Naruto's daily schedule for the next two months was set.
Waking early he would run through his exercise routine once in the morning before meditating and practicing his breathing technique until lunchtime. After hunting with shruiken in the forest for lunch, he would work on his fundamental ninja skills, such as water-walking, tree-hopping, and tree-walking.
After that he would make his way to the Hokage tower to spend quality time with his Jiji.
On his very first visit, three days after receiving his apartment, Naruto had snuck by the receptionist as he remembered that the woman never liked him and asked the two ANBU stationed at the door very politely if the Hokage was in and alone. At their affirmative nod, Naruto then proceeded to kick open the door whilst shouting, "Ohayo Jiji," in his most cheerful voice.
The Hokage had looked up and smiled at the blonde scamp and had waved the ANBU away, glad for the distraction from the endless paperwork.
"Hello Naruto," said the Hokage, "I am glad to see you but please knock next time. How are you?"
"Great Jiji," sang Naruto, "I'm getting really strong. Strong enough to be Hokage soon dattebayo." He boasted, before mentally chiding himself. "Dattebayo? I thought my verbal tick wouldn't start until later."
"Really now?" asked the Hokage chuckling as he relaxed back in his chair.
"Yeah! I've been training, see?" Naruto boasted as he began to walk up the wall.
Hiruzen's eyes widened as his pipe fell out of his mouth. Struggling to regain his composure, he asked "And where did you learn how to do that Naruto?" as he finished the sentence the Hokage's eyes lowered so that he was looking suspiciously at Naruto's stomach.
Naruto, wanting to get ero-sennin back in the village as soon as possible, had decided to reveal the progress he made. After all, in his jiji's eyes, It should have been impossible for the young Naruto to be using his Chakra at such a level.
"Well Jiji, I've seen ninja walking up trees and walls around the village, and I read a book about the about chakra control exercises we talked about, about how ninja used chakra to stick to stuff like trees and poles and walls. Hey I'm really little and the world is really tall and if I could walk up walls I'd be able to reach more stuff and so I taught myself how to do it."
"Impressive Naruto, you told the truth but not the whole truth. You're improving." Kurama congratulated him.
The Hokage sat back in his chair with a look of surprised understanding mixed with a little relief. He took up his pipe, lit it and said, "Well, that's certainly a unique little skill you've developed their Naruto. I think you are perhaps the youngest person to use chakra in that way. Well done!"
"Thanks jiji!" Naruto exclaimed with a wide smile on his face.
"Very good. You are becoming very strong indeed," said the Sandaime, very impressed by Naruto's show of Chakra control. "I'll have to contact Jiraya-kun," He thought, "perhaps our plans can start sooner than we thought."
"Now then anything else happening?"
The two then settled in for a little chat, before long the Hokage looked up at the clock on his wall. "I'm sorry Naruto but I need to get back to this paperwork before it starts to pileup." said the Hokage apologetically.
"Can't I stay a little longer?" pleaded Naruto his little lip quivering, "It's so boring in my apartment."
The Hokage translated this as his apartment being lonely, but the paperwork needed to be done. Just as he hardened his heart to say no, Naruto unleashed the Puppy Dog Eyes Jutsu.
"Oh all right," the Hokage gave in, "But you must be quiet while I work. Can you do that?"
"Of course," cried Naruto happily, "I even brought the book you gave me." And from his pocket he produced the Tale of the Gutsy Shinobi.
The Sandaime smiled. "How are you liking the book Naruto?"
"It's my favourite," answered Naruto, "It's about a ninja who never gives up and he has the same name as me!"
Naruto made his way over to the couch against the side wall of the office and made himself comfortable. The Hokage went back to his paperwork as Naruto opened his book and the office was enveloped in silence, but for the occasional turning page.
After a few hours of this Naruto's rambunctious presence rather strangely began to fade from existence in the minds of not only the Hokage but also from the minds of the hidden ANBU as Naruto engaged his stealth techniques learnt from years of pranking.
An hour later there came a knock at the door.
"Enter," called the Hokage.
A ninja, obviously Jonin, came in and handed the Hokage a scroll before standing at attention before his desk. "Jonin Jaki reporting completion of A-rank mission."
"Continue," commanded the Hokage calmly.
"Target identified at 0800 and neutralised as to mission parameters." reported the Jonin.
"Very well," solemnly stated the Hokage as he puffed on his pipe, "You may collect your mission pay downstairs. Dismissed."
The Hokage then went back to his paperwork as the Jonin left the room, closing the door behind him. This routine repeated itself four more times with various different Jonin before the Hokage remembered his young guest. He looked over at the couch only to find Naruto asleep with a small smile on his face.
However rather than sleeping, Naruto was in fact congratulating himself on finding a way to insinuate himself into the Hokage's office without arousing suspicion. This way he would be able to gather Intel and in much more comfort than on previous stakeout missions.
Thus his daily visits to the Hokage became routine, with only the title of his book changing day to day. In such a way he gained a real insight into the inner workings of the village as well as re-establishing a close relationship with his surrogate grandfather. A relationship he had sorely missed in the years following the old man's death.
After a few hours in the Hokage's office, Naruto went back home to do his workout for the second time. He would eat dinner after and practise his breathing technique again before bed.
This routine changed, of course, with his enrolment in Pre-Academy.
It was compulsory for all children in a shinobi village to complete two years of basic education, such as reading, mathematics and village history, before starting on their career education and this was called Pre-Academy. The children were taught all together so that they all had an equal level of knowledge and basic fitness before they were split up into the various specialised academies or apprentice opportunities, such as the academy for the merchant class, the various manufacturing guilds and of course the Ninja Academy. Classes were split by social class, all clan student in one class, orphans in another and so on, to make it easier to teach the students at their level.
Naruto was required to attend for six hours a day which he did not really mind as he used the time to further his fine motor training. By sitting at the back of the class and remaining quiet he managed to remain largely overlooked, helped by the fact that the teacher chose to ignore his existence for most of the time, allowing him time to practice his calligraphy and to read up on techniques and skills that he would like to acquire this time around.
Naruto's main regret from his time with Jiraiya was that he never really gotten a chance to learn more than the very basics of Fuuinjustu. Most of the time that would have been spent on the technique had been taken up with first learning how to read and then by correcting his atrocious hand writing and so he only learnt some basic sealing and explosive tags. Jiraiya always played off his disappointment by saying that they had plenty of time to train in the skill later, but of course this never happened.
By practicing his calligraphy now, Naruto hoped to have the level of fine control necessary for advanced Fuuinjustu by the time he met up with his mentor again, so as to never again cause one of his most important people to feel disappointed in him.
All in all the time spent in the classroom was beneficial to his new training regime. He had time to sit and read, the school supplied paper and writing materials so he did not need to use his own dwindling supply, the physical fitness exercises taught at the academy were tailored to the needs of his physical age and nutritious meals were supplied at lunch so as to improve the overall health of the village children and so supplemented his fortnightly grocery deliveries and as such he was eating more and of greater variety. However, all this came at the cost of a higher visibility of his person within the village.
By using the alleyways and shadows to move about the village, Naruto had managed to keep his presence at a minimum so much so that only a handful of people even knew that he was living outside of the orphanage, in stark contrast to his previous life when much of the village had known within a couple of days. But now that he was required to attend the academy, Naruto had found it much harder to stay beneath the radar.
But it was worth it, since he got to reconnect with the first person who truly understood him and accepted him as Uzumaki Naruto, his beloved teacher, Iruka-sensei.
Now that he was actually listening to his lessons and seeking out Iruka-sensei for help with fuinjutsu and his calligraphy, their almost sibling-like relationship was progressing much faster than before.
His better behaviour in class had also led to him making friends, namely one Shikamaru Nara and Akimichi Choji, who he had approached one recess to play Shogi.
Flashback to their meeting
Naruto walked over to where Shikamaru and Choji were playing their game and watched for a few minutes. When the Shikamaru won he decided to talk to them. "What are you playing?"
The skinny one turns his apparently too lethargic or lazy to get up before talking. "It is a game called Shogi."
"How do you play?"
"I'll show you but first what is your name? It is too troublesome to have to say 'hey you' or 'hey blonde' every time we try to talk."
"I'm Uzumaki Naruto. What are your names?" Naruto said, internally
"Nara Shikamaru" the skinny boy said not seeming to even want to put in the effort to want to say 'I'm'.
"I'm Akimichi Chouji. What's your favorite food?" the plump boy said.
"Hmm, definitely Ramen." Naruto replied answering Chouji's question.
"Mmm that sounds good, I like you."
"I'm glad to hear that, thanks" Naruto said deciding that despite Chouji's fixation on food, he liked him. Then he turned back to Shikamaru and listened intently as he explained the game.
"Those are the rules, it is too troublesome to continue" Shikamaru said when he finished telling him the rules.
"Cool, would it be too troublesome to play a game with me? If Chouji doesn't mind, that is."
"Go ahead" Chouji said, looking slightly relieved.
"Alright, let's set up the board. I'll let you go first since this is your first time playing" Shikamaru said.
So Naruto and Shikamaru played a game of Shogi. Shikamaru won, of course, but it was fun for Naruto to reconnect with his friends.
After that Naruto was frequently invited over to the Nara household, for dinner and to play several Shogi matches afterward with the pineapple-haired young heir.
The blonde found it hilarious to see his incredibly lazy friend, a bona-fide genius, be both fascinated and frustrated by his unconventional tactics, even though he ended up losing each match anyway. He considered it a victory on his part if he forced the pineapple-haired lazy ass to take his famous 'thinking' pose, in which he sat still with eyes closed and his hands together in an odd gesture, during the match. Sure, it didn't happen often, but he felt proud whenever Shikamaru go into his thinking pose.
Today was no different, and after Naruto left for home, he decided to take a leisurely walk through the quiet roads of Konoha admiring the beautiful full moon in all its glory on this night.
"We're off to a good start, right Kurama?"
"Hmph. You've certainly made a lot of progress brat, but considering that you'll turn six in a few days and you still can't water walk steadily, I believe that we should step up our training."
"Heh heh. Kurama, I think you have your standards are a little too high here."
Coming back to reality, Naruto noticed he was near the Hyuuga compound and gulped loudly. He never liked the entrance guards' white pupil-less eyes following his every movement as he walked past, stony expressions seemingly forever chiseled onto their faces. "At least Hinata was never like that." He thought.
Naruto made it past the two Hyuugas guarding the main gate and was walking along one of the compound's long perimeter walls. He realized it was already almost midnight according to the bright full moon overhead.
"Wow, that last shogi match took longer than I expected.' He mused
As he walked in silence, he heard scraping of feet on a rough surface, – likely roof tiles – but it was barely there. He doubted any other human could have heard this without chakra enhancement. He learned one day that he was blessed with heightened senses compared to other people because he was always the first to sense anything long before others noticed. He just never realized this until he was finally spending time with his peers and noticed his senses weren't exactly the norm. He also discovered at the same time that his sense of smell was about as good as a normal dog's, which he made use of this moment with a breeze blowing over him from the compound. He sniffed the air deeply and caught a slight hint of lavender. Was that a fresh shampoo scent?
Naruto narrowed his blue eyes as he scanned his surroundings. The scraping and scuffling sound was getting closer, likely from the other side of the wall. Deciding to follow his instincts, he pressed his back up flat against the compound wall to try to blend into the shadow it was casting from the moonlight. The scent of lavender became stronger as the scuffling got closer.
Then it all fell silent.
A long minute of waiting followed with thick and stuffy tension filling the night air as Naruto rapidly shifted his eyes right and left down the length of the wall on either side. Finally, he heard a light thump as a pair of feet carefully landed onto the street from the top of the wall, and it was like an explosive tag going off right next to him since he was concentrating so hard on his hearing.. He held back a pained gasp and an impulse to jump in surprise as he snapped his head to his right and glimpsed a tall figure clad entirely in a black stealth outfit.
His body shifted into a ready state as his eyes searched the figure and zeroed in on a small bundle in the figure's left arm. He noted right away that it was a little girl in a white nightgown, and she was tied up tightly and gagged.
Her lavender-tinted eyes were wide open with helpless terror. Immediately recognising her as Hinata, Naruto gritted his teeth. This was a bad situation and he knew he was no match for that black figure.
He didn't smell a single trace of this man; a good sign of an experienced shinobi. He would die before he even got the first syllable out if he tried to alert someone…but he had to save her!
Naruto would be the first out of anyone to know that if she disappeared, she would suffer greatly. Having been through so much already by now, he wasn't going allow that to happen to someone else if he could help it. As he watched carefully from his hiding spot, he noticed the shinobi was growing frustrated with the girl's struggling, and was getting quite distracted.
This was his chance as he took a steady breath and reached for something he happened to glimpse lying on the ground by the wall.
The black-clad man was growing irritated with the Hyuuga girl struggling in his hold. Since when did she instantly grow a backbone? He gathered from observing his primary target at the dinner earlier tonight that she was a cowardly and submissive girl. He thought she was going to be the easier of the two Hyuuga females to kidnap for his secret mission in an effort to acquire more kekkei genkai carriers for Kumogakure. His disguise as a diplomat was a ruse in order to study the security of the Hyuuga compound up close so he could attempt the snatch after he returned to his hotel room.
What would happen to the young girl and the shit storm that'd come when news of this got out…he didn't care. He was happy to serve the Raikage, and could almost taste the glory and fame that came with being the one to bring the famed Byakugan to his village.
POW!
That was the last thought he had before he heard a loud fleshly smack and felt pure agony like no other - even in his long career as a shinobi - fill his entire body all at once; pain so great he almost swallowed his tongue in shock. He barely noticed that this ungodly pain originated mostly from a certain pair of balls hanging between his legs. The last thing he saw before his eyes rolled up toward the top of his head was a fist that was connected to a young blonde boy.
"You blonde bastard…." He choked out.
"Your strength is developing nicely Naruto, I give that 10/10." Kurama laughed, holding up a sign with the number 10.
"Hehe, thanks Kurama." Naruto grinned as he rubbed the bottom of his nose.
The nin slowly sank to his knees with a strained groan as his arms instinctively reached for his prized treasure, dropping the tied-up Hinata in the process.
Naruto was waiting for this and caught her before she hit the ground. At that moment, they locked eyes again and he saw tears of relief and joy dribbling from her beautiful eyes. He ripped the gag out of her mouth and she immediately buried her face into the boy's chest with happy cries of thanks. His cheeks warmed up at the praise and close contact. However, he had no time to think on this since the man would recover quickly.
"It's alright. I'll get help for you!" the blonde assured as he used some effort to carry the tied-up Hinata as far as he could from the man, who was still in a quivering heap. He then inhaled in all the air his considerably large lungs were able to take.
"OOOIIII! THAT GUY IN BLACK'S TOUCHING THE PRETTY HYUUGA GIRL IN WEIRD PLACES!" could be heard echoing throughout the entire village of Konohagakure.
In an unrelated matter, all fathers of young girls suddenly felt compelled to check in on their precious daughters at this time, just to be sure.
Hinata was stunned into silence with mixed feelings about this. She was blushing at being called pretty but she was also embarrassed by the possible misunderstandings about having been touched in 'weird places'…whatever they were.
Naruto only had to wait one whole second before he heard the thunderous crash of someone smashing through a solid wall. That was immediately followed by a man's loud and terrifying roar of pure primal rage from inside the compound walls.
"WHERE IS MY DAUGHTER?! I WILL SLAUGHTER YOU LIKE AN ANIMAL!"
The entire compound lit up at once, and Naruto had to snicker.
With his sensitive hearing, he heard thundering footsteps zeroing on this location fast. Good, he and the girl should be able to get out of this uninjured.
"YOU….you…goddamn brat! I'LL KILL YOU!"
Startled, Naruto quickly turned around and instinctively pushed the tied-up girl onto the ground behind him. He only had enough time to see the man in black standing on shaking legs, with one hand clearly wrapped around his abused nuts and the other outstretched in front, before he felt a small twinge in his chest and heard a wet squelch. He then heard the girl cry out in terror from behind.
Why was she screaming like that?
At that moment, a tall and enraged pale-eyed man with long straight black hair leapt over the wall and landed between the two children and the surprised black-clad man.
If it wasn't for the seriousness of the situation, it would have been hilarious to see a man of high nobility standing barefoot and bare-chested on the walkway in his white silk pajama pants, shredded and dirtied by his alterative to using a door just a moment ago. Not to mention his wild and disheveled hair.
"YOU!" the new arrival growled out wrathfully as he caught sight of the kidnapper.
Before the black-clad man could get a word out, the Hyuuga man snarled and charged at the assailant with his Byakugan blaring. In under a second he struck multiple times with fatal precision as all chakra-enhanced strikes were aimed at the forehead, throat, lungs, kidneys, and heart. It was all over so quickly when the black-clad man fell, already dead, into a broken heap with so much dark blood pooling underneath that the moon reflected off it easily.
Naruto had to admire the way that powerful man quickly dealt with the kidnapper. This man also had to be the girl's father too from the relief clearly displayed in his eyes upon seeing the girl safe and sound, if only tied up for the moment.
Though the blonde couldn't understand why they changed to extreme alarm upon shifting their gaze to him.
Before he could say anything in greeting, his head instantly became light, his eyelids felt heavy, and it felt like he was falling slowly to the right. He didn't understand this…he should have been perfectly all right. Was this why the girl behind him was still crying out in anguish?
He watched rather than felt as his body hit the ground in slow motion; first with his right knee, then his hip followed by the shoulder, and finally his temple tapped against the cold pavement of the walkway. He couldn't fathom why he wasn't able to move his limbs anymore now. Finally, after a moment of panicked confusion, he used all his waning strength to glance down at his twining chest and finally found the cause.
Kurama groaned. "Its up to me to me to save you again then. We are definitely increasing our training intensity if you couldn't even dodge that."
A small kunai was embedded into the very center of it, almost up to the handle, courtesy of the black-clad man before his brutal death.
"Yeah, my bad Kurama." he thought. His eyelids drooped even lower, despite his best efforts to keep them open.
He felt himself being gently turned and laid on his back. He finally took a good look at the Hyuuga man that moved him; he looked like a stern and stoic man. "Hiachi-something was his name" He remembered
However, at this time, he could see clear concern in the man's pale eyes with the veins bulging around them. He also could hear the man's quickened breathing, apparently trying to work on his grievous injury. He also glimpsed Hinata's tear-streaked face standing behind the man, apparently freed from her bindings now.
"Please…you need to stay alive!" she cried out in anguish as her entire body trembled at the sight of so much blood gushing from the young blond boy's chest.
That was when it struck Naruto as his breathing became shallow and his throat began to flood with blood, making each labored breath that escaped sound like a wet gurgle.
"Shit" He thought, before the darkness consumed him.