Right, just quick answer for a guest reviewer recently: I have reasoning that will be laid out within the story as to how Jiraiya's book lasted so long. Just have a little faith, and a little patience. In my opinion, it's quite clever, in its own way. I'm actually curious if anyone can guess it. It's something that makes sense, given just a little thought.
Chapter 26: Unanswered Questions
Watts stared around in amazement. Despite his initial disdain for the ancient village, the archeologist within him was ecstatic, thinking up all the things he could learn from this village. For now, though, he had a job to finish. The boy, and all his history. Obviously, the boy couldn't be from this village. Simply put, it was impossible. The village was far too old.
That said, the boy had had that book. The one written in the language of the time when this village would have existed. Not only that, but the author had listed his hometown as this village as well, leaving Watts answerless. It was possible, however minute a chance it was, that the book had either survived or had been republished enough throughout history that it survived even to this day.
But it didn't seem likely. Watts was rather puzzled, overall. And yet again, he found himself thinking it to be incredible how he finally had a question of his answered, only for several more to spawn from the answer he was given. He was missing something, something huge to this mystery, to this enigma of a boy.
That said, the village of Konohagakure was a marvel of history. To have survived this long was incredible for anything, no matter how well built it was. Without any maintenance on any of the buildings for however long, they should have simply been dust by now. Not to mention the wealth of knowledge of the past that he could accrue. This village was from just after recorded history began. The book he had found it in was from nearly two thousand years ago, back when Salem had started amassing knowledge. It had been remarkably well preserved in her library.
But that was beside the point.
Watts had been in the village, wandering around, for almost three hours now. In contrast to his initial observations that it was simply a couple of buildings in a crater, it actually seemed to be remarkably well designed and seemed to have been very well populated. Watts wondered why it was abandoned.
He decided to just head for the largest building in the village, a red one that stood close to the cliff north of the village. It was made entirely of wood, just like every other building that he had inspected. He was curious as to why that was the case.
The moment he pushed open the door, it fell off its hinges and onto the ground, sending dust up everywhere. It seemed that this village was rotting away, after all. He made a note to be more careful next time. He entered the building, looking around the entry room. Once again, everything was made of wood. The seats, the desks, all of it. The only things that weren't were the windows, and the mounds of dust. It was as if someone had carved a block of wood to look like a building.
What looked to be a receptionist's desk stood against the left wall. He walked over to it, peering over to see what might be behind it. Nothing, as he should have expected. Even if these buildings had survived, it was highly unlikely that anything else would have. The only way they might have is if they were preserved somehow, protected from the elements. And with how much dust was in here, it clearly was open to them.
Watts glanced at the stairs, wondering if they were even safe to climb. Against his better judgment, he tried to walk up them. To his surprise, they didn't fall out under him, and he was able to get up to the second floor, where he was left in a darkened hallway. He went left, taking the first door he found along the wall.
Once again, it was a wooden room. There were windows along the far wall, allowing the light of the sunset into the room. But besides that, the room almost seemed to have a faint glow to it. It was like when someone emitted Aura, but it was coming from the walls, floor, and ceiling. He ran his hand along the wall, wondering where it was coming from. That's when he noticed that this room had absolutely no dust in it at all. It was actually almost pristine.
He frowned, confused at how that was possible. The room itself was almost empty, in truth. The only piece of furniture in it was a semicircular desk, and a chair behind it. Watts walked around it, sitting in the chair. Amazingly, it held his weight without breaking. He tugged on the drawers of the desk, only to find them locked. Not one to be stopped by something so simple, he broke the lock by forcing the drawers out. Inside, to his delight, amazement, and utter shock, there were piles of papers, shining white like they were brand new.
Like an excited child, he yanked the first piece of paper out of one of the drawers, skimming over it quickly with the same translator he had used on the book. It appeared to simply be paperwork covering some sort of mission assignment. In very formal language, it detailed the mission of a search party to find the Nine-Tailed Fox's 'Jinchūriki', whatever that was meant to be, and bring it back to the village. It also noted that this 'Jinchūriki' was in a place called Mount Myōboku. It was odd, though. The translator could get everything into English except for the word Jinchūriki. Whatever it was, it seemed to relate to the Kyūbi that Ozpin had been investigating. After all, the Kyūbi was also meant to be a nine-tailed fox. Chances were, they were the same thing.
At the bottom, it was signed by- and this got Watts interested- the Sixth Hokage. Below the formal title, there was a name, presumably belonging to this Sixth Hokage, which read out to be Danzō Shimura. But it was the word Hokage, that same word from Ozpin's notes about the Kyūbi, that got Watts interested. It seemed, seeing this paper, that the Hokage was the leader of this village.
He set that paper aside, and pulled another out of one of the lower drawers, one which seemed to be older than the first one. With a quick scan, he could see that this one was another mission assignment. Only this time, they were after someone by the name of Sasuke Uchiha. Watts kept reading, but had an immense shock when he read the names of the people sent on this mission from over a million years ago. They were Shikamaru Nara, Neji Hyūga, Chōji Akimichi, Kiba Inuzuka, and, most importantly, Naruto Uzumaki. The same name as the boy he was after. From over a million years ago.
When the moment of shock passed, Watts remembered the book. The one who had a man character with the same name. He thought for a moment, deciding that that book must have been based on the boy whose name he saw on the paper in front of him, and then the parents of the boy Watts was after had decided to name their child after a book. He nodded to himself, deciding that that made sense. At least, it made more sense than one boy living for a million years. No one could survive that long.
He shook his head, returning to searching through the desk. He found that most of the papers were either mission assignments or complaints from the citizens of the village. It was odd, though. Sometimes, words would keep popping up. Words that were foreign to the translator. Nonsensical words like chakra, or jutsu. The more he looked into it, the more he found that those two words almost always appeared on the same paper. He wasn't completely sure about it, but it seemed that chakra was what the people of this village had called Aura, and jutsu were what they had called Semblances.
When he finally looked up from his new mountain of papers, he realized that the room was slightly brighter than it was before. He turned around, looking out the windows to see that the sun was rising. He had been reading through the papers all night.
He couldn't worry about that at the moment, however. He had to find a way to get all of these papers onto his Bullhead. Granted, not all of them were important, but they were still stockpiles of ancient history.
"It's called what?" Naruto repeated, dead serious in his tone. Kali didn't seem to notice.
"Icha Icha. Kind of a weird name, really," she answered. Naruto blinked several times. Icha Icha. Icha… Icha. The book his master had written. The master who had died over a year ago, in another world, or so he had thought. But if it existed here…
"Yeah, it is a weird name," Naruto replied awkwardly. "Where did it come from?"
"Oh, it's some thousand year old book that the author of Ninja of Love found in an antique store."
"A thousand years?" Naruto asked. Not a long time, really.
"That's how old he said the publish date made it. He talks about it at the back of the book."
Naruto sat down in one of the chairs that was pulled out from the table, running his hand through his hair. He didn't understand what this could even mean. Was he in another world? Was he a thousand years into the future? He rubbed his eyes, deciding that he would get farther if he talked with somebody else about this.
"Kurama, you there?" he asked, facing the giant cage. He heard a rumbling just inside.
"Of course I'm here. And yes, I heard what the woman said."
"So what does it mean? Where are we?"
"How should I know, brat? I'm just as taken aback as you are. But it does explain some things I've noticed, that is if we are just in the future."
"But how is that possible?"
"I don't know either. Perhaps that pond of the toads' used Space-Time Ninjutsu to transport those who pass through it. Either way, it's definitely linked to this."
"But then… what about everyone else?"
"We know what happened to them, brat. The human with the Sage's eyes killed them. He told us himself."
"But what happened to all to the other villages? What happened to chakra? Could it all have just disappeared in a thousand years?"
"It may have. However unlikely it is, people may have simply forgotten it, and it faded away with time. Perhaps, it transformed into this Aura that people here use. Maybe Aura appeared when humans needed a weapon against the Grimm that they now battle."
"But where did the Grimm come from? They couldn't have just appeared one day, right?"
"How should I know?!" Kurama yelled, annoyed by the incessant questioning. "Perhaps they were a mistake of some fool somewhere. Perhaps they were created by someone like the Sage to wipe humanity off the planet."
"Wipe humanity off the planet?" Naruto questioned.
"Yes, brat, to kill them all. Now, that woman seems to be asking you something. Go bother her."
Naruto was ejected from his mindscape, finding himself hearing Kali ask him if he was alright. He nodded, "Oh, yeah, fine." He stood up. "Just laughing about the book again. Uh… I'm just gonna go find Blake real quick. I'll be back." He walked out of the room, no doubt leaving Kali remarkably confused.
He strode down the hallway again, following the route outside. Blake wasn't out here this time, most likely because she had taken the tray of tea into her father's study. He was about to open the door, but stopped just as his hand reached the handle. It wouldn't do for him to interrupt them. Blake needed to reconnect with her family, especially she apparently insulted them the last time she saw them.
He took his hand away, walking over to the railing and leaning against it, trees to his back. He watched the door, still trying to comprehend this new news that he was a thousand years into the future.
Suddenly, he heard the faintest of sounds behind him. He shrugged it off, since it was just a branch cracking. Then he frowned. The sound had come from up in a tree not too far behind him. And he wouldn't imagine that any animals large enough to break a branch up in a tree would be awake at this time of night. He whipped around, expecting to see a Grimm, like an Ursa or Beowolf. Instead, he was greeted with darkness, with nothing visibly stalking through the forest. He shrugged, turning back around and leaning against the railing. This time, though, he closed his eyes and listened closely. Mostly, he just heard crickets chirping, and the occasional owl. But then he heard one noise, one very faint noise, a noise that sounded oddly like someone breathing heavily, coming from just behind him, right below the deck, as if someone was pressed against it, hiding from someone else.
He opened his eyes, turning around to face the woods again. He readied himself for any kind of reaction, and looked straight down. He was met with the sight of what must have been a terrified White Fang member, mask and all. He vaulted over the railing, landing facing the Faunus that had been watching him. He hissed, trying to speak quietly enough that Blake and her father wouldn't hear, "Who are you?"
She pressed herself even more firmly against the wall, like she was scared to death. She glanced to each side, turning back to him without a word. Suddenly, she took off running to the left, even jumping up into a tree as she went. Naruto watched her for a moment before following. If she wanted to jump through trees, he was all for it.
Naruto backflipped onto the side of tree behind him, crouching down for a moment before pressing off with all the strength in his legs. He shot forward, overtaking the Faunus in only a few moments, before trying to stop and face her again. With his speed, he broke through two trees before he landed against the third one, dropping down to the ground. His back stung lightly from breaking through the trees at such high speeds. The White Fang member stared for a moment before she hung her head, also dropping to the ground, as if giving up.
"Who are you?" Naruto repeated. He wasn't blind, though, and he noticed that her right hand was moving very subtly at her side. She raised her head.
"I was sent here to talk to Blake."
Her hand stopped moving, as though it had done what it was meant to. Naruto spoke again, "Then why were you sneaking around in the trees?"
"I- I thought I saw her on that deck as I was passing by."
"You're lying. Why are you here, really?"
All at once, her demeanor changed completely. Her defeated attitude vanished, and a sharp whip flew forward towards him. Naruto ducked under it, having been half-expecting an attack from her right. He reached up left, grabbing the weapon and wrapping it around his arm, while his right hand grabbed a kunai from his weapons pouch. Then he remembered that he didn't have his pouch with him, since he never put in back on after he put on the kimono. So instead, he grabbed the whip further down its length. He could see a smirk on the girl's face, and he felt a tingling in his hands and left arm.
Her whip crackled to life with lightning, with him taking the full brunt of it. He winced, releasing his right hand, but unable to pull his left arm out of it. While his arm was being fried, he formed Rasengan in his right hand, driving it into the whip. He diverted the course of the lightning, then dispelled it with his Rasengan. At the least, it stopped the flow of electricity to his arm. Finally, she seemed to run out of Dust, and he dispelled the Rasengan. He wrenched his arm free, and moved towards her.
"Why. Are. You. Here?" he repeated, a growl evident in his tone. She cowered backwards, brandishing her now-retraced whip towards him.
"Stay back!" He stepped forward again, and her hands began to shake.
"Relax, I won't hurt you. Just tell me who you are and why you're here." He noticed that her skin and hair seemed to be bright colors. And also, different than they were a moment ago. Weird.
"I'm… I was sent to spy on Blake. My name is Ilia."
"Who sent you?" Naruto asked.
"The White Fang. They… Adam…" She didn't say anymore, just began to back away while Naruto faced back towards the house.
"Adam, huh?" Naruto mused to himself. At the very least, this took his mind off of the news kali had given him. While he was distracted, the girl started creeping away faster, hoping to escape. Naruto turned to face her. "Is that it?" She nodded. "Alright. Don't come back here. Leave Blake alone. Tell the Fang whatever you want, but don't you dare come after Blake again."
She nodded, then turned and ran. Naruto watched her go. He wasn't so cruel that he wouldn't let her leave. She hadn't seen or done anything that was that serious, after all. He turned back to the house, seeing that the door to the study was still closed. He jumped back through the trees, though much slower than before. He landed back on the deck, leaning against the railing as though nothing had happened.
And we're done here. See ya next time.
Until Chapter 27!