Chapter 41: The Rising of Makoto Heffner

Part 4: Makoteus Hotaruium

"Hey, Kabuto."

"You look like you haven't slept the whole night."

"That's becoz I did not sleep the whole night."

I had spent the few days speedrunning the proof of concept of animation by animating a whole OP by myself. Inking black and white illustration is one thing but doing cell animation while also coloring everything is a process I had never done before. I should be done after a few more days, where after that I will just have my wife sing the OP.

(((((((((((((((((

"What did you mean you want to sing for one of your weird project?"

"What else did I mean? You are voiced by Yuuki Aoi, one of my favorites voice actors. Of course I want to hear you sing! Besides it's an easy song. Even a toddler can do it."

My wife, Konami who is now confirmed to be voice by Yuuki Aoi for the convenience of your imagination. To be exact, she pretty much speaks like MaoMao from Apothecary Diaries. Not exact but pretty similar to that. Though she occasionally switch to The Bubbly Okita Souji speech pattern if I amuse her well enough.

I just hope she doesn't go full Tanya the Evil on me. Man, Yuuki Aoi has a wide range of characters.

"What do I get if I help you out this time?"

"Shouldn't a wife be supportive for their husband's business prospects?"

"I don't know why I should be supportive for some guy who had yet gives me my dowry and not even give me a real wedding ceremony. We're only culturally married, remember. We have yet to be married officially, so I have zero obligation to perform whatever nonsensical wifely duties for you."

Sheesh, this fucking fanfic man. Even when it throw me a waifu it didn't give me a simp like the usual LN harems. How dare a waifu has her own mind and desires and not bend over backwards to cater to my needs.

"Look, right now I am trying to get the capital for the whole wedding and dowry crap you want so much. To do that, I need this gig I'm having with Fuma clan to work. Can you just be a dear and help me out for once?"

"Urrghh, I already have to maintain this house without a single servant by myself. Why should I contribute more?"

"Okay fine. I'll bring you on a date."

Konami looks utterly unamused. Of course Konami couldn't give jackshit about normal girls idea for dating.

"A date into the Forest of Death. let's hunt a dear or some shit."

Then, Konami eyes light up.

"Oh! I want to eat a phyton! It's been a long time since I ate one!"

…..

………

……………

Okay, I can work with this.

))))))))))))))))))

"Are you sure you alright that Fuma will get most of the profit once your business takes off?"

"Oh, no problem, Kabuto. I have everything handled."

"Is that so?", Kabuto adjusted his glasses.

"Yea, now let's get this over with."

Kabuto just chuckles darkly. "Another day of cleaning up the mess for our magnificent village.

Today, we got a call from the Inuzuka clan to clean up their mass.

As it turns out, Kiba has taken an experimental treatment to fix the crippling injuries I had gave him. Because his injuries involves the deformation of bones and severe torn damage to tendons after I brutally beat him up, the Konoha Medical Department has the bright idea of,

Hey, we already doing organ transplants. Why don't we just transplant bones and muscles to Kiba?

And that results to Kiba to receives brand new bones and muscles from an unknown donor. Probably some poor bastard in the civvies.

Now, the transplant is a success and now Kiba has been reinstated into a full ninja. However, he has to take this unknown drug in order to suppress his immune system from rejecting the new bones and muscles for the meantime.

This drugs has the side effect of making him very violent, probably due to his Inuzuka beastial trait. It also made him reach puberty early and now Kiba looks like he's in his Shippuden age and is very horny.

And violent.

So here's Kabuto and I, destroying every evidence of Kiba mutilating the corpse of some poor civvies girl he had fucked. The vagina looked torn up though I don't know if that was after he went nuts mid-fucking or he had been raping the poor girl from the start. Shit, there's even intestines hanging on the ceiling fan and chandeliers. I guess Kiba decide to be festive midway and think guts and organs makes for a good x-mas décor.

Also I pretty sure Kiba ate some part of the girl. And this head of hers that he had ripped off barehanded has cum in her mouth. This better be from her sucking his dick before the murder and not Kiba ripping her head off to be used as makeshift onahole. That would be weird and edgy as hell.

Man, this fanfic had been so silly that sometimes I forgot that the rating of this fic was changed to M for a reason.

"Look at this, Makoto.", Kiba showed me the thigh that been torn off and gnawed. This looks like the bite of an animal instead of a human. Like one made by a dog or wolf."

"Ah great. So Kiba is a Teen Wolf villain now. Everyone, from now on, Inuzuka Kiba shall be known as Inuzuka Jacob."

"Jacob?"

"Yes, Kabuto. Jacob."

Kabuto just shrugs. He learns that if he wants to preserve his sanity he really just roll with whatever nonsense I came up with.

Still, Jacob is a werewolf now? Now I know Konoha is not really the good guys in canon, more like they're mostly a neutral hypocrites if you really think about it. But more and more I think Konoha is the real villain of this fanfic.

Well, beats me. It ain't my job to fix Konoha. I'll just wait for Pain to nuke this village and ran off to Central Plain with Konami.

"Alright, I got everything in the barrel now.", I told Kabuto while he is using a suiton jutsu to dissolve and discard all the blood stains. I checked on her ID before r tossing it into the barrel. Some chick named Ayano.

Urghh, she looks like Ayano from Kaze no Stigma. You know what, Jacob, what you did was excessive but I can't even be mad that you killed this girl. Just the fact she is a lazy copy of that trashy character makes whatever sympathy I have to evaporates to atmosphere.

If there's any character I hate more than Haruno Sakura, it would be Kannagi Ayano.

Man, hope that Kannagi clan ain't a thing here. I really don't want to deal with X-over bullshit in this fanfic. I don't think most readers of this shitty fic know what Kaze no Stigma is.

I tossed the ID into the barrel. Eh, let Kabuto deal with that crap.

"Okay, I'll be done in a minute. Just sit and relax, Makoto."

After he's done, Kabuto sealed away the corpse in a scroll. Then, he took a seat on the other chair and drink some water.

"Makoto, how many crimes have we cover up for Konoha?"

I ponder a bit. "Let's see, there's the raped housewife and her son and husband that was forced to watch while being stunned by kanashibari jutsu. We cover up for a Shimura clan member I think. Then there's the awful amount of Aburame's bug experiments, covering up Yamanaka's kids practicing Mindfucking on random civvies, the occasional murder cases and so on. Like sheesh, it's not even a year and I already think I'm halfway to be an ANBU with all the clandestine crap I had to pull off."

"That's right. It seems the Hokage instructed our Chief of Police to transfer over most of coverup missions to you."

And by extension, to Kabuto. Before I joined in, the coverup stuff was mostly done by the more discreet members of the Genin Police, but after I joined, about 6 out of 10 cases got transferred over to me. That fucking old man had me cover up some of the most messed up shit I ever seen.

I think I get why Konoha ostracized the Uchiha so much. The Uchiha must have so much dirt on them after years of covering up their crap. It's why Hiruzen didn't do shit to actually stop the Revolt. He just want the excuse to get rid of them.

"Have you ever wonder what it would be like if we weren't ninjas?"

I raised a glass and drink up some water.

"You will be some bigshot rookie doctor saving lives with you bullshit medical skills while I would be cooped up in my house just drawing mangas as usual. But meh, we have the bad luck of being born inside a ninja village instead. And not even been born as clan kids either. Nope, we're just some poor orphan bastards. Off to the Murder Gremlin Academy you go."

Kabuto just smirked. It is not news that I dislike Konoha with their bullshit. I made the point very public, even to the Hokage's face. If it wasn't because I am a holder of a brand new Kekkei Genkai, I would have been dead in a ditch a long time ago.

"Say, Makoto." His eyes glinted. "If someone came and offer you a chance for a way out, will you take it?"

I scoffed at the idea.

"Hell no, I'm running away and calling the ANBU."

Kabuto looks a bit surprised.

"Huh, I thought even if its hypothetical, you would at least consider it."

"I'm not an idiot, Kabuto." I looked over the room, who before is smeared with blood and gore is now clean and tidy like a virgin hotel room. "As if I will take an escape rope offered by another slaver. There is no guarantee that the other master is better than the previous one."

"Even if the other master is fighting the other for a greater purpose?"

"That's the thing, Kabuto. Fighting for a Greater Purpose require one to care for nonsense like other people's rights and justice for the innocents and all that nonsense."

I put back the empty glass on the table.

"I'm a selfish person, Kabuto. And I don't care about strangers. If there's anything I hate more than being enslaved by a tyrannical dictatorship, it would be being enslaved by the Greater Good."

"Enslaved by the Greater Good?"

"What, didn't expect stupid Hotaru to be philosophical?"

Kabuto seems to try to deny it, but then he realized, he did think of me as an idiot. Which is fine. I am not a conventionally smart person. My IQ is average and my academics is only good when it comes to memorization because of the nature of my Kekkei Genkai allowing me to directly control my brainwaves and choose what to permanently memorize and I simply don't make good life decisions.

A regular Self Insert OC would have been min-maxing their build and abuse their meta knowledge to manipulate everything to their favor, but I'm not that kind of OC. I have an OP Kekkei Genkai but it has some drawbacks and counters and I have the second lowest Chakra Reserve after Sakura. Even with clones I can only store 5 times my energy worth at a time. And Meta knowledge? Fuck that, I get thrown into an AU with nonsense worldbuilding that The Writer bullshit into existence on the spot, rendering all my plot prophecies moot.

With all the nonsense incoming at me, all I can do is just surviving as a nobody in Naruto. I'm just an out of his depth soul of a weeb who's only way to survive is to outmaneuver these goddem genius ninjas through being so utterly stupid they just can't comprehend my thought process.

"Then Makoto, what did you mean by being enslaved to the Greater Good?"

"It's a story as old as time. To save the most people, you have to make sacrifices. It's all for the good of the greater good. Majority over minority. There are so many people who justify their screwed up decisions by saying, look at how many people I saved. Class A exhibit, our dear lord Hokage. Remember how many civvies kids get conscripted into the Genin Corps and sent to the vanguard during the Third War?"

Kabuto gulped as he recalled what is perhaps the greatest massacre in ninja history. At the beginning of the Third War, over 5000 civvies kids from 8 to 12 was drafted into the Corps and given only a month to train their chakra and jutsu. And then those 5000 kids were sent to the frontline of the first battle at Hotspring Country where Kumo and Konoha begin their clash.

Of the 5000 kids, only over 800 returns alive.

Of the 800 returnees, only 200 returns unscathed.

Of the 200, only 50 that survive the next year of war.

Of the 50, only one make it to Jounin.

The Third War's Konoha Genin Corps Battalion 8. Konoha had never bothered teach the history of any of their Genin Corps Battalions, but this one did. Why?

Because it's the battalion that gave birth to the legendary Yondaime Hokage, Namikaze Minato. The 8 years old son of a fisherman who was forced to be drafted into the Genin Corps and sent to death at Hotspring Country.

And like a cockroach, he survived again and again.

One might wonder if Minato really was a genius, or was just a desperate child clinging for his life and dig himself out of that hell with pure grit and spite.

"The Hokage saved Land of Fire by breaking the very law that the Founder had laid down. There will be no drafting of minor under 16 into wars no matter how dire the situation is. But Sarutobi Hiruzen broke the commandment laid down by his own mentor and send thousands of children from the civvies of Fire so that our honored clan kids doesn't need to be sacrificed, tiring down the enemy forces and give the real ninjas who matter to the village easy pickings. By forming Battalion 8, 9 and 10, the Hokage had saved million of lives of Land of Fire citizens. All at the price of 15000 children."

"That he did…"

"The thing was, I know the old man. He is someone who wouldn't do such terrible decisions without cause. He is someone who you can say, conventionally good."

"Is that so, Makoto?", Kabuto quirked an eyebrow. It must seem so bizarre to him. I had never called Hiruzen as anything good, ever.

"Indeed. However, even someone like him, is capable of making a decision as terrible as breaking the The Shodaime Hokage Treaty that prevents every ninja village from deploying minors into active warzones. A treaty that everyone followed until Hiruzen broke it in order to gain the most advantage at the start of the war."

Kabuto flinched. I guess I slipped up. My hatred for Hokage and Konoha may leaked out if I'm not careful with controlling my micro expressions .

"Because it is the pragmatic decision. It is the decision that will save the most people. It is the decision that is best for the Greater Good. And millions of Fire citizens thank him for it, for making the hard choices."

I look at Kabuto dead in the eye.

"Tell me Kabuto. Who protects the Lesser Good from the evil that is the Greater Good?"

Kabuto is silent. He has no answer for me. As someone who is also drafted into the Genin Corps for the bad luck of being born a civvies and turned orphan from conflict he never remembers, Kabuto is perhaps one of the few people who could never refute me. Who can understand my point of view.

Because like me, he too is part of the Lesser Good. And we are simply pawns for the Greater Good. Expendable.

"Kabuto, I rather work for an honest villain than a hypocritical hero. At least they don't make me vomit as much. Not that I give a rat ass for either of them."

)))))))))))))))))))))))

A week passed and today I am conducting a live demo at the Uchiha Compound.

I invited the Fuma execs and animation staff, distribution agencies, Kabuto just to be polite, Naruto obviously, Hanabi and Hinata, and I guess Chouji and Shikamaru.

Man, fanfics always go for the Shikamaru is my BFF route right? Or at least being chummy with him coz brainpower or whatever.

Funnily enough, I avoid Shikamaru like a plague for reasons I don't know why. I was more concerned on trying to get demoted back in academy, so I really just skipped his character interaction. Besides, I was an infamous troublemaker, so Shikamaru also avoid me like a plague.

So eh, now that I'm not concerned about anything much anymore, I guess I should start networking.

Sasuke? Why would I invite him? He literally lives here.

Also I told Sasuke to tell Sakura that she is very much not invited. Just in case.

Welp, time to get this demo going.

"Well hello everyone, I hope you have a good feast. Let me tell you, Uchiha Mikoto and my wife are mad cooks."

The attending crowds murmured agreement in unison

"Now, I have invited you all here to demonstrate anime. Basically it's like movies, but done through arranging a series of pictures to make an illusion of movement. Let me tell you, it's one hell of a pain in the ass to do. I have to draw each frame by hand!"

That caught their attention. That sounds like such a painstaking process that you better off just do live action as usual.

"Now, I'm not going to explain the technicalities of this artform, I will let my work speaks for itself. Now, I will present you three demonstration. A song scene, a music performance scene and an action scene."

I then roll down the silver screen, signal my tech worker to turn off the light and turn on the projector and sound machine.

Then, the opening instrument of the famed Opening song of Doraemon grab the audience attention as an earless blue cat makes his entrance by walking on a globe.

Konna koto iina dekitara iina

Anna yume konna yume ippai aru kedo

Enter Nobita, waking up late for school and got scolded by his mother.

Minna minna minna kanaete kureru

Fushigina pokke de kanaete kureru

Doraemon tries to help him to get to school on time, so he pulls out a gadget from his pocket and gave him a helicopter hat.

Sora wo jiyuu ni tobitaina

"Hai! Takekoputaa"

An an an tottemo daisuki Doraemon

Nobita managed to reach school on time. He then gives Doraemon a thumbs up for the help. Cool gadget, bro.

An an an tottemo daisuki Doraemon

Doreamon then looks back to camera and winked to the audience for a job well done.

The crowd was in silence, utterly perplexed with what they had just seen. I can see what's going on in their mind. Movies had been a thing for a few decades now, but for some reason no one thought to go hey, maybe we can do this with drawings to.

Then, the audience abruptly discussed over what they saw excited over what they had just witnessed.

"Encore, Makoto! Encore! Let us see it again!"

I chuckled. Hah, they're so fucked now. Hook, line and sinker. If they thinks this is good then I have even more mind-blowing things to show.

"Relax. I haven't show you guys the more advanced stuff. Its just a kiddy song video."

Someone in the crowds yelled oi loudly. Probably Konami.

"Now, to the next demo."

The next demo is a 3 minutes animation of me playing the violin at different angles.

I had animated each frame to the exact accuracy, from the position of my fingers to the speed and angle of my bowstring sliding over the violin strings.

The audience was captivated as I play a Paganini song, something that never existed in this world. They did called him the Devil's Violinist. I'd be surprised if they find it meh. It was bullshit trying to figure out how to play it from just my memory of hearing it. And then I have to animate it to pinpoint accuracy!

Yea, I animate this just to fucking flex.

Man, my animations staffs, Sasame in particular especially looks like they've got trapped into Infinite Tsukuyomi. I had taught them the theory of animations and the basic techniques regarding it, basic coz I was never an animation student back in my previous incarnation so I have to reverse engineer the damn thing!

But now? Now they see what animations can really do. Now they see what they are being trained for.

Once the demo was over, the audience was stunned for a minute. Well I guess going from a fucking Doraemon OP to a S class animation demo is a bit much huh?

Then, someone had the idea to clap and the hall erupts to a deafening applause.

Man, my poor wife. She's must be hurting her ears now.

"Now now, calm down everyone. As you can see, this is what animation can do. There are limits to live action, but with drawings, you don't have to subject yourself to reality. You can animate however you want allowing more creative freedom beyond the limits of reality. Now, for the last demo."

To finish the demo, I just play the fight scene from Fog Hill of Five Elements.

I'm pretty sure everyone creamed their pants midway of the fight. Yea I know. It's that good.

)))))))))))

"Finally, we're home.", I enter our home with sore throat. Man, that was too much socializing for me. I want to puke after the third distributor came to introduce himself to me. I did puked at the fifth.

"I know. Why does everyone thinks I know everything you do just because I'm your wife? We don't even do anything together other than eating and sleeping."

"Who the hell they supposed to ask? Sasuke?"

"Urghhh. For now, I'm taking a shower."

"Yea, you do that. I'm going to sit for awhile."

"oho, you're not going to ask us to shower together?"

"We're 12. That's just effing weird."

"Good to know my husband is still a sensible person. We're not doing anything weird until 15 okay?"

I wave Konami off. Mentally I am fucking 12 even when I have meta knowledge. I still like kiddy shit like Doraemon and I only start this hentai gig to earn money. Aside from starting to get interested in boobs, I'm still in the 'I think girls has cooties' mental phase. With brain wave control, I only intend to let my body goes full puberty when I am 13 year.

But Hotaru, why did you makeout with Konami several chaps before if you're not that into the horny teenager phase yet?

Okay, let me clarify. The only reason I was attracted enough for Konami to make out with her was coz of her personality, funnily enough. I would hardly be that interested in her if she's a regular LN MC's simp. I don't even feel that strongly for Hanabi to smooch her lips but Konami, I did. Dunno why, she just stimulates me, I guess.

Maybe I am the weirdo for liking a girl that is probably satan. I once saw she viciously ambushed and clawed the face off some minor clan girl that called her harlot behind her back the other day. Was it excessive? Maybe. Was it hot? Very much so.

I have a problem and that is being strongly attracted to girls that's probably going to kill me. Maybe I was a mantis in my previous incarnation.

Then again, my fetish kink came from dominating wild girls, not being dominated by them. I don't want to fix em. I want to devour em.

You know what, I'm going to stop this cringe monologue.

For now, let's see the review of my demos shall we

"Damn Soren! What the hell you just did?! I thought you can't use Genjutsu! I love the show so much and I want that fight scene copy tomorrow!" Naruto

"The one with the blue cat was cute. Are you going to make it a full show? Also, I want a copy of your violin scene." Hanabi

"That was an impressive show of optical illusion. I have seen the basics with the Bird in a Cage optical illusion trick, but I had never thought the idea can be expended to that extent. I hope your project will go further into greater success." Yakushi Kabuto

"That was awesome, Makoto! If I knew you were this cool I would've befriended you back in school! Oh, by the way, come up to Yakiniku Q! I will treat you with an all you can eat buffet!" Akimichi Chouji

"Neat." Sasuke

"You worked so hard, Hotaru! If you need funding, just ask me anytime! The Hyuuga owes you and will help you anyway we can." Hyuuga Hinata

"That was amazing, Hotaru. Your mother must be proud of you." Mikoto.

I stopped at that review card. Oh for fucks sake, did Mikoto knew my mom? Why didn't she tell me? This is fucking Mikoto knows Naruto is Kushina's son plothole all over again! You couldn't just tell me before? What's the point of being the BFF auntie if you're going to ignore you besties' orphaned kids?

Sheesh, guess I'll ask her tomorrow.

I read over some few more review cards, just from some irrelevant characters. Sasame was really hyped tho and it seems like she has really awaken to the passion of animating. Good for you Sasame. You finally found your character development.

Konami is done with showering and I did the same. Then, we sleep on the same bed. Nothing sexual okay. Can't just two kiddy spouses just spoon to sleep without get sexualized? We ain't doing the weird shit until three years later, okay.

Man I hope you don't develop too fast or I may broke the promise at 14 or some shit.

)))))))))))))

Hmm… great what now.

After getting kidnapped by ROOT once in my sleep, I got pretty damned paranoid to go to sleep, the one time I will not be aware of danger.

However, once I figure out Occlumency in my quest to keep my thoughts private to mindreaders like Konami, I learn to create a minor consciousness to keep monitoring my body while asleep.

So, when Sleep Bot awakes me in the mindscape while my body is for some reason walking on my own through the Naka Woods, climbed over the fence and walk into the Nara Forest next door, I have this epiphany.

Oh for fucks sake, don't tell me that the Nara Clan is my nemesis too! I know my whole thing is Stupidity trumps Genius, but don't make this fic make fucking Nara as my thematic villains!

Everyone likes Shikamaru dang it! Shikaku too, I guess. Do you know how much I'm going to be flamed if I murder Shikamaru too?!!

"You can stop walking me, you shady asshole. I can walk by myself.", I decide to cut the chase and reveal that I'm awake before I'm getting dragged deeper into this damned woods.

"So you're awake this whole time, Makoto Hotaru."

"What do you want, Shikamaru."

He came out from the shadow under the tree into the clearing here there's only dim moonlight to illuminate his form.

"I just want to talk, Makoto."

"About what?"

"About you coming from Earth."

Oh yea, I knew why I avoid him like a plague this whole time now.

To avoid cliché shit like this!