Author's Note (A/N): This chapter is my way of saying 'Screw this shit!' to all the stuff that happened before Naruto's graduation from the academy.

I will tell you right now that I suck at sentimental scenes. As such, the parts involving Minato and Kushina are not well written. At least, that's what I think. And I think that's the truth. Another warning that I have for you is that this fic and specifically this chapter is probably chock full of plot holes which I'm not intending to fix unless it's something major and can change the entire story upside down. And remember: This is a fanfic! Realism is not the main focus of my writing.

EDIT (17/11/2016): Hello again. I apologize for not releasing another chapter but I have been busy as of late. Very busy. The exams are around the corners... screw that, the exams are already here and every day is a mess. So I will release a proper Chapter 6 maybe in December. Yep, unfortunately, I don't think I can write an entire chapter in between exams. Sorry.

Now, on to more important matters. I have 'upgraded' this chapter by altering the interaction between Naruto and Sasuke's family. It is no longer in a report type paragraph. Instead, it is in a standard story and interaction type. Scroll down to the Naruto meeting Sasuke's family part and you'll see that it is completely changed. Hope you like it. Sorry if you didn't.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. I do not own Naruto Shippūden. And by applying some unknown theorem, I do not own anything Masashi Kishimoto owns. Except maybe oxygen. And I'm not exactly sure of that.

Chapter 5: Revivals and Graduations

The three stood there and stared at each other for an entire second before the two older persons made a mad dash towards the young boy and effectively crushed him between their bodies. The whiskered boy was not unhappy about this however and instead hugged them back as much as he could, considering his body size.

All three wept that day. Tears dampened their clothes and the soil beneath them, as they fell to their knees while still in each other's embrace, muttering each other's names repeatedly. The orange fox watched the trio from a distance before he turned around and walked off into the forest. The goddess followed his actions, opting to give the family some privacy.

Namikaze Minato let go of his son as he sat back down on the grass. He watched the form of his wife Uzumaki Kushina hugging their son, with a fond expression.

"I don't know if this is a dream, but I don't want it to end." the red-haired woman spoke in a voice that clearly conveyed the pure happiness she was feeling. Their family had been reunited. If this wasn't a dream, what else could it be? Herself and Minato had died on the day of their son's birth. But here they were, appearing as if nothing had happened and in the middle of a beautiful green field. It was definitely a dream, one that she did not want to wake up from.

"Yeah..." Minato said with a smile on his face.

Naruto shook his head in his mother's embrace as they both eventually let go of each other. After all of them calmed down enough to form rational thoughts once more, Kushina and Minato once again began to look around the place they were in before turning to their son.

"Naru-chan, where are we?" Kushina asked. It didn't matter if this was a dream, but she wanted to make some sense nonetheless. A glance at Minato revealed similar thoughts coming from the man.

Gaining his breath, the blond boy looked to his parents. "This isn't a dream, kā-chan. The two of you are not in your actual bodies. Both of you are the representations of your respective chakra that you sealed within me when you sealed the Kyūbi."

The two widened their eyes as Minato spoke shakily "S-So then, this is..."

"My mind. Yes." the boy replied with a nod. He was wondering what their reactions would be to this situation. As predicted, they started to observe their surroundings first. After a few seconds though, they turned back to the boy with a frown.

"Where is... Kyūbi?" Kushina questioned hesitatingly. The reason she was so confused as to where they were in the first place was because of the green fields. Normally, a person's mindscape wouldn't be so… vibrant. But now that she regained her thoughts, she realized that she was indeed in her son's mind. But if that was true, where was the prisoner that their son held?

Naruto turned his head and gazed into a part of the forest before turning back to the two. "He is... here."

Minato and Kushina shared another look before their faces gained expressions of sadness, which confused the whiskered boy. Why were they sad? He had thought they would be happy for being able to have the family together again.

"What's wrong? Why do you look so down all of a sudden?"

They both looked at their son with sad faces before Minato spoke "Naruto, I'm sorry to say this... But we can't stay forever. We only have a limited amount of time left before our chakra is depleted. I'm afraid we can't be together for much longer." he looked down as he grit his teeth in frustration. Their family was finally together once more, but they wouldn't be able to enjoy it for much longer.

In response to this revelation, Naruto merely smiled widely. "Who said so?"

Kushina's lips twitched downward "Naru-chan... we know you don't want that. We don't want it either but-" she was interrupted by her son as he removed his shirt and revealed his torso. The woman and Minato merely blinked at their son's actions, curious to know what he was doing.

Naruto kept his belly in view of his parents as he consciously circulated the Kyūbi's chakra in his body. The Eight Trigrams Seal appeared on his stomach as he smirked at the sight of his parents widening their eyes and slightly opening their mouths.

"Wha-... What is that? That's not the seal I put on you. I mean, it is. But what are all the extra seals surrounding the swirl?" Minato asked as he looked at the strange additions which were very slowly starting to make sense. At first glance from a Seal Master's point of view, the 'tube' around the swirl line appeared to add some additions or 'enhancements' to the original seal. What the enhancements were, however, was something he did not know… yet.

"This," Naruto pointed to the seal "is what will theoretically allow both your chakra's to exist indefinitely within me."

Both of them snapped their heads towards his face in an instant upon hearing that and shouted "What!?" right to his face. Naruto smiled and began to explain the additions on the original seal.

"You see, ever since I found out about the existence of your chakra within me, I knew that if you were 'summoned', you would fade away soon. So I tried to extend the duration that you can stay." he noticed that both of them were looking at him curiously and he smiled before continuing.

(A/N: For the people who don't want explanations, skip to next author's note.)

"You know that chakra is made of the Physical and Spiritual energies of a body, correct?" Seeing them nod, he continued. "Your chakra in my body is similar. It has both your Physical and Spiritual energies which you stored during the time of sealing, and is able to exist for a while. But eventually, both the energies will start to exhaust themselves and run dry, which ultimately results in you fading out of existence." his parents were staring at him with their full focus while occasionally glancing at the seal. He chuckled once before explaining further.

"To prevent this, I spent the last one and a half year making and perfecting a seal that will allow for the regeneration of both of these energies. And... I succeeded." With that, both of his parents dropped their jaws.

"Y-You mean… the regeneration of foreign chakra in a body?" Naruto smirked at his mother's question before nodding.

"Physical energy was easy to deal with. I just had to link it to my own chakra and allow it to replenish itself using my reserves as a refill, which worked since we're related by blood. Luckily, since you two are technically projections of a kind, it doesn't put any stress on my reserves since the amount of your chakra in me is not the same as the actual amount in your own bodies. That, and I already have Kage level reserves. So there wasn't much problem there." he nodded to himself.

"The real problem was Spiritual energy. Since that's what makes people unique from each other, if I just link it to my own, your personalities and mind would be overwritten by my own. So to fix that, I took other measures. Since Spiritual energy depends on the mind or, in other words, the brain, I spent the majority of my time trying to make one... An artificial brain."

"An a-artificial b-b-brain?" both of them stuttered out in awe.

"I eventually did it. I made a seal that acts as a 'virtual' brain. Two of them, which hold each of your minds separately and hence allows you to create new memories and experience new things, which leads to the regeneration of your Spiritual energy. The only downside with that seal is that it constantly takes some of my own and some of the Kyūbi's chakra to function properly. But like I said, my reserves are giant and the Kyūbi is like an infinite reservoir, so it's not a problem."

"There are a few more things. A separate seal is used to combine the two energies safely and allow for your use. If the Physical energy line is somehow cut or I have chakra exhaustion, you'll still exist for up to two months with the help of the backup seal that holds some extra 'fuel'. If the Spiritual energy line is cut, you won't experience any existence problems, but after maybe three days, you'll freeze. 'Paralyze' would probably be a better word. In other words, your body will be fine. But it would be a body without a brain. Hence, something like a living corpse. There's also some seals for stability and control, along with communication and sense sharing, and some others. But I'll explain that some other time."

(A/N: Continue.)

"To summarize, as long as I'm alive and well, the both of you will exist as well." Naruto concluded with a satisfactory nod to himself.

"Fascinating..." his father said while both of his parents were now observing the new seals, touching and poking at them occasionally. The blond boy had to resist the urge to giggle more than once due to their unintentional tickling.

"Naru-chan has mastered fūinjutsu at such a young age. I might think he's even better than us." his mother said with the same amazed voice of his father. The two of them then shared a look before they turned to him in concern.

"Naruto, it's great that you're so good at fūinjutsu, but how did you get so good at such a young age? Did Jiraiya-sensei teach you?" It would make a little bit of sense if that were the case. But it still doesn't explain everything.

Fūinjutsu was a complicated art, there's no denying that. It was way beyond the scope of a child even if he/she was a genius. Even the famed Uzumaki clansmen were not that much of geniuses. Naruto seemed to be around seven to eight years old at the moment. If a boy of that age was able to make a seal that could function as the life-support system of a chakra projection, that boy would have needed the knowledge and the thought process of one beyond his age. If he did have those, he would not be a simple genius for his age. He would be a once-in-a-century prodigy, if not once-in-a-millennium. Did that mean that Naruto was one such prodigy?

The whiskered boy shook his head in the negative. "No, tō-chan. That's not it. Well, he did teach me a bit, but I'll get to that later. Right now, I want you both to meet Kurama."

"Kurama?" both of his parents repeated in unison, blinking and tilting their heads to one side.

Naruto chuckled before getting up from his cross-legged seating position on the ground and helped his parents up before putting on his shirt again. Just as he was about to lead them to Kurama though, Minato picked Naruto up and seated the boy on his shoulders, much to the boy's embarrassment. Even though he complained that he was an adult and stuff, his father wanted to spoil his son a bit as he never got the chance to before. To hell with the 'time and place for things' crap.

With Naruto leading the way through the forest, they came upon a large peaceful clearing. They looked around for a second before they froze. Naruto jumped off his father's shoulders as his parents both took their respective combat stances as they prepared to face the beast that was sitting a few dozen meters from them with his head on the back of his front paws.

The Kyūbi sneered at two of the three arrivals while the two in question flinched. His crimson eyes glared fiery holes into their forms as they began to sweat in anticipation of a massive battle.

"So you're back, huh, Yondaime (Fourth)? I've grown stronger than before. I dare you to try and touch the great Kyūbi-sama now! HAHAHA-OW!" the fox recoiled in surprise when his nose got punched by the young boy standing before him, who also had an annoyed look on his face.

"What are you doing?" he asked in a bored and resigned tone.

"Damn it, brat! Let me have some fun with them. I was just about to break their minds with fear and you just ruined it!" the bijū spoke while rubbing his nose with one hand/paw. Not that it hurt in the first place. The punch came from someone the size of his eyeball after all. A reflex. One that didn't fit a massive beast such as the Kyūbi no Kitsune.

Naruto gave the fox a flat stare "As if I'll let you break them right after reviving them and setting them up."

"Tch." the beast clicked his tongue in mild exasperation before turning away. Naruto smiled at his partner's actions before turning around to his parents to see that they were busy picking up their jaws from the floor. They seemed to be doing that a lot lately. Jaw dropping that is. The Kyūbi glanced at them as well and snorted in amusement.

Naruto stepped in between the beast and the two humans, and turned to aforementioned beast. "Oy, come on. Introduce yourself."

"You have got to be freaking kidding me."

"No. No I'm not."

"I'm not doing that."

"Oh? So you want me to introduce you, hmm?" A mischievous glint could be seen in striking detail in the boy's eyes.

A shudder through the spine convinced one of many things.

"Alright fine!" the fox said before sitting on his haunches and staring down at the two behind the blond boy who had relaxed a little bit due to the strange, borderline friendly, interaction taking place. The bijū's nine tails were swishing around behind him, almost idly, considering their unplanned motions.

The beast then proceeded to speak in a monotone voice "My name is Kurama. I am known as the Kyūbi no Kitsune (Nine-Tailed Fox). My hobbies are sleeping or messing with the brat's head." he ignored the indignant shout of "Oy!" and continued "I have no dreams to fulfill seeing as I live forever. But… I do want to kill a certain Uchiha one more time." he finished with a thoughtful gaze.

Naruto stared at the fox flatly "Really? I mean… really? After all that we… *Sigh* Just forget it. It's not worth it to argue with you right now." He turned back to his parents who had gotten confused enough by now to just stare blankly into nothingness. "Great. This just became… awkward…" Looking at them again, he sighed and added almost as an afterthought "And a whole lot more troublesome." Indeed, the Nara is strong in this one.

In an attempt to remedy the awkward atmosphere, Naruto tried to rope them back into the situation of him being overly smart for his age. With his parents regaining consciousness (almost as if they had gone brain dead for a small while), Naruto proceeded to tell them about his situation, him and Kurama coming from the future to his younger body due to the boredom of a goddess. At which point, said goddess floated down to the trio like a lollipop fairy before introducing herself and floating off again.

It was a funny sight to see when they heard that. Both of them had tried repeatedly to dispel a non-existent genjutsu and get out of the bizarre experience. Eventually they gave up but not before uttering the default 'What the hell?' response to the story.

Naruto told his parents a few details about the future. Harmless things like being friends with the Kyūbi, becoming Hokage, learning (and nearly mastering) fūinjutsu and some more. On their urges, he told them some of the stories of his youth and how he was treated back when he was young in the previous timeline. Both of them fumed when they heard of his harsh treatment from the villagers, but Naruto let them know that he wasn't too sad right now… mainly because he had pranked the life out of those who had wronged him anyways.

Minato and Kushina listened to their son as he spoke of his adventures when he was a genin. All of them had a laugh at his expense when he was forced to recall some of the more embarrassing experiences, such as the first time Team 7 fought against Kakashi during which the whiskered boy received a Sennen Goroshi (One Thousand Years of Death) to his rump.

When asked for more details on the future, he told them to ask Kurama for the time being while he got back to the real world and go home. He was in a training ground after all. But before leaving, he told them the function of the communication seal which allowed for a mental conversation when he was focused on actions regarding his real body.

And so, Naruto went back home skipping along the way with the happiness overload from seeing his parents again and having set up a way to keep them around too.

Three months later

Naruto's entry into the Ninja Academy along with his friends was not as glorious as he had expected it to be. After the first speech, it was just studies. They were no practical courses in the first year besides routine physical exercises so simply said, it was utterly boring for him and his friends, including Sakura who was even better in academics than before since she wasn't a fangirl at the moment. Naruto thought of this as a major waste of time so he consulted his parents and thought up an idea.

On that matter, Naruto had decided that he would keep the matter regarding his parents a secret from the Hokage or Jiraiya. Even though it would be nice and they would almost definitely be happy for him, he worried that they might become over-dependent on his parents' opinion for things. Instead of all that trouble, it would simply be better to live normally without too many complications… Well, more than there already were.

Currently, he was sitting in front of the Hokage who was taking a puff from his pipe. Once he had enough for the time being, he turned to the young boy.

"So what exactly are you here for, Naruto-kun?"

The boy in question perked up and explained his plans to the Hokage who went over the details. He found the idea appealing and listened further, while offering some changes to them in the middle.

"And since I know the normal jōnin or even chūnin will be busy all the time with missions and stuff, I think this plan could work wonders for the others. And trust me jii-chan, we're going to need all the miracles we can get for the coming future." Naruto concluded in a serious tone.

Hiruzen though it over and finally nodded his head after taking another puff. "Alright then, Naruto-kun. You can go ahead with that idea. But I request that you ask them to be confidential about the matter. If they start to blabber out their situation to everyone they meet, it will become a rather large problem to solve. Even thought it would be false, people who found out would criticize me for favoritism. If it is necessary, use my name to threaten them into co-operating."

Naruto nodded as well before getting up and walking to the door with a smirk on his face. "Will do, jii-chan. You can expect the best damn batch of genin you've ever seen to graduate after four years.

One week later

"Well? What are we doing here, Naruto?" Kiba asked as he paced around the training ground, with the young pup Akamaru following behind him.

Currently, Naruto and his friends were at one of the empty training grounds scattered around Konoha. They had gathered there under the request of their friendly neighborhood whiskered blond who said he had something important to show them.

Everyone else turned to the blond who was staring at a particular direction. "Wait a few minutes. He'll be-… He's here." he said just as a small cloud of smoke appeared in front of them.

The smoke cleared to reveal a man who was roughly 5'10, had spiky red hair and violet eyes. He was wearing what seemed like the standard Konoha jōnin uniform but there was no hitai-ate anywhere on his body. He did not have any side bangs to frame his face nor any whisker marks. Either of them would remind someone of one of two people after all.

The man stood there smiling and watching all the kids in front of him. Most of them were surprised or startled at the sudden appearance but had calmed down and were now staring back at him curiously.

Finally, he clapped his hands to end the staring contest and began to speak. "Hello everyone. My name is Tonami and I have been hired by the Hokage to train the lot of you for the next three years."

The announcement was met with silence. It was so silent that the wind blowing through the field was as loud as an orchestra. Finally, a sound came from Kiba who was looking down and shaking. Before anyone could say anything though, he pumped his fist high into the air in victory. One could almost see the imaginary tears that were flowing out from his eyes, anime-style.

"Yes! YES! YES! We finally get to do something other than studying! Real ninja training! And the person teaching us has been hired by the Hokage! Oh YES!" Kiba continued to thank the heavens, along with the name of each and every clan ancestor he knew of and promised to give them an offering of gratitude. Almost everyone else sweat-dropped. They knew the academy was bad and/or boring, but they didn't think the news was worth that much celebration over.

Shikamaru, ever the doubtful one, turned back to their new instructor with narrowed eyes. "Why exactly did the Hokage, of all people, decide to give us - as in, this particular group of people - a special instructor?" He was very suspicious of this man. First of all, he didn't have a hitai-ate. Next, he looked somewhat vaguely familiar for some reason. He wasn't naïve enough to believe what someone says the moment they say it.

Realization dawned on Tonami's face as he understood what the young Nara was thinking. "Ah, I see. The reason for that would be Naruto-kun over there." he said, pointing to the blond in question who sheepishly scratched the back of his head when everyone's eyes fell on him. "From what I hear, he nagged the Hokage to teach him and his friends something other than the routine exercises in the academy. But since the Hokage couldn't do such a thing so blatantly - since it would be a fine show of favoritism - the Hokage hired me to teach you guys and get Naruto out of his face." he said with a careless shrug.

Immediately, an air of understanding flew through the crowd before Kiba spoke. "Yeah, that sounds like him alright."

"Troublesome… Couldn't you have just left me alone? Now I have to put up with more training." Shikamaru said with a dramatic sigh at the end.

"I don't *munch* mind though." came from Chōji who was busy eating his chips.

"Me neither, I guess. Not like I have much else to do besides looking after the flower shop." was Ino's reply.

Shino's answer was a nod of the head.

"A-Ano. I would like training as well. I-it would help me for my own p-purposes." Hinata stuttered out. In truth, her stuttering had reduced considerably, credit to all the time she had spent with Naruto and the group. Her confidence was slowly rising as she was beginning to become more independent as well.

Sakura took a look at Ino, then at Sasuke and Naruto, then back to Ino and finally back to Tonami, who almost took a step back, seeing the determination in her eyes. "Me too." was her simple response.

Sasuke stood in his place, waiting until everyone else had said their part. When it came to him, he nodded vigorously before he froze then folded his arms and just gave a grunt "Hn."

'Hmm…' Naruto thought in his mind 'From the looks of it, his clan is in the process of shoving the Uchiha-stick up Sasuke's back. I better pull it out before it goes in too deep.'

"Good luck with that."

'Huh? Why? Is it that hard?'

"Naruto, Uchiha are Uchiha for a reason. One does not simply pull the stick out from an Uchiha's ass." the bijū inside the boy spoke with a grave tone. Why he chose that tone to say something like that was something the boy didn't want to find out right now.

"Kurama! Language!" Kushina's voice reverberated through his mind.

Said fox just snorted at the woman "Kushina, you have no right whatsoever to say that. Especially since you're the most verbally vulgar human I've ever been sealed in."

Naruto felt his mother blush in embarrassment and heard his father laughing, soon followed by a sound that sounded similar to a fist colliding with a skull. At seeing Kurama's victorious smirk, Kushina blushed once again and turned away "S-Shut up, dattebane."

The blond boy chuckled at hearing his mother's verbal tic. He himself had his own, the infamous dattebayo, but had mysteriously stopped using it a few years ago. It was gradual and eventually, he just stopped saying it. It felt… weird talking without it and he never did understand how that happened. Was it something that happened when a person reaches a specific age?

…

Nah, that can't be it. After all, he still sometimes slips up when he gets highly excited or embarrassed.

Back to the situation at hand, Naruto noticed that everyone was looking at him expectantly. He grinned widely "Of course I'm in. I'm the one who started this after all."

Seeing everyone smile and turn back to him, Tonami did the same and all of them spent a few minutes introducing themselves and getting to know each other.

Once that was done, the man cleared his throat and spoke "Alright then. First of all, I want to tell you a few things regarding your training." He waited for them to nod before continuing.

"The first thing to tell you is that I won't train you all the time. That would cause way too many suspicions around you and we don't need that kind of attention. As a side rule, I'm telling you right now that if you reveal that you are training under me to anyone, and I mean anyone, even to the pillow on your bed, I will stop your training." He saw their horror-stricken faces, so he quickly spoke further. "Calm down. The condition is simple - Keep your training a secret from everyone around you, except each other. As far as anyone else is concerned, I don't exist and you've never met me. Understood?"

That seemed to satisfy them if the way they switched to a smile and nodded was anything to say. Well, you couldn't see Shino's face since it was buried in his clothes and Shikamaru didn't look like he cared much on the outside. Naruto though was never worried since the beginning.

"Next condition. I will not teach you any new jutsu." He put up a hand to stop anyone from shouting "The reason I won't teach you any new jutsu is because we have two problems. One - you're all from a clan, well most of you are. If your clansmen somehow notice you know jutsu that no one taught you, then they would become suspicious, which I already said is something we don't need. Normally, I don't think they would mind. The problem is with the other clans who notice and might investigate, and finally criticize the Hokage. Two - because of some personal circumstances, I am unable to do anything chakra intensive."

It was obvious most of them were dissatisfied at that and the reasons as well. So he quickly continued.

"But, I can help you in improving and/or refining jutsu that you already know. Mainly, I will train you in things outside of the academy syllabus that are very important, not to mention useful, for every ninja. I can also help you in taijutsu as well."

They nodded again, accepting the conditions so far. They were a bit odd, but not dangerous or anything.

"The last condition is not much of a condition as it is a bit of information. Let me tell you this right now so you get it through your heads." Tonami began in a serious tone "I am not your personal sensei. I am just a helpful friend who was hired to teach you a few things. - Yes, that doesn't make sense. Get used to it. - As such, I want you all to treat my teachings as advice from a friend and not as teachings from a tutor. Do you understand?"

Most of them either nodded or stood silent, but Kiba spoke out in a confused tone "Um… What does that mean?"

"It means, Kiba…" Tonami said looking at the boy in question "that I am not responsible for anything that happens between yourselves regarding the things you learn. A normal teacher would try to solve most of your problems, be it personal or involving a group. But I am just a passerby, hence I will do no such thing. So in essence, I will not be teaching you for three years. I will be advising you for three years. Get it now?"

The Inuzuka boy nodded reluctantly and Tonami supposed that was good enough for now.

"Good. From today on, I will tell you where and when to meet me the next time after each day's group training. Between the sessions, I want you all to train individually on the latest topic that we went through." All of them once more accepted the conditions and got ready. Tonami smirked at their determination.

"Alright then. Since most of you are from a clan, I would imagine that you already know a thing or two about the basics. The Leaf Concentration Exercise is a chakra control exercise where you stick a leaf to your forehead and see how long you can hold it there by concentrating as much as possible. But…" Tonami gave a feral grin which sent shivers up the spines of everybody present, except Naruto. "My version is a bit different. Each of you take three leaves and stick one to the forehead, and one each to the back of both of your fists. Ah, Sakura come here. I will teach you the basic exercise, seeing as you're from a civilian family and you probably don't know it yet."

It took a while but eventually everyone managed to stick the required leaves to their foreheads and fists. Except Sakura, who wanted to get comfortable with the basics before attempting the more advanced stuff.

"Good. Now that you're done with that…" the man gestured towards the fields surrounding them, pointing generally towards the training ground as he spoke "Go and run ten laps around the training ground with those leaves still stuck to those positions."

"What!?" was Kiba's shout of disbelief.

Tonami ignored him as he continued "If you drop the leaves, stop, stick them again, and continue running. This is a simple but great way to improve both your physical attributes as well as your chakra control and concentration, along with the ability to split your focus."

Everyone just stood there looking towards the fields and starting to sweat lightly.

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU WAITING FOR? MOVE IT!"

With that, the kids jumped in surprise once before they started to run carefully. They were quite busy trying not to either drop the leaves or bump into any obstacle. Sakura saw the exercise as a challenge and tried her best with the Leaf Concentration Exercise so that she could also join them as soon as possible. Naruto used the training to improve his body by amping his gravity seals to three times normal. He had left his usual clones at his personal grounds for other things anyway.

As it neared sunset, everyone were finished with their respective exercises, most panting and gasping for breath while some were nearly on the verge of falling unconscious. After they got the info on their next meet up time and location, they immediately went home leaving only Naruto and Tonami in the grounds.

"That was ok. You could be a little less harsher on them though. They're not all me." Naruto said to the man beside him. He looked to see that the sun had almost completely sunken into the horizon, making darkness take over the world slowly.

"Meh, they'll get through it. Besides…" Tonami was suddenly engulfed in smoke. As the smoke was blown away, in his place stood an identical copy of Naruto with the same clothes as well. "I'm you, right Boss?"

Naruto shook his head and dispelled the clone before walking out of the grounds.

"Naruto, I wanted to ask you something."

The boy in question turned to his father who was, at the moment, watching his son walk on his hands on the surface of the river in his mindscape. The man was wearing a simple Konoha ninja uniform without the hitai-ate and flak jacket. He was sitting on the riverbank, cross-legged.

Naruto had long since learned that he could train in his mindscape the same way he could train his shadow clones, which meant anything except physical training. As such, he was doing just that while his real body was busy sleeping and being cuddled by Yui.

"What is it, tō-chan?"

"You already know quite a lot about fūinjutsu. But I noticed something." Minato said with a calculating gaze.

"What?" Naruto tilted his head, and lost his balance before tumbling down. Luckily, he redirected his chakra to stay above the water instead of sinking. He walked back to the shore and sat beside his father who turned to look at him.

"I've seen you practicing seals both outside and in here, but every time, you were using paper… What I mean to ask is, why don't you use the more advanced direct applying method?"

The whiskered boy looked sheepish and rubbed the back of his neck before speaking again "I… I know there's something like that. I've seen it before. But ah… I never had anyone teach me how to do it. I learned how to do it on my own but I felt it was kind of… wrong, the method I mean. I was about to fix the method, but then… I came here." he was referencing that he came back to the past, which his father also understood.

Minato cupped his chin with his hand and looked thoughtful. After a few moments, he smiled and got up, grabbing Naruto and seating him on his shoulders before going off.

The two soon found Kushina chatting away with Kurama as if he were some long lost relative, though the bijū was trying and failing to ignore her as evidenced by the occasional grunts and one liners.

"Kushina-chan."

Said woman looked to the father and son duo, and once again felt the warmth in her chest that she felt every time she saw the two together. It seemed that their son had eventually stopped resisting to his father's non-periodic tendency to seat him on his shoulders and was now resting the palms of his hands on his spiky hair.

She smiled at the sight before turning to them properly "What is it, Minato?"

The man plopped down in front of her and let down Naruto who seated himself beside his father though he had a curious look on his face. Minato looked to his wife with eyes sparkling excitedly, which made Kushina curious until he spoke "It seems our son still hasn't mastered fūinjutsu yet. Specifically, he has some trouble with the chakra application method."

Kushina's expression turned to one of surprise before she turned to her son who nodded sheepishly. She smiled happily seeing that her and Minato could still teach something to their son.

They had been a bit depressed that even though they were his parents, they couldn't teach their son anything. They had thought that he had already surpassed them in everything. But now it seemed that was not the case.

"Well, looks like there's something we can teach you after all, dattebane!" the red-haired woman said gleefully.

Naruto did not miss the hint in her words. Since he didn't have parents most of his life, their words now registered in his mind far quicker than normal words. And hence, he picked up a hidden meaning in the words of his mother. They were unhappy that they couldn't help their son in any way useful.

He smiled.

That's what they thought. In reality, they could help with a lot of things.

"Thanks, kā-chan." he said before he looked at his father "Hey, tō-chan."

Minato turned to his son and blinked once. Naruto continued "Can you teach me your Hiraishin (Flying Thunder God)?"

For some reason, both of his parents gaped. He was about to question why they did so just before his father spoke "You… You don't know the Hiraishin? Even though you're so good at fūinjutsu?" he asked incredulously.

Naruto rubbed the back of his neck uncomfortably. "Well… You were called Konoha no Kiiroi Senkō (Konoha's Yellow Flash), right?" Minato nodded. "I… just didn't want to steal that title from you… I wanted you to be remembered as the only Yellow Flash in history and the fact that person was my dad."

Minato and Kushina blinked once more before they snorted and started laughing. Loudly. Loud enough for Kurama to yell "SHUT UP!" and go right back to sleep. Both of them promptly shut up and Minato ruffled the whiskered boy's hair.

He smiled at his son before he spoke "Naruto, thank you for your intentions, but in truth, I would be honored if you take my title from me. If I were alive, I would have shouted out to the world that my son surpassed me." he fixed his son with a gaze "Listen, son. Parents would be immensely happy when their children surpass them. And I'm not an exception to this."

As Naruto listened to his father's words, he realized that he already knew that. He had been immensely happy whenever Boruto or Himawari surpassed him in anything. Whenever they won a simple spar against him, he had been happier than the winners themselves. Likewise, he now figured that his own parents would have been happy if he had chosen to surpass them in their own fields.

But then again, in his time, there weren't that many chances to showcase the Hokage's powers, since it was a time of mutual peace.

"So… What else did you neglect learning in exchange for honoring us?" Kushina asked teasingly.

Blinking away the wetness in his eyes, he proceeded to tell them of his current shortcomings. Mainly, he was dissatisfied with his taijutsu. While it was suited for him, it was admittedly not as strong as he wanted it to be. The reason he stuck to it was because he almost never got to fight normal humans in his time. It was always beasts, sharks, monsters, energy balls, bijū, deities and purple samurai.

Anyway, Kushina's taijutsu was top class and if she taught him, it would be very useful. But the problem was that her taijutsu was designed for her personal use, meaning it needed her own body to be used properly. In the end, Naruto decided to merge the two styles to create a new one specifically for him.

On Minato's end, he agreed to teach his son the art of weapons. Not that Naruto didn't already know how to handle a kunai. Minato wanted to teach the boy how to be more efficient using them. He also agreed to teach Naruto the Hiraishin and the correct way to use it, which really meant how to use it without getting blown away or stuck in a tree.

Both of them together also wanted to teach Naruto a few things he was lacking in fūinjutsu as well as some jutsu for his elements that he hadn't already known.

The next few months flew by in an identical vein. Tonami would gather everyone up for group training at least twice a week. Each time, everyone would leave the training ground completely exhausted, but satisfied. They couldn't find it in themselves to complain as they learned something new every time. Usually, it was a new physical exercise or sometimes a hybrid of chakra control and physical.

Tonami had drilled it into their heads that chakra control was one of the most important things they'd need in the future. Naruto had learned from experience and thus had such an opinion. He had decided to go slow with the teaching process and show them things one step at a time. Most times, that just happened to be sticking more leaves simultaneously. Tree walking and water walking he decided to teach them in their later years of the academy.

In the meanwhile, Naruto was busy mastering the method of applying seals using only hand seals and chakra. It was a lot more easier than he imagined since he already knew a lot about fūinjutsu. With every successful application of a seal, he moved up to a more complex seal. Along with this, his clones were usually busy doing one of two things. They were either refining chakra control or they were getting stuck in trees using Hiraishin. The seals for the technique were hand drawn on papers using ink for the time being.

He was also finally able to make a normal Bunshin. So, his next milestone in chakra control was to be able create Rasengan under his feet. He himself was weirded out when he decided this, but just ignored the weirdness of it.

In the academy, Uzumaki Naruto, Uchiha Sasuke, Haruno Sakura, Aburame Shino, Inuzuka Kiba, Hyūga Hinata, Nara Shikamaru, Akimichi Chōji and Yamanaka Ino were seen together at most times by the people around and hence the group was dubbed the 'The Inheritance Gang', implying that most of the members were future clan heads who would inherit the seat. Though people had no idea why the group had Naruto, who was clanless, as the leader of the group.

Naruto's performance in the academy was, in a way, some kind of a joke. The results of his written tests were horrible. Out of a 100, he had an exact 10 in each subject. But the thing was that whenever Umino Iruka or any other teacher asked him a question in class, Naruto would give an answer worth a 100 points. This confused many teachers and enraged those who tried to sabotage him, hating him for his tenant. His friends had a laugh every time he did that and praised the ingenious method the blond had found to prank the teachers indirectly.

Though when they asked him why he did so in the first place, he gave a shrug, which was the universal gesture for 'I don't have a single freaking clue.'

But no matter how low he scored on the written tests, the effect was nullified by the physicals which were at a perfect 100 each and every time. The average of both the written and the physicals usually added up to an exact 55%, while the passing grade for the first year was 50%.

In technical terms, Naruto would be the dead last in the passable portion of the class. But no one in the entire class thought of him as so. The reason being that were it not for the written tests, he would have been the top student. And no person in the class had good opinions of the written tests anyways.

Some bullies tried to force the title of the dead last on Naruto, but they were 'persuaded' to stop doing so. All credit went to the eggs pelted at them whenever they even tried to get within two feet of the blond boy. No one understood where the eggs were coming from either.

Naruto also quickly befriended Iruka. It was rather simpler than expected with the help of his normal 'brightness' and the Attra-Light.

In a nutshell, there were no visible problems with the academy part of his life.

The door to the house opened to reveal a woman with black eyes and long black hair, in a homely dress. She looked down at the person who had called and smiled.

"Welcome home, Sasuke. Oh my, you seem to have brought a friend today?" Uchiha Mikoto said as she patted her son's head. The boy pouted indignantly and tried to grab the arm patting his head, only to grab empty air. The woman chuckled as she looked at the other person.

Sasuke huffed and turned to his blond friend beside him, gesturing him with a hand "This is Naruto. I've told you about him before, kā-san."

Mikoto observed Naruto with a smile creeping onto her face. The boy was pretty much the spitting image of Minato, who also happened to be her best friend Kushina's secret husband. Oh yes, she already knew about the two of them having a child, as well as that child carrying one of the biggest burdens of the village.

The black-haired woman wanted to shower him with affection ever since he was born. After all, that was the least she could do to honor her friendship with Kushina. She personally cared for the boy as well, because ever since he had come into her own son's life, Sasuke had become much more cheerful. She wanted to look after the boy who had no real blood relatives nearby, who was alone for five years from his birth until he found himself a sister. Unfortunately, things were not that easy.

The only reason she could not care for him properly was because of the one thing that held back any ninja family in Konoha from doing the same. Politics.

The fools on the council believed that they should keep him as a neutral party with no affiliation to any ninja clan in Konoha as they feared that he would be exploited for his value, and that said clan would break the power balance in Konoha if they manage to get the 'weapon' on their side. Well, that might indeed be the case in her own clan, but she did not think that would be the same in every clan though.

Take the Nara clan, for example. What would they do with him? They're utterly and completely loyal to the village so they wouldn't try to exploit the boy. Most likely, they would probably just turn him into the laziest jinchūriki in the world.

Anyway, back to the present. Mikoto smiled sincerely before crouching down to the whiskered boy's level and holding a hand out to him. "Hello. You must be Uzumaki Naruto. My son has told me a lot about you. My name is Uchiha Mikoto and I am Sasuke's mother."

Up until now, Naruto had been watching everything before him with plain interest. Now, he was a tad bit taken aback by the woman in front of him. For some reason, his brain had concluded that every Uchiha he would ever meet would be stuck-up pricks. Well, considering the people he had met before, that was a very possible conclusion. But of course, if someone was nice to him, he would be nice to them too. Simple as that.

He placed his own hand on the bigger extended one. "Nice to meet you... Mikoto-san?" he asked nervously but seeing the woman's smile put him at ease as he continued "Sasuke had invited me to dinner at his house today, and I accepted that offer. I hope I am not a bother."

Sasuke's mother shook her head and patted Naruto's head, which he leaned into comfortably. "Of course not, Naruto-kun. You are very much welcome to join us." She stood up and ushered both Sasuke and Naruto inside.

In the blond's mindscape, Kushina had big teary eyes and had a look of absolute happiness and gratitude... somewhat. "Thank you. I knew I could count on you, Miko-chan."

'Eh?' Naruto's voice reverberated through the space.

At his son's confusion, Minato decided to explain. "You see, son, Kushina and Mikoto were both best friends back then and they had a friendly rivalry on the side too. So because of that, Kushina-chan is probably happy that Mikoto didn't judge you by your tenant and cares for you. Well, that much is pretty obvious from the look of adoration she just gave you."

After a pause, Naruto made an 'Oooh.' sound and put his attention back to the real world.

Once inside the house, Sasuke visited his room briefly to put away his things and came back down the stairs. He and Naruto sat at the dining table and chatted away while Mikoto cooked dinner and took part in the conversations in between.

It was at this time that Itachi came down the stairs and into the dining room. Sasuke happily bounced off his chair and into his brother while said brother just smiled at the boy's actions.

Sasuke parted eventually and gestured to the blond in the room "Niisan, this is Naruto, my classmate and friend I told you about."

Naruto smiled and bowed "Nice to meet you, Itachi-san." He then looked at the teenager and shaped his mouth into words but did not use his voice 'Hello, Weasel-san.'

Being adept at lip reading, the teen easily interpreted the words. He felt the corners of his lips twitch upwards as he nodded "Good to see you as well, Naruto-kun."

While Mikoto worked on preparing the food for dinner, the other three occupants of the room were talking to each other. Well, mostly just Naruto and Sasuke talking, and Itachi giving one-liners every now and then.

All of this stopped when Fugaku entered the room. By the time he came, dinner was ready to be served, which was done quickly as well. All of them ate in complete silence until Fugaku started to speak. "So Sasuke, who is this and what is your relationship with him?"

'I'm right here, you damn bastard.' Naruto spoke in his mind in an annoyed tone. Kushina and Kurama growled at the man for different reasons. Kushina, because she was just plain annoyed by the treatment her son was being given and Kurama, because he was getting uncomfortable between so many Uchiha.

Sasuke snapped his head towards his brother and then at his friend and back to his father. "He is Uzumaki Naruto, father. He is my classmate and close friend."

Due to being with Naruto and company for more than an year, Sasuke was no longer keen on making his father proud or acknowledge him. He was satisfied with gaining his mother and brother's attention. But after he decided that, he had noticed how... 'different' his father treated him. And thus, he now kept up a formal relationship with him, which really meant he treated Fugaku much the same as his mother did, who was very close to openly offending him but did not do so because of her reputation as the wife of the clan head.

"Hn." Fugaku grunted his response and continued to eat while glancing at the jinchūriki every now and then.

While eating silently and neatly, Naruto noticed that some killing intent was being directed at him from Fugaku. Apparently, the others had noticed as well but had kept quiet. Unfortunately for the Uchiha clan head, the blond didn't even falter in his eating. After a few moments though, he began to get annoyed by the increasing psychological torture (or an attempt at that).

'Pathetic.' Naruto thought as he released his own killing intent solely at the man.

Fugaku's eyes widened and he choked on his food for two seconds before the oppressive feeling went away. He glanced at Naruto again while drinking a glass of water. The blond was so calm, it was as if nothing had happened. After a while, he finished his meal and went back to whatever he was doing before coming for dinner, while thinking one thing 'That brat.' The reason for his reaction to the killing intent from the boy was because of the suddenness of it, not because of its potency.

Mikoto hid a smirk as she finished her own meal and got up to clean the dishes. Once out of sight of everyone else, she grinned gleefully as she worked. 'Kushina, I'm beginning to love your son more and more.'

Unbeknownst to anyone, Itachi was thinking very nearly along the same lines. Of course he knew about Naruto's parents. The people who didn't were more likely to have a screw loose in their head.

This was how the meal had come to an end that night. Naruto wished a good night to Sasuke, Itachi and Mikoto and went home to listen to Yui complain about him not having dinner with her.

A few days later, Sasuke introduced Naruto to Shisui, Itachi's closest friend. Their encounter took place in a very simple way.

"Hey there, kid. My name is Uchiha Shisui. I'm Sasuke's cousin." Shisui said, extending a hand to the blond who shook it.

"I'm Naruto... Hmm... You're kinda awesome, you know that?" Naruto said staring at the teen in front of him.

Shisui grinned widely and put a hand on Naruto's shoulder while giving a thumbs-up with his other hand, a standard nice guy pose. "We'll be getting along just fine."

And the two became best friends of a kind.

For some reason, the goddess in his mindscape was unusually silent since the past few months. When he asked what was wrong, he learnt that she was concerned that one of the most tragic moments in history was about to take place soon.

The Uchiha Massacre.

Indeed, Naruto had begun to see signs of the rumored coup d'état. The members of the clan were in more of a hurry than before and were running around the district. He knew he had to do something about this or else Sasuke would end up hating his brother and everything would fall apart… again. Unfortunately, he didn't have enough influence in political matters to have any effect on decisions. Of course, not many on the council knew that the massacre was planned but he still needed influence.

Since Naruto couldn't influence decisions directly, he decided to do something indirectly.

First of all, Naruto convinced the Hokage to suspend Shisui from taking missions temporarily and place him under house arrest either in his own house or at his friends', but under no circumstances was he to be alone. This would ensure that he would not be isolated at any time and would hence be safer with someone else's company. Safe from Danzō that is.

And then finally came the fated day.

Naruto all but kidnapped Sasuke, Shisui and Mikoto for dinner at his own home. Yui served them the most delicious meals she could make along with some help from Naruto. But even she, being a civilian, could see the tension in the room when they were having dinner. Naruto, of course, feigned ignorance by chatting with Sasuke who genuinely did not know anything. But, Yui noticed that both Shisui and Mikoto were rather gloomy the entire time.

By the time the ANBU arrived on the scene in the Uchiha district, saw the massacre and an alarm was raised in the village, Itachi was already gone. Mikoto and Shisui told Sasuke to stay at Naruto's home while they went and found out what was going on. Though, Naruto saw in their faces that they already knew exactly what had happened.

And so passed the most troublesome day in Sasuke's life.

Though Naruto berated himself every day for not being able to do anything more for the clan, or rather, more for Itachi, he also knew that he couldn't have done much more. If he had tried to stop the massacre entirely, the Uchiha clan would have moved forward with their rebellion and Konoha would have been thrown into pointless chaos and possibly a war.

Of course, there were some merits in the changes he had made as well though.

The best change he made was that he prevented the death of Sasuke's mother Mikoto and his cousin Shisui. Both of them were extremely precious to Sasuke and hence seeing them alive had less of a negative effect on the boy than when his entire clan had died. Naturally, Itachi was also precious to him and was understandably depressed. But, Mikoto and Shisui made sure not to let Sasuke see any corpses or blood. And of course, Sasuke didn't care too much about his father any more so he wasn't too concerned with the man's death.

Because of their actions and their very presence, Sasuke's life goal had changed a little than what it was in his old timeline. Now, Sasuke wanted to confront his brother and question him for his actions rather than outright murder him at first sight. Of course, Sasuke was angry at Itachi but it was not blind rage as it was before.

Sasuke had also asked his mother and cousin the reason for his brother's actions, but they did not tell him completely. For the time being, they practically begged him to not see his brother in a bad light and to give him a second chance.

Thanks to that and Naruto's efforts in pulling out the stick, Sasuke didn't brood as much as he did in Naruto's memory. He interacted with the group but was just a tad bit distant than before. When he did try to brood, this was what happened:

Flashback - A week after the massacre

Sasuke stood with his arms crossed as he watched the others run up and down trees. Tonami had taught them Tree Walking a few days ago and they were practicing it to improve their chakra reserves as well as turn the exercise into a habit and not concentrate on it when trying to do it in the future.

Tonami came up to the raven-haired boy and frowned "Are you done already?"

The Uchiha turned his head and grunted. A moment later, he snapped his head back to the man when he felt a bit of killing intent. The older man was smiling hauntingly while cracking his knuckles. "Sasuke... do you think brooding is cool and gets you girls and makes you strong?" He then let out a creepy chuckle that had Sasuke sweating. "Let me tell you something then."

The man took a deep breath and shouted "EMO IS LAME! NOW GET YOUR ASS IN GEAR AND RUN FIFTY LAPS UP AND DOWN THAT TREE!"

"Y-YES, SIR!" Sasuke squeaked loudly and began his vertical laps while Tonami held his head high in pride, proud of being able to beat the brooding out of an Uchiha, while his other students snickered. Tonami slowly turned to them with the same haunting smile, to which they immediately stopped their snickering and resumed their exercises with renewed gusto.

The next three years passed by in a flash.

The whiskered blond's reputation in the village had improved to the level where most people would remain apathetic in his presence, not treating him like a hero but not particularly going out of their way to mistreat him either. This was the result of half a decade of helping people around the village with their work. He'd gotten onto the good sides of some of the villagers who treated him like a normal friend. Some still glared at him of course, but that number was very low these days.

Naruto's daily routine had just been to train, go to school, train and sleep, which was a rounded up version of his schedule. On the weekends, he'd casually sneak into ANBU headquarters, play a random prank and get out in an obvious fashion. They'd routinely chase him around the village, which was his intent on doing the prank in the first place. Since the people chasing him were highly trained professionals, it allowed him to get better in his stealth, running, strategy (how to prank, where to run, where to hide, etc.) and trap-setting.

It had gotten so routine over the years that the ANBU would regularly fortify security on weekends, for the sole purpose of keeping the blond menace out. As if such a thing would hinder the Prankster King of Konoha. Naruto, armed with the knowledge of fūinjutsu, would pretty much just appear inside, switch their masks for clown masks or set up glitter bombs or something, and just get the hell out and wait for the chaos to start at a form of starting line made especially for chases.

Over the course of three entire years, the single time he got caught was when the head of the ANBU, codenamed 'Fox', had joined the chase. But even with his interference, it still took over two hours to catch him. When he was caught though, the boy had convinced Fox to let him play pranks on purpose every weekend to keep his subordinates alert and not let them slack off. Fox, seeing the merit in that offer, had agreed not to get involved again in his chases again, unless the boy tried to prank Fox himself.

After that incident, Naruto never attempted to prank the head of ANBU ever again, but after two years, he knew himself well enough to be able to prank Fox and get away with it. But he didn't do so out of respect for the man.

Ignoring the usual prank runs, Naruto's training had gone way past the limits of rate of human growth proportional to time. His shadow clones were practically a cheat as he used and abused them mercilessly, while abusing his real body physically in the process.

The vacations between academy semesters he used to train his more dangerous set of abilities. At the start of each vacation, he would make a super-reinforced shadow clone along with a chakra supply seal and leave it in the village to cover his presence. The real Naruto would get permission from the Hokage to go a safe distance outside the village and train in the use of Kurama's chakra, mainly in order to establish the synchronicity needed for the perfect Bijū Mōdo (Tailed Beast Mode). He also trained extensively in using Sennin Mōdo (Sage Mode) to reduce the time needed to gather Nature Energy.

Hence, his training had proceeded with no problems.

On his friends' side, they were also proceeding smoothly. All of them had both the Tree Walking and Water Walking exercises down, and with that, all of their chakra levels were low-chūnin or mid-chūnin level already, Sasuke's being high-chūnin. All of their respective taijutsu skills were very good and near the best it could reach with minimal outside help. Ninjutsu was also better in that they were more efficient in its usage, although they did not learn any new ones outside their clan-specific techniques.

In the four years of the Ninja Academy, Tonami had watched over them for the first three years and left them alone for the last year to improve by themselves.

But one thing was for certain in the minds of all members of the group. Naruto was above them all combined. They had once tried to gang up on him in one of their spars, and he had beat them all back with enough energy leftover to go one more time. They seriously wondered why he wasn't a ninja already, since they were pretty sure he should be at least chūnin with his skills. When they actually asked him about it, he had told them that he wanted to graduate alongside his friends as a group and did not want to be the odd one out. His declaration had induced some tears and hugging from the more emotional members of the group.

Another important thing to happen was regarding Naruto's sister Yui.

After all the trouble he went through to give Yui a peaceful life, the story of a boy standing up for his sister had become a kind of kid's story at nighttime which had spread outside the village. Five years after the kidnapping incident, a family of jade-green haired people had come to Konoha. They were three in number with two parents and a young girl of five years of age.

Apparently, once the rumors of the story reached their village, they had spent their resources trying to get to the root of the rumors. By their own words and assurances, the woman of the trio was the younger sister of Yui's biological mother. She had always hated her sister's actions and interests, but she couldn't find her niece after the laboratory explosion incident. Only after hearing the rumors and the rough description of the girl involved did they find her.

But after finding her, they wanted to adopt her and take her to their home in a village a fair distance from Konoha. At first, Yui had been a bit resistant, but a few words from Naruto and his insistence that she be happy for both herself and for his sake with her family, she decided to follow her relatives. She did try to get the blond to come with her but knew that wouldn't happen. Naruto was ten at the time this took place.

On the day they were leaving, Naruto, Yui and her aunt's family had gathered at the gate of the village along with some of the people from the market district. All of them shouted out their goodbyes to their little princess, happy for her to still have some living blood relatives.

Yui hugged her younger brother muttering goodbye to him and walked backwards slowly. Naruto and all the others were busy waving at her. The blond told her to come and visit someday, and gave her a warm smile. Seeing that though, a certain barrier finally broke.

In the blink of an eye, Yui was in front of Naruto and pushing her lips onto his, her arms wrapping around him. She took full advantage of his shock and slightly ajar mouth by quickly pushing her tongue inside. Yui continued to make out in public with the frozen Naruto for ten seconds, fifteen, twenty until she finally let go and separated. She whispered another goodbye right by his ear and pecked him on the cheek before running back to her gaping family and quickly getting them to move, not allowing anyone to see her burning red face.

Due to the stunt, the north gate had become a mess of puddles of blood due to nosebleeds, dropped jaws, feminine giggling, outright laughter, fuming faces and unconscious perverts.

The most severe case was the frozen blond boy standing in the middle of the chaos, eyes wide, mouth open, hands and feet frozen. The people around actually had to admit him into a hospital to cure his temporary paralysis which was gone after about a day. An entire day.

Anyway, after the incident, Naruto had wondered about what to do about the home they had lived in. Before leaving, Yui had transferred all the rights to the property to him so he was thinking how best to use it. In the end, he decided to keep the shop downstairs as a way to make some money by selling the vegetables and fruits he had been growing in the training ground. But instead of a shop, he converted it to a stall so that the Civilian Business Association couldn't have any quarrel with him, the 'demon brat', even though no one called him that anymore, at least not openly. The staff for the stall he filled with Henge'd shadow clones, reinforced ones.

The last important thing to have happened is that Naruto revealed one of his secrets to his friends.

When they reached an age that he was sure they were smart enough to think things through - which was the age of 12, one year before graduation from the academy - Naruto assembled all eight of them in the Hokage's office and told them about the presence of a bijū in his gut. Though he feared they would reject him or hate him, he found that their respect for him had grown even more than before, which was admittedly a lot already. Not a single one of them shunned him and it warmed his heart to see them accept him… again. Even though he could have told them about his tenant some other time, he confessed he didn't want to keep secrets from them… not too many at least.

Ever since that day, whenever a random villager glared at Naruto, all of his friends glared right back at him/her, severely unnerving the rebellious villager.

They thought for a moment that Naruto was using the Kyūbi's power to win their fights against him, but a vehement denial from the blond in question ceased that line of thought. If nothing else, they knew Naruto would not lie. Not to his friends. So they believed in his words.

After that day however, Naruto had noticed that Ino was spending substantially more time with him. She would invite him to her house for dinner at least three times a week, with Sakura joining occasionally. As a result, he had gotten very familiar with the members of her family as well as her clan. He politely ignored the playful sexual assault Mana attempted every time he visited, as he talked with Inoichi before and over dinner.

Though the cause for his presence, Ino, never showed any strange signs around Naruto. By his thoughts, along with his parents', she was either masterfully concealing her emotions or she was genuinely more friendly and wanted to show her support for him for his 'burden'.

He supposed it was the latter and just left the matter… for now.

Today was the day of the Genin Graduation Exam for the final year academy students.

All of the students, except one, were seated on the benches and chatting happily with their neighbors. Some were still trying to cram in any bit of knowledge they could get in the last minute.

The Inheritance Gang were much more calmer than their neighbors though.

As usual, Kiba was showing off his alpha-ness as usual, Shikamaru was asleep, Chōji was eating chips, Ino was trying to get the lazy Nara to wake up, Shino was buzzing (read: seated stoically with the subtle sound of insects around him), Hinata was looking around the class, Sakura was making small talk with Sasuke who was replying minimally while keeping his head on his palm looking bored out of his life. They were all wearing their normal outfits but the girls in the group had much more muscle mass than if they were to diet, hence having a certain appeal to them.

At that moment, the door to the classroom slid open silently and in walked someone the entire class, if not the entire village, knew very well. Though when they saw him, some of the female population of the class blushed unknowingly.

Uzumaki Naruto, at the age of thirteen, stood at 5'3 - a quarter of an inch taller than Sasuke. His golden blond hair was kept in a spiky fashion with a pair of goggles around his neck. He had trimmed his bangs which used to make him look identical to his father, since he wanted a bit of uniqueness.

He was wearing black cargo pants with blue ninja sandals, a sleeveless black zip-up jacket - left open - with a red swirl on the back and thin orange borders, along with a form-fitting short-sleeved orange undershirt. The jacket had several pockets lining its inner area which were empty at the moment, sans the academy equipment. Both of his hands were sporting black fingerless gloves with a metal plate strapped to its back.

A kunai pouch was securely strapped to his right thigh, along with two shuriken/supply pouches at the waist. He had made sure to strengthen each piece of his attire with seals for durability, along with a seal for self-repairing minor damage.

Naruto walked in with his hands in his pockets and went to the empty seat beside Hinata who was, at the moment, blushing up a storm similar to the other girls. The reason for that were his abdominal muscles that were showing slightly through his orange shirt. Ignoring the red storm around him, the blond smiled and waved casually to his friends, who waved back, before seating himself.

Some of the girls in the class eyed him for a few minutes until Iruka barged in and silenced them all, shortly after which Mizuki entered, openly glaring at the blond jinchūriki in the class.

Iruka watched all of them calm down and swept his eyes across the class while raising an eyebrow at his favorite blond's new attire. Done with his initial inspection, he explained the rules of the exam and distributed the sheets for the first part of the exam - the written test.

With the new reforms from the Ninja Council under the supervision of the Hokage, the basic rules regarding the score were as follows.

Minimum overall percentage of 75% needed to pass the exam and become Genin.
Passing grade for individual subjects is 50%.

This meant that the student must have 50% minimum score in all four subjects - Written, Physical Conditioning, Weapon Throwing and the Basic Three Ninjutsu. Beyond that however, they must have scores that average upto 75%. This can be done in either one of two ways.

One - The student can score 75% or above in each subject, thus giving the required average.
Two - The student can score less than 75% in a certain subject while compensating for it in another subject, thereby maintaining the average. But, the low scoring subject must have a minimum of 50%, else the average would be invalidated.

With Naruto's understanding of the rules, he filled the exam sheet so as to receive exactly 50 points, before setting his pen down and waiting. He wrote his answers in ways that no one could fail him because the questions he did answer, he answered masterfully without a single error or missing point. If someone refused to give him points, they would have to do for the entire class.

Once done with the written exams, the students were given a ten minute break before being moved out to the field. There they were asked to run laps, do push-ups, sit-ups and finally, run an obstacle and stealth course. Naruto, along with everyone of his friends, breezed through this part of the exam, earning them a perfect 100.

Next came the weapon throwing test. The goal was to throw 10 kunai and 20 shuriken towards the target a good distance away, with 5 points for every kunai and 2.5 points for every shuriken that hit the target. As a minimum, 5 kunai and 10 shuriken must hit the target to be able to pass.

And Naruto did just that. He flung 5 kunai first which landed with one in the center and four more in the corners of a square, looking like an 'X' mark. After that, he threw the other 5 kunai directly towards the already hit kunai, making them bounce off of them and missing the target entirely. He did the same for the shuriken, flinging 10 at once and hitting perfectly, then deliberately missing the remaining 10.

Every single person there knew he was playing. They knew he was not taking this seriously. They knew that if he wanted to hit the target accurately, he would hit it with complete dead precision. But he didn't. Despite his actions and obvious skill however, the teachers could not simply give him full points for his abilities. Because, in the end, he missed. And hence, they settled on giving him 50 points, since he passed anyway.

Finally came the ninjutsu test. The students were asked to perform the Basic Three Academy techniques - Henge (Transformation), Kawarimi (Substitution) and Bunshin (Clone). Naruto had long since mastered all three of them and had no problems with performing them. Though the satisfaction he felt when he successfully made three normal clones was one that he would never forget.

Naruto took the given hitai-ate and eyed it for a moment. He felt extremely… relieved to have one in his possession again. For the past few years, reminding himself that he was not a ninja yet and did not have one yet was irritating for him. Now that he finally had one however, he wanted to shout out to the world that he was back again.

He did no such thing of course, a little concerned that the people around might think of him as crazy. Instead, he removed the goggles from his neck and put it in his pocket, before tying the new hitai-ate, his confirmation that he was indeed a ninja of Konoha, around his neck. The blond did not tie it around his forehead because he wanted a new style, something different than before. Which explained the new clothes and the hitai-ate placement.

Naruto flicked his thumb on the metal piece and listened satisfyingly to the cling sound that resounded from it. He closed his eyes, took in a deep breath and smiled. He was back again alright, back in business.

But before going further…

He glanced towards Mizuki who appeared calm on the outside, but was emitting negative emotions in waves. So much so that Naruto didn't even need the Negative Emotions Sensing ability from Kurama.

That problem needed to be fixed.

Once the exams were over, he saw Mizuki coming towards him and smiled secretly.

At the moment, Naruto was at a forest clearing with the Scroll of Seals, waiting for Mizuki to come and award him 'extra credits'. A while later, the man in question arrived.

He took a look at Naruto and gave an evil smile, which in Naruto's opinion was the least evil smile he had ever seen in his life. "Ah, so you are here after all, Naruto. I was worried you failed the task since there is no alarm sounding in the village."

The blond gave a grin "Who do you think I am Mizuki-tem… I mean Mizuki-sensei?"

The man clearly missed the slip-up and instead threw a kunai at the blond who 'accidentally' stumbled away from it. He looked at the man with obviously faked horror "Wh-Wha? Mizuki-sensei?"

Mizuki was doing his best impression of an evil grin as he looked at the boy down on the ground while he stood on a tree branch above. "Tell me, Naruto. Do you know why the villagers hate you so much? Why they despise you? Why they isolate and abuse you?"

"Yes. Yes I do."

The man laughed loudly before continuing "Well, let me tell you then. It is because you- Wait, what?" He asked dumbly after he processed the boy's words.

This time, it was Naruto who gave an evil grin, which looked much more genuine than the man's attempts "Because…" he controlled Kurama's energy to form nine perfectly defined tails using the red chakra behind him while his eyes became crimson and pupils were slitted

"Because… I am the Kyūbi!" he lifted his head and gave a feral grin.

The blood drained from Mizuki's face as his skin became pale and limbs began to tremble. Suddenly, the jinchūriki in front of him vanished from his line of sight. He looked around while still trembling but could not find him.

"Boo." the boy's demonic voice sounded just behind his ear.

A very girlish scream rung throughout the village before it died down, leaving a few villagers in panic, and the majority in confusion. Some ANBU set out towards the source of the scream to get to the root of the situation.

Back in the forest, Mizuki was lying on the ground, passed out from fear and shock, after having fallen off the branch while Naruto was back in his normal form and laughing his ass off.

"O-Oh my god. That was easily one of the best pranks I've ever played." he said in between his chuckles and gasps for air.

"Gotta agree with that… It's been a long time since I've seen something like that." the bijū within him said while finishing his chuckles with a smirk. Even Kushina and Minato were holding their hands to their mouths to stifle their giggles while the violet-haired goddess had already passed out from excessive laughter.

"Oh hey, you can go now." Naruto said while looking at the base of a tree where the Scroll of Seals was placed. Said scroll went up in smoke as it cleared to show another Naruto holding his throat and taking deep breaths while trying not to laugh himself. He eventually nodded and poofed out of existence.

Naruto got up and stretched his hands above his head, and looked to the unconscious man below him. He shrugged and jumped down to the ground near him. "Guess I'll just drop him off at T&I and go get some ramen." He unceremoniously grabbed the man's leg with one hand and put his other hand in his pocket, and began to walk back towards the village with a smile on his face. It was good to be back alright.

Yep, Uzumaki Naruto was back in the game.

This time, better than ever.

A/N: And that's a goddamn wrap!

First of all, yes, I apologize for blazing through so many things in a single chapter. I'm sorry for not putting in proper interactions between Naruto and Sasuke's or Ino's family, but I just wanted to just get to the starting line already. I'm sick and tired of thinking of things for the childhood part, and I just wanted to end that quickly.

But do not worry. I am planning to put in some interactions between them in future chapters. Just not now, that's all.

EDIT (17/11/2016): Ok. I will honestly say that I did not know the readers liked Yui that much. So instead of simply purging her from the fic, I have another idea in mind. But it won't happen until maybe one or two chapters later.

One last thing. I hope you like the new name. But the epic-ness will be starting from the next chapter.

REVIEW REPLIES

1. Are you serious? Naruto's life has been fucked up by that crazy kami, and he doesn't seem upset about it? This is very unreal... The worst part, is when he think about his non-existing feelings about Hinata. Just NO.
But... Well, I'll read this story, anyways. I hope a fix with good plot and well-done fights...

R. I edited a bit of the first chapter to add some 'anger' but in the end, he can't just go against her. After all, however nice she may be, she's Kami. And regarding Hinata, the main reply I can give you is 'No romance… yet.' Regarding plot and fights, I honestly have no idea. I just hope to myself I can do well.

2. Reviewer: Azaira

R. Thank you very much for your incredibly detailed and insightful reviews and I will try my best to fix any issue you as well as anyone else point out specifically.

3. Reviewer: Percx

R. By now, I think of you as some kind of trusted advisor or something. You reviewed each chapter so far and I am happy and thankful for that. If possible, please continue to do so for this and future chapters as well. Also, yeah. Something's always missing from my chapters. I probably know what it is, but can't get around fixing it. I'll try though. Thanks.

Thank you for reading this chapter and please leave a REVIEW below. It helps. A lot. Please look forward to the next chapter as well. Blaze Out!