Summary: A frozen world that has never been brought to light. It's story untold. A boy concludes his destiny as he faces sorrow, heartbreak, and death on a mission he never thought he would have to complete. Personally created characters first. Original main characters later.

Ok, this is my first successful fan-fic, so please correct me, critizise, praise, whatever the heck your little heart desires! Oh, and I would like to note that the "Naruto" world, characters, and story is not mine and all it's rights belong to it's ingenius creator!

Umm...I apologize, this first part is kind of boring, but you have to read it in order to understand the rest of the story! If you skip it…I will know…mwahahaha! XD

Section One: The Village Hidden in the Snow

Ice. The land no one knew of.

Snow. The village hidden in this frozen landscape. This village was very small. A population of a mere ninety people; it was also young-- almost twenty-one, but it was thriving well.

Shenobi-- Ninja. The people that kept this tiny village alive. All ninety of them.

This village originated from the Land of Lightning's Village Hidden in the Clouds. One shenobi by the name of Haruko Inakura (who, in the end, turned out to be quite foolish) was inspired in his young age (around twenty-five) to create his own ninja utopia (though understand that his "inspiration" came from an extreme jealousy of his own Raikage). He committed to research on the subject and found a small peninsula very far to the north of the Land of Lightning. He and thirty other ninja-- Jounin and Chunin-- claimed the peninsula and together they started upon it the Village Hidden in the Snow calling it's place of rest the Land of Ice.

They very soon discovered the almost unbearable change in climate that took place every morning and evening during the winter, putting an understatement to the name "Land of Ice." All thirty ninja threatened to leave Haruko in his desolate village and move to warmer lands. Haruko pleaded that his people should give him three days to find a solution, so they did.

Haruko spent all seventy-two hours searching ancient documents and scrolls for an answer to their problem, when dawn came-- the morning that would end his time of redemption. His fingers trembled as he searched franticly to find a solution to keep his dream alive. Then, he stumbled across something. It was the Fusion Jutsu-- a forbidden jutsu. This allowed the user to combine a human body (the users' or another) with the body of another living being. He figured that combining a ninja with one of the three common forest animals in their region (the wolf, the polar bear, and the lynx) would give the subject the adequate survival skills to live in their frigid world. Although, not only was it a forbidden jutsu, but there was no way to make it permanent. Or was there?

Haruko read on. He needed to hurry. He could see the sun coming up over the horizon. He knew that his comrades would soon be there demanding his solution. Then, he found it! In a very small context, it said that in order to make the Fusion Jutsu permanent a three inch cut must be made on the left side of the body with a kunai knife that has been saturated in the blood of the creature that is being fused with the human. Next to this was something else that was written. Haruko tried to read it, but it had been smeared through age, making it illegible. He decided that this was not important. He also decided to overlook the fact that it was forbidden. He figured that his village was far enough away from any of the Five Great Shenobi Villages that it wouldn't matter. And it didn't. Or, so he thought…

Haruko tried the jutsu first on himself, finding it very successful. He then preformed it on all thirty Jounin who were very content with the results. Haruko divided the village into three tribes - the Wolf Tribe, the Bear Tribe, and the Lynx Tribe (although, each tribe did not consist of the same families). The villagers could now live comfortably as they built upon their small ninja nation. Very soon, other villages were established on the Land of Ice. Including the small fishing village to the east of the Village Hidden in the Snow, Oomaru.

There are a couple things to address about this jutsu. First of all, the Fusion Jutsu, when preformed, would produce a few "side-effects" in the human. Not only would the animal pass on their super-acute senses to their human hosts, but they also could give one some of their physical manifestations as well. For example the ears of the animal may appear, or a tail. Maybe the subject's eyes could change to look like their animal's eyes. They could have claws, even teeth like their animal. But not everyone would acquire all of these traits. Sometimes only a few permanent animal changes could occur, some not at all. It really depended on the person. The most common physical change was the ears.

Second, on the subject of multiplying in population. When two ninja who have had the jutsu preformed on them have a child, the child will not automatically acquire the animal traits of his or her parents. The jutsu would have to be preformed on the child separately and the parents would decide what tribe to put him or her in. In most common incidents the parents would be from the same tribe and would put their child in the same tribe as well, but sometimes the parents would be from different tribes. This was when they would have to decide. Finally, once the jutsu is preformed, the human subject obtains the ability to "take on" their animal form for a lengthened period of time. The experience of the ninja and their chakra levels will determine how difficult it will be to maintain their animal form.

In the center of the Village Hidden in the Snow there was a small Ninja Academy. There were never more than ten students attending there. This meant that the sensei teaching the future ninja there would be able to spend more time with each individual student making it very easy for the students to learn quickly and graduate early.

Like usual, when the students graduated into the Genin class, they were separated into squads and were given a Jounin squad leader. They would be trained by this sensei-- taking on missions, training with individual exercises and drills, always on the challenge. Although, a problem occurred. Once a sensei believed that his squad members were ready for the Chunin exams, they found out that the trip to the elemental land hosting the exam twice a year was too far for anyone to travel and they would not have been able to make it. So, Haruko (now appointed "Lord Inakura") decided to host his own unofficial Chunin exams at the Village Academy. It worked out beautifully. The young Genin would become Chunin and move on, continuing to protect their beloved village.

End…Chapter One: Introductions

Shigure: Hey, when do we come in?

Sora: Yeah, seriously. Maybe I should just go to The Haunted Alchemist's fan-fic instead!

Just calm down guys! You come in next.

Sora: Ok, good because I don't think I could handle being an alchemist.

Shigure: Sora, you can hardly handle being a ninja. What makes you think that-

Hey! Shut up! You're going to give stuff away! You know how much I hate that!

Anyway...

R&R please!