AN: new chapter out. Enjoy!

Chapter 18 - Confession

As the sunlight peaking through the curtains fell on her face, Eri stirred awake. She let out a big yawn and her entire body shuddered as she stretched her arms above her head. But instead of opening her eyes she curled up like a small animal and rubbed her face against the pillow while hugging the airy blanket to her chest. Although fully rested, it was so cosy that she didn't want to come out of bed. Little Eri couldn't remember the last time she had had such a restful sleep, in such a comfortable bed.

But that last thought made alarm bells ring in her head and she abruptly sat up and looked around scared. Not recognizing her surroundings immediately, a feeling of panic washed over her. Her heart drumming in her chest, Eri jumped off the bed and ran towards the door, her first instinct being to escape from whatever place she was in. But on the way to the bedroom's door, her eyes inadvertently fell on the tall mirror of a wardrobe's door.

The reflection she saw in the mirror made her stop in her tracks: her long white hair was washed clean and braided in two tails and instead of the dirty and stained dress she used to wear, she was dressed in what appeared to be a clean but oversized white cotton t-shirt. Furthermore, bandages no longer covered her wrists and legs.

It was upon seeing her new appearance that she finally recalled the events of the previous day.

"Eri-chan! You're awake!" she heard an oddly comforting and familiar voice as the door of the bedroom opened.

It was a blonde-haired boy with fox ears and three tails. At the sight of Naruto, Eri rushed at him with an expression so bright that he felt his heart melting. He grinned as he knelt to be on her level and took her in his arms.

"Did you sleep well? Are you hungry?" Naruto said after breaking the short hug.

Eri looked down shyly as she muttered a quiet "Yes".

"Oh my, who is this?" a woman's voice was heard and when Eri looked up, Kushina's beautiful and kind smile immediately relaxed her.

But when she saw Eri's mismatched braids and the loose strands of hair poking out everywhere, she put her hands on her waist as she turned to Naruto. "You told me that you braided her hair yesterday but, my god, what is that?!"

"It was the best I could do, okay? It's my first time braiding someone's hair!" Naruto said defensively.

"No, no, this won't do! And we can't be making such a pretty and adorable girl wear your clothes a moment longer!"

Crouching to little Eri's level, she said:

"Don't worry, Eri-chan! From now on, we will take good care of you."

"...You won't send me away?"

When the little girl hesitantly asked that question, Kushina's heart went out to her.

"We won't. From now on, you will be part of our family too. Nobody will hurt you anymore. Come here!" she said and took the little girl in her arms, embracing her tightly to her bosom. "You won't have to worry about the cold or food. We will buy you pretty dresses and you won't be alone anymore. You will be my cute and adorable little daughter."

Kushina's motherly words tugged at Eri's heartstrings and she teared up.

"You've been such a brave girl until now. You must've suffered a lot. So it's okay, you can cry. Let it all out," Kushina said as she caressed the back of her head gently, all the while tightening her embrace. "I am here for you. We are all here for you. From now on, we are your family."

The suffering and pain she had experienced until then, all her bottled-up fears and emotions burst like a damn and Eri could not stop crying for a long time. Naruto left the bedroom and let his mother and Eri bond with each other alone.

⁂

"I haven't seen Kushina this excited in a very long time," Minato said, grinning like a fool as he watched his wife treat the little girl like a dress-up doll.

"Eri-chan seems to enjoy it too," Naruto also said, his smile at that moment making him look very similar to his father.

Although the little girl still wasn't smiling, her red cheeks and her wide eyes betrayed her excitement. Pink, yellow, and blue frilly summer dresses, cute t-shirts with chibi imprints of various female heroes such as the Rabbit Hero, Mirko, or the Dragon Hero, Ryuuku on them, several pairs of sandals, sneakers with light-up LED on their soles, and even three different types of hats - a yellow straw hat with a red bow, a white cap with a pair of black cat ears, and a pink beret ornated with flowers... Eri had never worn clothes as beautiful as that!

"Is this really all for me? Really-really?" the little girl asked as if she could not believe her eyes.

"Hmm, I don't know, maybe Naruto would like a few of these too," Kushina said and she put the pink beret onto Naruto's head, flattening his fox ears in the process.

"Mom! We're in public!" Naruto said exasperated but a sudden white flash made him freeze just as he was about to take the pink hat off. "Tell me you didn't just take a pic of me!"

Minato's answer was to quickly put his smartphone in his pocket before snickering like a hyena. When he also saw how his parents high-fived each other, Naruto could only let himself fall on the cushioned bench next to the changing room and bury his face in his palms.

However, at that moment, a cute tinkling sound made him abruptly raise his head up. The downcast and shy little girl who always seemed afraid to even look others in the eyes was now laughing! That sight was so precious that Naruto suddenly felt that maybe wearing that pink and flowery hat wasn't that unbearable anymore.

⁂

"What made you change your mind about Eri?" Naruto asked his father while they carried the mountain of bags of clothes to their car.

Shutting close the door of the trunk, Minato turned and leaned against the car as he watched Kushina lifting Eri up for her to see all the flavours of ice cream that she could choose.

"I was never against taking her in," Minato said. "I just said it's not a choice that can or should be made on the spot. This is a life-changing decision not only for Eri but for us as a family too. I still think we've made our decision too quickly but it couldn't be helped. Eri's situation was too difficult for us to take our time."

"I promise you won't regret it. I'll take care of Eri properly. And once I'm of age I'll adopt her. I won't burden you for-" Naruto began to say but his father interrupted him before he could finish his words.

"Your intentions are admirable but having a child at your age - albeit an adopted one - will hinder your future prospects much more than you realize now," Minato said kindly.

"I'll never consider Eri a burden!" Naruto said strongly but Minato brought his hand on top of his head and ruffled his hair endearingly as he said:

"Raising a child is no easy task even for grown-ups, much less a teenager. You're still a child yourself. You have the whole life ahead of you. Be patient. In time, you will get your own children too. Assuming you're not gay, of course," Minato said and sniggered at the last bit.

"Oh, stop it!" Naruto said in chagrin. It looked like his father wasn't going to let go of the amusing misunderstanding from yesterday anytime soon.

⁂

"Naruto-nii-san?"

"Ah, shoot!" Naruto cussed and stopped in his tracks.

He had tried to leave the bedroom quietly so as to not wake Eri up but he failed.

'She's gotta have a sixth sense or something, I'm sure I was perfectly quiet!' he said to himself.

"Are you leaving?" the little girl asked as she got up from bed and grabbed him by the sleeve of his pants with one hand while holding a fox plushie in the other one.

"Mhm, I'm going to school. But I'll be back in a few hours, you have nothing to worry about!" he said and patted her once on the head before attempting to leave. But Eri still wasn't letting go of his pants.

Although three days had already passed since the Uzumaki family had taken Eri in, the little girl was just as clingy and dependent on him as on the first day. She seemed to be glued to his side no matter where he went.

After the Sports Festival all the students of UA High were given three days off to heal and rest so Naruto didn't have to go to school. However, school was starting again today, he couldn't stay home with Eri anymore.

Much to his relief, although the little girl's eyes reddened, it looked like she was doing her best not to start crying.

"If you feel lonely while I'm away, you can always go to mom. She'd be more than happy to spend time with you. You also have Kyuu-san with you, no?" he said with a smile as Eri hugged the fox plushie at the mention of its name.

⁂

"Oi, oi, what's with that, he didn't even participate in the Sports Festival!"

"After what he did at USJ, it's no surprise if you ask me."

"I wonder how many of those were from foreigners!"

"Todoroki is at the top too, as expected."

"Well, he's won the 1st place in the tournament and he's also Endeavour's son."

The entire class broke into loud discussions the moment that professor Aizawa revealed the number of internship offers that each student had received.

Uzumaki Naruto was firmly at the top with over 5000 internship offers. It had to be said that Japan had around 4000 registered hero agencies. Hundreds of hero agencies from across the sea or even from across that ocean had extended an invitation for him to join their ranks.

Todoroki Shoto was also extremely popular with the pro heroes too seeing as he had received an internship offer from pretty much all the agencies in the country, over four thousands.

The next in line (although with a number of offers only in the low triple digits) were Tokoyami, Iida, Yaoyorozu, Kirishima etc. But there was one thing that stood out like a sore thumb and Naruto couldn't contain his curiosity so he turned towards Ashido Mina to ask:

"Hey, how come Bakugo is not on the list?"

Regardless of his dislike for the irascible and aggressive boy, Naruto did not belittle how strong his quirk was and the talent he possessed for fighting. Realistically, Bakugo should've been somewhere in the top 5 at the very least.

"Oh, you haven't heard of it? Bakugo was expelled."

"No freaking way!" Naruto said.

"I'm serious, you can ask anyone. Hey, Kirishima, tell him I'm right," Mina said with a pout and crossed her arms.

"She's not lying," the red-haired boy confirmed.

"How? Like, why was he expelled? What did he do?"

"Do you remember the guy from General Studies that mind-controlled someone during the Bo Taoshi game?" Kirishima asked.

"...I wasn't in the stadium at that time."

"What? But we saw your face on all the screens in the stadium. You were together with the Rabbit Hero, Mirko."

"It's a long story. But I only caught the beginning of the sports festival. Something happened and I had to leave," Naruto said, not going into detail. "Anyway, what about Bakugo?"

"Well, the third task of the Sports Festival was an elimination-style fighting tournament and Bakugo ended up facing the guy from General Studies that I was telling you about. He has a quirk called "Brainwashing", a really tricky thing to go against. Bakugo lost the match without even throwing a punch. Shinso mind-controlled him to go out of bounds so he got disqualified."

"Yare, yare," Naruto said and let out a sigh, already knowing where the story was heading.

"Yeah," Kirishima said, "Bakugo didn't accept it. He jumped right back in to blow him up into pieces but professor Midnight put him to sleep with her Quirk."

"Then why was he expelled?" Naruto asked in confusion.

"Bakugo couldn't let it go," Mina answered him this time. "He followed Shinso on his way home after the Sports Festival was done and beat him badly. Shinso is now in hospital with second-degree burns all over his body."

Naruto would have liked to say that he was surprised to hear Bakugo would go that far...but he wasn't. The boy had some severe anger management issues and he was a walking TNT dispenser.

'It's a miracle this guy hasn't killed anyone yet.'

Their conversation was cut short when Aizawa began to speak again:

"Keeping these results in mind, regardless of whether you have received any internship offers or not, every single one of you will participate in an internship with the pros. There are over forty hero agencies that are in partnership with UA specifically for such cases. But that is the case for you. You've all managed to catch the pro heroes' attention at the sports festival."

While the students were cheering at being acknowledged, Aizawa poured ice-cold water over their heads with his next words.

"But don't let it get to your head. Receiving an internship offer doesn't mean you're all set. For the following three years, you will hold a temporary position in the hero agencies where you'll be interning. Depending on your performance, you could very well be rejected at the end of high school. Everything depends on your efforts and how serious you are about becoming a pro hero. You have already seen a part of what being a pro hero truly is like. It's not all glamour, riches, and fame. You will be putting your life on the line when facing villains. Not a year passes without several pro heroes dying in the line of duty. I suggest you take advantage of this period of time that you'll be spending at hero agencies and amass as much knowledge and experience as possible. Being a pro hero isn't a child's game."

Completely uncaring of the sombre mood that took over the classroom, Aizawa continued:

"Lastly, it's time for you to make a final decision about your code names. That is the case especially for those of you who couldn't think of something good a few weeks ago."

As he said those words, professor Midnight also stepped into the classroom, clad in her erotic skin-tight costume, like usual. Not for the first time, Naruto wondered how the hell was she allowed to dress like that when teaching at a school filled with hormonal teenage boys.

"As I'm not good at this, I'll leave it to professor Midnight, like the last time. But keep in mind that when you give yourself a name, you get a more concrete image of what you want to be like in the future, and you can get closer to it. This is what it means when they say, 'Names and natures do often agree'. Like "All Might," for example."

While various students started coming up in front of the class to tell everyone their hero names, Mina was ruffling her shaggy pink hair with her hands.

"What should I do, I can't think of anything good!"

"Your choice a few weeks ago was 'Alien Queen' or something, no? I thought it was cool, it suits you," Naruto said.

The girl's pink cheeks turn a shade darker and she grinned at him.

"Y-you think so?"

In the meantime, Yuga Aoyama came in front of the class and showed off his hero name:

"I can not stop twinkling!"

Quite a few students snickered at this choice but their snickers turned into gasps when Midnight actually gave him the green light.

"She deadass rejected your cool hero name but she was okay with that?" Naruto said and Kirishima and Kaminari snorted with laughter at his disbelief.

Time passed and eventually, Naruto also came in front of the class to show off his hero name.

"Uzumaki-san, you've had nearly a month to find a new hero name..." Midnight said in disappointment when she saw that Naruto's hero name was still unchanged - Kurama. "Being a hero is more than just about saving people and fighting villains. You also need to manage your popularity because your income is deeply influenced by it. A large part of the pro heroes' revenue comes from sponsors, endorsements, donations, and shooting ads or promoting various brands. Kurama doesn't say anything about you. It's not catchy, it's not special, it's just...bland. You've already gotten the looks, the personality, and the skills down, all you need is a hero name with more personality!"

"I chose this name in honour of someone who had saved my life more than once. He is one of the people I respect the most. I won't change it!" Naruto said categorically. "And lacking popularity is the least of my concerns at the moment."

"He's not wrong but hearing him bragging with a straight face like that kinda pisses me off," Kaminari said half-seriously half-jokingly.

In the end, Midnight couldn't change his mind and Naruto returned to his desk.

⁂

"Wow, you really stood up for yourself, Mina-chan!" Uraraka said, gushing with excitement. "Why were you so dead set on choosing that hero name?"

"I, I just think it's a really cool hero name. I mean, come on, it's "Alien Queen"! What's not to like about it?" Mina said but after weeks of being classmates and friends, Uraraka could tell that she was flustered.

"It totally had nothing to do with how Naruto said he likes it, right?" Kyoka piped in teasingly and then burst into laughter when she saw Mina's pink face flushing a deep red colour.

Uraraka squealed as she took Mina's hands into hers.

"Girl, you have it soo bad!"

Although she was embarrassed, Mina didn't try to refute it anymore.

"Alright, that's it!" the pink-skinned girl said with vigour and her chair made a screeching sound as she abruptly stood up from her seat.

Still keeping her vigour, she stomped towards Naruto who was chatting at the other side of the classroom with Ojiro and Kirishima about working out routines.

"Uzumaki-san, can I have a word with you? In private."

"Um, sure," he said and walked after the girl who left the classroom in such a hurry that it looked like she was running.

By the time Mina finally stopped, the two of them found themselves in the courtyard of the school, behind the library building.

"It took me a lot of courage to do this but I have to say it..." Mina began to say while wrenching her fingers. "Would you like to go out with me after school?"

Due to his Fox Quirk Naruto had always been able to feel the rough emotional state of a person based on their smell. He had known for a while that Mina Ashido had a crush on him but he had not expected the girl to actually make the first step and ask him out.

"I'm sorry, Ashido-san, I-,"

Feeling that it would be cruel to just tell her that he didn't feel anything for her, he said:

"I like someone else already."

It was a lie. He didn't like anyone in particular at that moment. Until then, he had been too preoccupied with other, far more important things, girls had been the last thing on his mind.

Training Izuku and pushing him to his limits to unlock his hysterical strength, the League of Villains' attack on USJ, his brutal fight against Nomu and his defeat, Mineta Minoru's death, his fear for his parents' safety, his indecisiveness related to his future, Mirko kidnapping him and taking him to Tokyo and, last but not the least, the encounter with Eri and his parents' decision to adopt her... so many things happened since the beginning of the school year that Naruto had not had any time to think about romance and the like.

"I kind of suspected it already," Mina said and smiled weakly but as she looked down, tears started rolling down her cheeks. "It's the Rabbit Hero, isn't it? ...how am I supposed to compete with someone like her...?"

"It's not like that-" Naruto tried to say but then, the girl shook her head and wiped her face with the back of her sleeves.

"I'm sorry, Uzumaki-san, I must've made you uncomfortable. I-, ugh, we better go, the next class is about to start."

The two walked back to the classroom in silence, Mina ahead and Naruto behind her. Before they entered the classroom, Mina stopped and turned to face him.

"Can we still be friends?" she asked, not daring to meet his eyes.

"Of course, why wouldn't we?"

Naruto's immediate answer made the girl perk up and she smiled at him radiantly.

"Then, I'll start calling you by your first name. From now on we're friends!" Mina said and raised her hand for a handshake.

But when Naruto shook hands with her, Mina unexpectedly pulled him to her and wrapped her other arm around him. When she broke the hug, she grinned at him cheekily as she said:

"What's with that surprised face, it's normal for friends to hug each other every now on then, no?"

Naruto: "..."

She giggled seemingly very satisfied with herself at how she had left him speechless. Winking at him once, she opened the large door and went inside the classroom, leaving him alone in the corridor.

As for Naruto, he was still reeling from surprise. He had given an answer to her confession right on the spot because he did not want to repeat the mistake he did in his past life with Hinata to whom he had not given an answer for more than a year after she confessed her feelings for him.

However, in spite of Mina's initial reaction at being turned down, the pink-skinned girl seemed to have not lost her drive. Instead, her advances became fiercer than ever before. Naruto couldn't recall any girl (whether in his past or current life) ever making such bold moves on him. If anything, he was the one who used to pester Sakura to go out with him.

'This is weird.'

As weirded out by the situation as he was, he put that train of thought on hold as he went into the classroom too and started preparing for the next class.