'Not again...' A young blond haired boy thought to himself as he swung alone on a swing, watching dejectedly as his fellow classmates chatted away happily with their families, excited at having passed the Ninja Academy graduation exam.

The reason the boy was swinging all alone while his classmates celebrated was twofold; he had failed the exam yet again, dooming himself to yet another year of the Academy, and even had he somehow managed to pass there was no one he could celebrate with. Naruto Uzumaki was an orphan as long as he could remember, with no knowledge of who his parents even were, and had no foster family to speak of.

Sighing at the fact his dream of becoming Hokage was once more put out of his reach, Naruto stood up and went to walk home, ignoring the jeers of his classmates and the sighs of relief that he had failed from their parents. He had just reached the gate when he felt a hand on his shoulder, and he turned his head to see the assistant teacher, Mizuki-sensei, offering him a comforting smile. "Mind if we talk in private, Naruto?"

As he ran through the forest, Naruto couldn't believe his luck; Mizuki had told him of the secret exam, a way for hopeful students who failed the standard test to still have a shot at graduating. He briefly thought that stealing a scroll from the Hokage's office would be impossible, but after knocking out the Third Hokage with a quick application of his Sexy Jutsu, he realized that this test was meant to let the students show what they were really made of; after all, who cares if he could make a working clone or not when he could knock out one of the strongest ninja in the village with a jutsu he personally came up with?

Now came the hardest part.

Naruto sat down on the ground with the giant scroll, unfurling it to see all the jutsu within. Mizuki had told him he needed to learn a single jutsu from the scroll in order to pass, and while much could be said about Naruto's lack of smarts, even his biggest detractors could admit he was a determined little bastard. Even if it took him all night, Naruto swore he'd master at least one jutsu.

"Alright, let's see..." Naruto said, poring over the scroll. "'Hiraishin'?!" He exclaimed in shock at seeing the Yondaime's legendary jutsu listed. His face lit up in excitement, before he scowled. "Gah, it's probably just someone pulling a prank. There's not even any directions for it, just a bunch of weird looking scribbles!" Angered by the 'prank', Naruto continued reading past the incredibly detailed Fuinjutsu script, reading the next jutsu in line. "Kage Bunshin? Dammit, not a clone technique! I can't even get the normal clone jutsu down, how am I gonna get Shadow Clones!" He went past that jutsu as well, but upon seeing the following jutsu, his eyes widened.

"Edo Tensei..." He read, reading the description carefully. It seemed to be a jutsu that could revive the dead and make them fight for the summoner; there were even some supplementary jutsu for it, like making the summoned zombies explode into hundreds of explosive tags. Not to mention that the zombies were, apparently, totally 100% immortal.

Naruto's mind began to race at the possibility. He may have been the Dead Last in school, but the one thing that could always grab his attention was stories of powerful ninja. Madara Uchiha, the Hokage, the White Fang...and those were just from Konoha. Every other major village had dead Kage of their own, not to mention their own legendary ninja whose lives had ended ages ago. If Naruto could summon those ninja to fight for him, wouldn't that make him the greatest Kage of them all?

That thought fueled his determination like never before, and he practically glued his eyes to the scroll to commit every last bit of the technique to memory. His spirits sank a bit when he realized that he couldn't properly use the technique without a sacrifice, but he consoled himself with the knowledge that once he did stumble across a sacrifice, then he was practically guaranteed to become Hokage on the spot!

He didn't know how many hours he had spent studying the technique and all its limitations and loopholes, but when Iruka-sensei finally stumbled into the clearing he was in, the moon was definitely higher in the sky than it had been when Naruto first entered.

"Naruto! I finally found you!" Iruka said, angrily, walking up to him. "Do you have any idea how much trouble you're in? Stealing the Forbidden Scroll, Naruto? This can't be passed off as just a harmless prank!"

"Hehe, no need to act so angry, Iruka-sensei!" Naruto said, rubbing the back of his head in embarrassment. "I already know all about the secret test!"

Iruka's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean, secret test?"

Naruto happily explained the test Mizuki had informed him of. "But you don't gotta worry Iruka-sensei, cause I totally passed! I learned a jutsu from the scroll!"

Momentarily distracted at Naruto's declaration, Iruka raised his eyebrows in surprise. The Forbidden Scroll had a reputation for possessing incredibly difficult jutsu invented by Konoha ninja, and it was generally accepted that even jonin would have difficulty learning jutsu from it. "Oh really?" Iruka asked. "Which one did you learn?"

Naruto grinned. "The Edo Tensei!" He happily announced with a grin, oblivious to Iruka's obvious concern at the reveal. "I figured that if I can revive awesome ninja from the past, then that makes me even more awesome than they were!"

Now, Naruto wasn't an evil child; not by any means, really. But to expect him to recognize the inherent evil behind such a jutsu as Edo Tensei, when he quite simply had no one to really instill any sense of real morality in him apart from very infrequent meetings with the Sandaime, was foolish. While the Sandaime had managed to convince him that a Hokage should care for his village and consider them as close as family, and not to go too far with his pranks, that was really as far as it went. As far as Naruto was concerned, disrespecting the dead in reviving them as his own personal soldiers, spitting on the very concept of death itself in the process, was perfectly in line with his own moral system.

It was this lack of understanding that terrified Iruka, as he futilely began trying to comprehend Naruto's lack of understanding of this very basic concept of humanity...and it was Iruka's own lack of understanding in Naruto that led to him forgetting all about Mizuki's plan, leaving him unprepared for the fuma shuriken that flew out of the trees and jabbed through his neck.

Naruto stood stock still as Iruka suddenly sputtered, spraying blood all over Naruto's face, before his sensei fell to the ground, dead. The academy student was frozen in fear and disbelief, slowly raising his eyes to see Mizuki entering the clearing. "I-I don't...I don't understand." He whispered.

Mizuki sneered at him, readying another shuriken from his back. "What's so complicated?" He asked, walking forward. "I used you to get the scroll, and you were dumb enough to fall for it. Like we'd give a Dead Last like you a second chance." He mocked. "A shame Iruka caught up to you first; I didn't really want to kill him, but you'll just be blamed for it anyway, so I guess it all works out."

"But you were the one who killed him! You killed Iruka-sensei, not me!" Naruto argued, trying not to cast his gaze on Iruka's lifeless body. Best to keep his eyes on Mizuki, and hold on to the anger inside him; it was better than breaking down crying over Iruka's fate.

"You think anyone will really care?" Mizuki questioned. "Think about it! You've been hated your entire life; you really think anyone will speak out in your defense?!"

"..."

"They won't." Mizuki said simply. "Because everyone in the village knows a little secret about you, Naruto. A secret that the Sandaime tried to keep from everyone, but he underestimated just how perceptive the villagers could be. The secret of your disgusting birth."

Naruto stepped back as Mizuki continued to walk forward, but he didn't yet flee; as much as he knew it had to be yet another trap...he had to know. He had to know why the villagers hated him, and why Mizuki used him in this plot. "Why...why does everyone hate me? What happened?!"

Mizuki began laughing. "It's quite simple, really!" He yelled in glee. "The reason you don't have parents, the reason everyone hates you, the reason your birthday is the same day the Kyuubi died...It's all because you, Naruto, are the nine tailed fox, the same one that attacked our village all those years ago!" Mizuki revealed. "Sure, some of the villagers are dumb enough to believe that crap the Sandaime was spouting about the beast dying, but quite a few ninja knew better when they saw your fucking face."

Walking around Iruka's corpse, Mizuki began asking questions to seemingly no one. "Why would some random orphan look so close to our deceased Yondaime? Why bear the last name of Uzumaki, when every member of that clan had red hair?" He wondered aloud, before looking at Naruto. "The answer is simple; the Yondaime never killed the Kyuubi, but he weakened it enough to force it to take a human form. And out of mockery, it chose a form resembling the Yondaime, just to remind every villager of what it took from them!"

Naruto felt like puking when he heard the reason the village hated him. It had to be false, it just had to be, but he could tell Mizuki wasn't lying. He didn't know if Mizuki was right, but he realized bitterly it didn't matter. Konoha thought he was the Kyuubi, and they'd just look to him stealing the scroll and being present for Iruka's death as evidence of that.

"Hand over the scroll, Kyuubi." Mizuki demanded, ready to throw his giant shuriken. "Hand it over, and I'll let you scurry away."

Naruto stumbled backwards, barely catching his balance, looking all around for some way out of this. He knew he couldn't beat Mizuki; the man was a Chunin, far better armed than he was, and was clearly ready for battle. While Naruto did learn a forbidden jutsu from the scroll, the Edo Tensei wasn't something that could be performed without preparation, and the only available sacrifice he could use would be Mizuki-and using a conscious, battle ready opponent as the sacrifice for a forbidden jutsu was so impossible as to be laughable.

Naruto threw the scroll at Mizuki, quickly turning and running away into the forest as he did so. Mizuki wound up dropping his shuriken to grab the large scroll, and by the time he correctly identified it as the real one, Naruto was already long gone. Mizuki made to follow, but a brief look at the sky made him realize just how much time had passed, and he gave a curse before running off into another direction-while he'd love to tie up all the loose ends, he had to bail before sunrise to maximise his chances of escape.

Naruto kept running, unaware that Mizuki had stopped chasing him ages ago, and the scenery passed by in a blur; he knew he couldn't just run back home, and no doubt there were already ninja looking for him after he stole the scroll. If they found Iruka's corpse, they might assume Naruto killed the kind academy teacher solely because he might really be the Kyuubi, and he suspected that might just change any capture on sight orders to ones that were far more permanent in ending his supposed threat.

He finally stopped several miles outside the walls of Konoha, on a dirt road that seemed poorly traveled. The sun was already up, and Naruto looked at it, completely lost as to what he should do. He had nothing but the clothes on his back, a bit of academy training, and knowledge of the Edo Tensei.

"...What should I do...?" He whispered, on the verge of tears.

There was no answer.