't we done any rituals yet?" Obscuro (still in invisible-chalk form) simply wrote back "You aren't ready. Recite the meaning of a nonagram-matrix." Naruto let out a huff and started to recite "Nonagram matrixes are used mainly for illusions and barriers, and can cover large areas with ease. But what do you mean I'm not ready? I've been practicing for weeks and I know all of the symbols. Why can't I – ouch!" he yelled as he felt a forehead flick. He shook his head and saw the new message "Breathe. Focus like I trained you."

Naruto closed his eyes and began taking deep breaths. In. Out. In. Out. After several repetitions, he opened his eyes and asked again in a calmer tone "Why can't I perform a ritual yet?" Obscuro wrote back "Think. I have taught you to use your brain better. What have I not taught you yet?" The blonde scratched his chin in contemplation for a moment when his eyes widened in realization "Life-force. I don't know how to use life-force yet."

The board now said "Correct. You have not learnt how to use your life-force. This is merely a process that even ninjas take. First theoretical, then practical. If I just told you to perform a ritual now, it wouldn't work." Naruto looked away with a slight blush on his cheeks and mumbled "Yeah. Sorry." Obscuro simply wrote "Irrelevant. Now, how is your progression with Latin?"

At this Naruto perked up and replied enthusiastically "It's going great! It's a bit different than this language, but it's really fun! It's a bit like hiragana in the fact that each letter makes a sound, and combining letters- therefore sounds – will make a word. Kanji is more like a pictogram language than this." In reply, Obscuro wrote back "Astute observation. Translate this: The river waters the forest and the forest covers the mountain." Naruto rubbed his forehead for a moment before replying "De fulminae aquae in silva et silva operire montem." (1)

Obscuro levitated the eraser and tapped it against the board thrice. It then wrote "Correct, but you must say it clearly without accent. Now, let's move to the living room. Time for weapons training." Naruto proceeded to groan. While he was initially excited at the prospect, he soon discovered that Obscuro was a slave driver when it came to weapons. Naruto got up from the chair and grabbed a pair of wooden training daggers on his way out. The daggers' blade length was a bit longer than an outstretched hand. At the hilt of each dagger a thin but strong cord was attached. When Naruto first saw the weapons, he asked "Why daggers?" Obscuro wrote back "They are light, easy to wield and they will suit my teachings. I will give you real ones when you are ready." Naruto raised a questioning eyebrow at that last statement, but he didn't question the shadow demon.

Obscuro had an unusual training method for Naruto. He would use the shadows in the living room to create a shadow dummy that he would control. The dummy was armed with different weapons on each spar, but most of the time it was armed with a copy of Naruto's daggers in order to teach him. This was to ensure that the Uzumaki was prepared to fight against most, if not any, weapon that would be thrown at him. (2)

After an exhausting fight, Naruto sprawled himself on the couch. For a demon, Obscuro knew how to fight like a human pretty damn well. The shadow-demon was very fast and ruthless in its fighting style and barely gave Naruto any chance to breathe. Obscuro constantly was on the offensive while performing feints and surprise attacks at any given chance. Obscuro's reasoning for this was: "If you feel how the attack hurts, you will know how to perform it." (Un)fortunately for Naruto, that tactic seemed to work.

Naruto was panting on the couch when he felt another piece of paper hit him. He opened it up and it read: "Take a break for an hour. Take the notebook. After that, we're going out." Naruto simply grunted in exhaustion and, with some difficulty, went up to his room.

He got to his room and sprawled himself on the bed, looking at its cover. After a few seconds, he started flipping through the notebook. As he flipped through it, thoughts started to creep in his head. One of them was 'Can I trust Obscuro?'

Due to his rather harsh years growing up, Naruto grew up with a strong sense of paranoia and alertness. He would use those senses to avoid a lot of scuffles with the villagers and to steal food. He had several occasions where people tried to act nice to him just to try and kill him, and he even fell for it the first time, but this paranoia didn't seem to act up whenever Obscuro was around. While this normally meant that Naruto could trust the shadow-demon, he still couldn't get the lingering feeling out of his head.

'Why would he do this much for me? He said he found me interesting but that can't be the only reason. Not that I'm complaining, but something still seems off' Naruto thought. He then looked out his window and saw what seemed to be floating stones burying themselves in the ground around the house. Behind one stone he recognized Obscuro's tell-tale shadow. It took a few seconds, but Naruto realized what Obscuro was doing, at least partially. "A ritual…" he muttered "But what?"

-Obscuro-

Just like Naruto predicted, Obscuro was performing a ritual. It had planned on doing this for some time now but it either was teaching Naruto or doing surveillance around the village. The reason it chose to do it now was because something caught its attention a week ago.

When it was out watching the forest, it noticed two groups of ninja near the border of the house. One of them were those ANBU ninja that he had seen tailing the boy. The ones named Weasel and Cat were there too. Obscuro knew that they were here on the orders of the Hokage. The other group however was strange. They looked like ANBU but their masks were blank and a small kanji was written on their lower cheeks. The kanji for 'Root'.

This made Obscuro suspicious, as the 'Root' ninja avoided the ANBU group and when they withdrew, the 'Root' group headed in a different direction than the ANBU. It followed them to their base, which was apparently underground, and saw them kneeling before the bandaged old human it had seen at the council meeting a month ago.

The old human looked upon the ninjas and commanded ''Root, report.'' One of them looked up at the old human and replied in an emotionless tone "Yes, Danzo-sama. We have tracked the ANBU to the jinchuuriki's hiding spot. The hiding spot seems to be a large house of sorts, abandoned by the looks of it." The old hum – Danzo nodded and asked "What else?" The ninja replied "It seems that past a certain point, it seemed as though someone was watching us, and it wasn't the ANBU. It was like eyes were looking at us in every direction." Danzo hummed in response. After a minute of thinking, he looked back down at the Root ninja and said "Keep the surveillance but keep your distance as well. When the time is right, we strike."

With those words, Obscuro knew that it had to prepare a defence on the house. The essence that it left around the house grounds won't be enough. It had to up its game.

So the shadow-demon started the ritual right after. It took a little while, but it managed to carve a complicated ritual circle underneath the house. Deep enough for it took to take effect and deep enough so that the house won't collapse in on itself. What the ritual does is it takes a bit of the caster's life force and uses it as a shield that prevents anyone but the caster or anyone that the caster permits (via blood sample) to enter. The second function of the ritual was that by leaving the caster's essence in the circle, it will act as a retaliation system that will harm and even kill anyone who tries to force their way in by using the caster's essence as a layout. In this case, should any unfortunate soul try to attack the house, an imitation of Obscuro's shadow tendrils will lash out and either deflect or kill the attacker. The third and final part of the matrix was the reason why it was so dangerous: every time blood is shed on the grounds of the house, it will be absorbed into the ritual circle and strengthen it. Like a flytrap. The stones that Naruto saw were anchor points for the shape matrix; burying them would enhance the protection and protect the circle itself from destabilizing. (3)

One thing that should be noted is that if Naruto was to perform this ritual, he would need stimuli to properly activate it. This is another difference between Obscuro and Naruto's ritual casting. As a demon, Obscuro can simply filter parts of its life-force onto the shape matrix as a replacement for the stimuli, as well as carving out circles in much less time.

An hour passed since Obscuro started, and it needed one final part to the ritual: Naruto's blood. As mentioned before, it was necessary if he was to enter the house.

It slithered quickly up to Naruto's room where the demon saw the boy looking out his window in concentration and writing in his notebook. Obscuro inwardly smirked. 'Good. It would do well for him to learn outside of lesson hours.' The demon took a pebble and threw it at Naruto's back. Naruto yelped and abruptly turned around with an irritated glare "Can 't you just tap me on the shoulder or say something?" Obscuro simply withdrew a small board with chalk from its shadowy form and wrote down: "I cannot speak and this gets your attention better."

At this comment Naruto grumbled and raised an eyebrow. He then sighed and asked "Follow?" Obscuro wrote back "Yes."

Naruto and Obscuro left the house. As they were about to head for the forest, Obscuro scratched Naruto's arm. The jinchuuriki looked down to see that a small amount of blood was seeping from a cut in his arm and forming into a ball. The ball then floated to one of the buried stone markers and floated down and vanished into to the earth. About 3 seconds after that, a bright red circle glowed around the house before vanishing. Naruto looked in shock before stammering "W-what happened?" The shadow demon simply picked up a stick and wrote down on the earth "Protection. Let's go." Naruto blinked and replied in a meek voice "S-sure."

The pair then walked (or in Obscuro's case, slithered) towards the village. As they started to approach the back alleys, the shadow-demon pushed a note and a map into Naruto's hand. The boy opened the note and read out-loud: "We are going to get some ingredients. After that, there is something I wish to ask you." Naruto then opened the map and saw it was a map of Konoha with a few stores marked in red, with a list of items near each of them. The closest one to him was the pharmacy, which was just around the corner.

The duo approached the store and stuck to the shadows to not be seen by the villagers. Obscuro took notice of the boy looking around, his dangers senses fully active. But while they were good for a human, nothing can escape a shadow-demon…

-Obscuro-

Naruto was looking out for any passer-by's, when suddenly he felt something cold and heavy drape over his back and eyes and tried to yell "Hey-" Then he fell silent.

He felt as though he was being hollowed out and refilled at the same time, while winds buffeted his sides. In his mind, he was screaming in fright 'what are you doing!? Let go!' He tried to keep struggling, when suddenly he felt a strong flick on his forehead. This action told Naruto everything. "Obscuro…? Why…?" He was about to ask more when his eyes were forced open.

He found himself standing in the exact same spot as before, but as he looked down, the blond saw what happened.

His hands were encased in the same shadowy substance that Obscuro was made of. His fingers looked like claws and so did his feet. He turned around, and saw that a black, demonic cape fluttered behind him as though it had a mind of its own. All in all, it creeped Naruto out, but what was even creepier was the constant feeling of gusts at his back and the whispering. Quiet, snake-like whispering that seemed to surround him.

He gulped and asked in a nervous voice "O-Obscuro, what is this?" For a few seconds nothing happened, when another surprise struck Naruto.

He saw an image play out in his head where he saw himself pressing on the shadowy side of the building and suddenly melting into its shadow. For a moment the blond couldn't even see himself, but then he saw his cloaked form rise out of a shadow from behind. Then the image was gone.

Naruto shook his head to regain his senses and looked at the building's shadow. He then thought in realization 'Can I…?' He slowly walked over to the shadow, and

pressed himself against it. What happened next though, shouldn't have surprised him.

He felt himself sinking into the wall.

Well, calling it 'sinking' wouldn't be entirely accurate. It would be more accurate to call it being spread out, stretched, and then being sucked into a vortex, with a little bit of sinking for extra. This combination of unpleasant sensations was what Naruto experienced as he went into the wall. 'Ugh, that's nasty' Naruto thought as he tried to regain his senses. When he adjusted his eyesight, he yelped out in shock.

Instead of seeing the street, he saw that everything turned red and black. The shadows from the building looked like smoking black pools. A villager passed by and to Naruto, it was as though he was glowing red, with the same black pool at the bottom of his legs, following him as he walked by. The sky flickered with red and black, and the buildings themselves were lined with black shadows that danced around in frenzy, as though a constant wind was blowing.

Naruto looked around in awe and fear. It was as though the whole world was made of shadow. Then, a thought crept into his head 'is this how Obscuro always sees things? I don't think I would be able to handle it like this.' Naruto then felt another forehead flick. 'The store. Right.'

Naruto looked into the store and saw several shelves of items. He couldn't see what the items were, but there was a large shadow from the shelves, hidden from the storeowner's sight. Naruto then focused onto the shadow and he imagined himself popping out of it.

The blond then saw himself under said shadow. Acting quickly, he pushed against the shadow pool trying to get out. The shadow felt like tar and water and Naruto nearly lost his hold, but he managed to push himself through the shadow and into the store.

Blinking and trying to regain his balance, he saw that he was standing in an aisle with the same shelf he saw before. He turned around to look at the aisle, but nearly jumped back in surprise at what he saw. Reflected off a glass pane, the young Uzumaki saw himself cloaked in the same shadows he saw outside the store, but his head was what surprised him. It was as if a smaller version of Obscuro's head was attached to his head like a mask, with only his blue eyes peeking through the eyeholes. He looked closer, before whispering out: "Cool."

He opened the map in his hands and took a look at the list. He spoke in a low tone "Ok, first, I'm gonna need some sumac leaves…"

Naruto then began picking out and carefully taking the items on the list. Whenever he picked up one, the item disappeared into his 'shadow-cloak', as he called it. He then looked up at the last item on the list, a lighter. The blond started scouring the aisles carefully trying to find one. After a minute of searching, he found one, but the supply was located right above the shopkeeper's head. Said shopkeeper was lazily reading a newspaper.

Naruto recognized the shopkeeper from one of the mobs that chased him when he was younger. He had to get that lighter, but he didn't know how to do so without alerting him. Then, the blond saw another image play out in his head: He saw himself raising a finger and a small tendril of shadow grabbed a lighter from the shelf before receding back.

Having already experienced this, Naruto imitated what was shown to him. He raised a finger and focused on the shadow that was under the lighter's shelf. As he focused, Naruto saw that a tendril started to slowly form and wrap around the lighter. The blond narrowed his eyes in concentration as he tried to lift the lighter back up into the shelf floor. But there was a rustling of paper and the shopkeeper turned in his seat.

The blond lost his concentration for a brief moment and the lighter nearly slipped from the tendril's grasp. Naruto took a deep breath, silently thanking whoever was up there for avoiding a potential catastrophe. He tried again, and this time managed to pull the lighter into the shadow. He then headed to the back aisle and pressed against the shadows.

After experiencing the maelstrom of unpleasant sensations once more, Naruto found himself in the alley in which he started. He then pulled out the map and said in resignation "On to the next one…"

Every store Naruto would reach, he repeated the same process: shadow-travelled to the back of the store, acquire the items and exit unnoticed. Thankfully, there were no other situations like the one with the lighter.

More than an hour later, the blond slumped down in exhaustion and dizziness at a shadowy alley. "Man" he said "I do not want to do that again. The shadow-thing makes me sick." He wiped his forehead and looked around. The alley was relatively clean. Out of the corner of his eye, he heard the sounds of fighting on its end. Curious, the young Uzumaki crept to the alley's opening and saw a building with a large courtyard, where two older children seemed to be fighting one another with other children watching them along with an adult. He remembered then that this was the Ninja Academy.

He was about to turn back, when he felt the shadow-cloak slide off him. He looked back and saw the demonic form of Obscuro materializing out of the ground, instead of its usual shadowy impression. The shadow-demon pulled out the small board and chalk and wrote "You did well." Naruto gave a little glare and replied "Next time you do that to me, warn me first." Obscuro replied "Irrelevant. You were off guard. Let this be a lesson to you."

Naruto grumbled in response. Obscuro simply wrote down another message "It is a stroke of luck that we are here, because there is something I wish to discuss with you." Naruto waved his hand for the shadow-demon to continue. "You haven't noticed this since you rarely left the house for the past month, but we are being watched." Naruto widened his eyes at this, but Obscuro quickly wrote down "They haven't entered the area of the house, but they are watching close by. From my observations, they are ninja sent by the Hokage." Naruto scratched his head in thought. 'Ninja sent by the Hokage? Does that mean…' He focused on Obscuro and asked "What did they look like?" The reply was: "Their distinctive feature was the animal masks that they wore."

Several memories flashed in Naruto's mind. Sometimes, when the mobs would corner him, masked ninjas would swoop down and push the villagers back. Other times, in the same situation, he saw them looking away instead. "Them? Why?"

Obscuro smacked its palm on Naruto's head and wrote "Figure it out. I have been teaching you for a reason." Naruto huffed in indignation, but then tapped his chain in forethought. After a few seconds, he spoke. "I'm the Kyuubi's container. That means I'm strong. Really strong. The Hokage doesn't want to lose me because he doesn't want anyone else getting strong. Right?"

Obscuro nodded and wrote "Correct. The night you first came into the house, they followed you there but thanks to my efforts, they didn't go beyond the tree ring." Naruto hummed in response. "Regardless, I have a question for you. Do you want to become a ninja?"

At this, Naruto jerked up wide eyed. He hadn't expected this question. Nevertheless, it was a good question, so he leaned his back against the wall and began to think.

During his time at Obscuro's house, Naruto sometimes found himself thinking back on the village. He read from smuggled library books that ninjas were warriors, guardians and protectors that saved people and rescued princesses. His experiences with several ninja however, made him doubt the validity of those tales. Even when he read more advanced books, they all portrayed ninja, at least Konoha's, in a positive light. His experiences with several ninjas however, made him question the validity of those stories. Another thing that he read was the fact that ninjas were loyal to their village (most of the time), had to obey their Kage/leader, and protect its citizens AKA villagers at all costs.

This was where Naruto's thoughts of becoming a ninja deteriorated. He held an intense dislike bordering on hatred towards the villagers because of all that they had done to him. Why should he protect people who don't even want him to live? In addition, he would be forced to take orders from people, who probably hated him too. The Hokage might be the only one who didn't hate him, but he hadn't had much interaction with the man. Finally, being a ritualist sounded better simply because of the fact that someone actually helped him and he could somewhat relate to. Two demons, in the eyes of Konoha, were a perfect team-up.

Naruto sighed and spoke "No. I don't want to be a ninja. Why should I when all the village has shown me nothing but hate? I wanna be with you. You, a demon, saved me, gave me a home and taught me much more than humans."

Obscuro looked at him for a few seconds before writing "I somewhat expected that. Human nature is so easy to predict." Naruto's eyebrow twitched but didn't say anything. "Be warned, even if you don't wish to become a ninja, you might be forced to by the Hokage due to your 'condition', but we will deal with that when the time comes." Naruto nodded with a smile. "Now let's go back. We will start life-force training soon." Naruto gave a bigger smile "Yeah! Let's do this!" The pair soon snuck through the village and back into the forest, with the blond unaware that someone was watching them...

-Obscuro-

Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Third Hokage, frowned. He attempted to use his crystal ball for the past month to try and see where Naruto was or what was he doing. Each time, he could only see dark shadows, or on rare occasion, a house that matched Weasel's description. Today he tried to use the ball again, when he finally managed to locate Naruto. He saw him enter a store before something black crept up behind him and attacked the boy. Then the ball went to black again. He tried again for several minutes, before seeing flashes of Naruto wearing some black cape, entering and leaving stores. He had a guess of why Naruto was doing it while trying to remain unseen (damn villagers) before he saw Naruto appear again in full at an alley near the Academy.

The Hokage then saw Naruto talking to someone, but every time he would try to focus on the figure, the image would distort. Relenting after a couple of tries, he readjusted the view to Naruto. After reading his lips, Hiruzen rubbed his forehead.

'How could this have happened? I knew that the villagers would try and take things too far, but I never imagined that they would cause Naruto to avoid ninja life altogether. I am going to have to think of something to help him. What was more worrying though, was that black cloak and the figure he talked to. Are those two connected? If so, who is this? And what is a ritualist?'

He then saw the blond leaving back to the forest. After watching him for a few minutes, the ball turned black again. The aged leader sighed and smoked his pipe. "Maybe a friend would help Naruto gain a tie to the village..."

-Obscuro-

(1) Is this translation correct? If not, where can I find a good translator?

(2) I am bad at writing fight scenes. If you want those, someone PM me and teach me how to write them. I will try in the future regardless.

(3) Detailed Descriptions will come soon

Hi guys! So sorry for the delay, I was in China and school started so, yeah delays. But fear not! This story will continue!

Naruto might or might not (my decision) gain a friendly acquaintance in Konoha, but he will not be loyal to it or want anything to do with the village. He is staying because of the house.

IMPORTANT: What do you want to see next Chapter?

Single or Harem?

BETA/HELP NEEDED!

See ya!