Disclaimer: I do NOT own any of the characters written here. They are own by their respective owners. Nuff' said. Yes I know the title is speeled wrong. It is meant to be.

Warning: This is rated M for a reason (blood, gore, extreme violence, language, and possible adult themes/lemons, etc.) Some of the characters will be a little OC.

Now on with my first story.


The Black Leaves

Chapter 1

A eight-year-old Uzumaki Naruto frowned at the jar sitting on the other side of his kitchen table. The jar was filled with some strange black liquid and Naruto was staring at the jar as if it was some kind of poison. Which, as far as he knew, it was.

Uzumaki Naruto was short for his age, had lightly tanned skin, spiky blond hair, and bright blue eyes. On each of his cheekswere three horizontal whisker-like marks. He always liked his marks, he thought that they looked somewhat intimidating and would make any enemy ninja cour in fear if they ever saw them. Basically, Naruto looked like someone that any woman would randomly pick up and squeeze into her breasts in a bone crushing hug because of his cuteness.

Unfortunately most of the adult villagers would not even go near the boy let alone touch him. Instead they would glare, ignore, or verbally assualt little Naruto. On rare occasions, the villagers would gang up and beat the boy until an ANBU would come in and stop the abuse. Sometimes the beatings would be so bad that Naruto would have to be sent to the hospital, luckily he had his own personal doctors and nurses that the Hokage had assigned to take care of Naruto every time he is sent to the hospital.

The cause of the tormentwas the demon sealed inside of him. On the day of Naruto's birth the Kyuubi-no-yoko attacked Konoha and caused many deaths and much destruction. It lasted for several hours until the fourth Hokage sealed the great demon inside Naruto. Over the years the villagers' hatred for the fox was projected onto the boy, who most saw as the demon itself. Only a few people saw Naruto for who he really was and not what was sealed inside him. Because of a law made to 'protect' Naruto, it was illegal for anybody to even hint at what was sealed away without risk of execution. This law was meant to allow Naruto to make at least a few friends with children his own age, and so far it has only caused him pain.

One would think that such torture would break one's spirit and drive them to do terrible things. Not Uzumaki Naruto. Naruto would always appear to be in a good mood, a big smile on his face or a look of absolute determination. His will appeared unwavering. The only time his happy demeanor would falter would be either during a beating or when someone hurt one of his precious people. Though limited in number, the little boy would do anything in his power to protect and make his precious people happy.

Flashback

A few hours ago, after he had had his dinner of twelve bowls of ramen at the Ichiraku Ramen Bar and was heading home with a full stomach, Naruto was stopped by a figure wearing a tan cloak and an ANBU mask.

"Hello there, Naruto," The figure said in a kind female voice. "I have a gift for you."

Naruto glared at the figure, years of being the 'butt' of many cruel jokes from the villagers has made him wary of any form of 'gift'. "And just who are you, lady?" He said snobbishly.

The woman lightly chuckled. "Who I am is not important," She reached into her cloak and pulled out a large clear glass jar filled with a strange black liquid. "What is important is what is inside this jar."

The women nelt down so that she was face-to-face with the short blond kid, and held the jar between them. "Inside this jar, is something that is very special. But before I can give it to you, I have a question. Do you want to become strong, Naruto?"

"More than anything else in the world!" Naruto shouted loudly, while a fire of passion burned behind his eyes. "I'm gonna' train to become the strongest ninja in the whole village and become Hokage!" He pumped a fist in the air at his declaration.

The woman gave another light chuckle and asked with mirth, "And why is that? Why do you want to become Hokage, it is such a big responsibility?"

Naruto's face broke into his famous foxy grin. "I want to be Hokage so that I can protect the people that are important to me and to finally get the respect of the whole village."

"Alright," The lady said as she held out the jar to the child. "Take it."

Not wanting to be too impolite to the nice lady, Naruto took the jar and smiled. "Thanks lady."

The woman stood up, turned around, and began to walk away. She was only able to take a few steps before Naruto called out to her.

"Hey, lady. You never told me exactly what is inside the jar or why you gave it to me."

She mentally shook her head and smiled underneath her mask. Turning to face the boy she said, "I already told you that something very special is inside that jar, it will help make you very strong, all you have to do is open it. Not here!" She quickly added as she saw Naruto about to open the jar. "Wait until you get home to open it, then reach in and grab the black stuff inside. To answer why I am giving it to you. It's because your special, nothing else." And with that the lady disappeared in a cloud of white smoke.

Naruto looked down at the jar in his arms and smiled broadly. 'If this stuff will make me strong than I can become Hokage faster. Maybe the old man would see how strong and awesome I realy am and just hand over the title of Hokage to me. I'll become the youngest Hokage ever!!!'

And with that final thought, Naruto ran home with the biggest grin he ever had. As he neared his apartment though, his mood and thoughts changed. 'That lady was nice but how do I know what she said is true?' He held the jar up to eye level so that he could see the black substance. 'She said this stuff would help make me strong. As far as I know she could just have been trying to trick me into taking some kind of poison. This junk doesn't look like like it will help me get strong. But then again, it could be some new kind of super medicine that will make me grow giant muscles and make me strong enough to crush any mountain.'

Naruto continued to mull over whether the black liquid was as he reached his small apartment, unlocked the door and went inside. He placed the jar on one side of his kitchen table, grabbed the seat directly across from the jar and sat down.

Naruto's apartment was small; with a single bedroom that had a single person bed, a small dresser, a nightstand with an alarm clock, and a small closet. Across from his bedroom was his bathroom which had the bare necessities for said room. His kitchen/dinning room was connected to a small living room by a small hallway. The living roomonly had a small two person couch that looked to be about twenty years old in the center of the room and a small table in one of the corners of the room where he had a small potted fern sitting on top. Naruto's kitchen/dinning room was as small as his bedroom, with a small table that was able to sit two people at either end, a sink, a couple cuburds filled with his favorite food, ramen, and a small refrigerator. Despite the limited space, Naruto was comfortable with his home, he had all he needed. He was never able to understand why people always wanted to have a big house, all it would do is take up space that could be used for something more important, like training to become Hokage. Naruto was glad that the Hokage bought him his apartment after he was kicked out of the orphanage.

Present Time

Naruto suddenly stood up and walked over towards the jar and stared hard at it, as if hoping the answer would just appear on the jar itself. 'I don't know what to do!' He mentally screamed. 'I can either risk getting poisoned if it is dangerous or become incredibly strong if what the lady said is true. But I can also show it to the old man and ask him what it is, but he'll probably say that I shouldn't mess around with stuff if I don't know what it is and then he would take it away and I still would have no idea what the Hell this stuff is!'

Naruto shrugged his shoulders and grabbed the jar with his right hand. With his other hand he unscrewed the lid of the jar and placed it on the table. He stared down at the black liquid and thought. 'well, I've never heard of a poison that kills people just because they touch it,' He took a deep breath, 'It's now or never.' He closed his eyes tightly and reached into the jar.

His hand came into contact with the black liquid and he held it there, just lightly on the surface of the liquid. Naruto kept his hand there for several seconds and slowly opened his eyes. He looked down at the hand touching the black junk.

"It's warm." He said to himself surprised. Seeing that nothing had happened when his hand touched the stuff, Naruto pushed his hand past the thin barrier that separated the liquid from the air and felt his whole hand encompassed by warmth. He noticed that the substance felt more like glue than water and it didn't ripple when his hand touched it. Naruto tried to grab the contents of the jar.

Suddenly the black goop began to travel up Naruto's arm. In surprise he yanked his arm out of the jar, causing it to roll off the table to smash on the floor. The black junk was still crawling up his left arm as the empty jar fell. Before the substance could reach his elbow, he grabbed a handful and tried to pull it off. The substance stretched as Naruto pulled at it and it began to crawl up his right arm along with his left. Before long both of Naruto's arms, chest, and upper parts of his legs were covered in the black substance. He tried to call out in vain hope that someone would come, but his voice did not seem to work.

It did not take long for the black substance to travel up his neck and begin covering his head. He suddenly began to feel tired, like as if he had ran twenty laps around Konoha without a break. Then his vision went black as the substance covered his entire body.

Meanwhile, Inside The Kyuubi's Seal

The giant fox demon was thrashing around inside his cage. "Something is trying to get in and gain control, but what?"

The room of the Kyuubi-no-kitsune was impossibly large, the ceiling could not be seen since it reached beyond the most powerful eyesight into darkness. The whole room was flooded with several inches of water that continuouslydripped from the pipes that came out of the concrete walls. Basically the room looked like a sewer, only cleaner. The bars of the fox's cage were like the bars of a jail cell with a small slip of paper that had the kanji for seal on the center bar. Dispite the lack of any form of light source, everything except for the ceiling and the single massive hallway exit could easily be seen.

The sounds of crashing water and the vibrating floor drew the nine-tail's attention to the only entrance to his chamber. Something big was approaching and judging from the vibrations of the floor, whatever it was, it was as large if not larger than the Kyuubi itself. Before the unknown guest could be seen, the vibrations stopped. The being had stopped just before the light of the room could touch it.

"Who are you!?" The demon demanded of the unseen figure, his lips curled back into a vicious snarl.

At first he got no reply. Then suddenly a large black fist flew out of the darkened hallway and smashed several bars of the cage. Kyuubi was so surprised by the action that he failed to notice the countless number of small black tendrils that slithered along the walls and floor towards his cage.

The fist opened up revealing five strong fingers that had dark purple claws in place of nails. Kyuubi snapped out of his shock and noticed that the hand was larger than his head and was attached to a heavily muscled arm.

Kyuubi tried to attack the hand but sudden pain caused him to stop in his advance. He looked down to see millions of small black tendrils wrapping themselves around his legs. He tried to yank his legs free but every little movement caused a massive wave of agony to course through his body.

The giant hand pulled back and disappeared into the darkness of the hallway.

"Grah!" Kyubbi growled as he tried to free himself. "What the Hell is this?! Who are you and what are you doing to me?!"

The unseen being remained silent as the tendrils began to travel up the fox's body.

"Stop this at once! Do you know who I am?!" The Kyuubi roared as he ignored the pain caused by his thrashing about. "I am the great Kyuubi-no-yoko and I will devour your soul for attacking me! I am going to rip out your intestines and hang you with them! I am going to skin you alive and use your pelt as a bath mat!"

Suddenly the great demon lords legs gave out underneath him and he toppled over onto his side. His eyes widened as realization finally struck.

"Your trying to kill me?!" He roared in absolute rage. "You dare to attack and kill the most powerful demon in existence?!"

The Kyuubi slowly began to chuckle while the tendrils crawled all over his body. His light chuckling soon became full blown insane laughter. "You can't kill me! Nothing can kill me!" He continued to laugh and boast while his body was slowly over taken by the tendrils.

In a matter of minutes, the dreaded demon that caused so much havoc and mayhem for countless centuries, was gone. The mighty Kyuubi was dead.

The tendrils slowly began to retreat back into the hallway where they had come from. They left no sign of the giant fox or of their presence. As soon as all of the tendrils were gone, several giant tentacles took their place. The tentacles slowly stretched and spread out until the entire room was black.

The sounds of crashing water and the vibration of the ground slowly retreated from the now empty room.

The Next Day, Early Morning

"Uugh," Naruto groaned as he slowly woke up and got into a sitting position. "What the Hell happened last night?" Slowly, the images of what took place the previous night flashed in his mind.

Jerking his left hand into view, he saw no sign of the black liquid that had attacked him last night. Naruto slowly stood up and began to look himself over for any sign of the black stuff.

Just as he was about to take his jacket and shirt off to check the rest of his body, a loud beeping sounded from his bedroom. He quickly dashed to said room and saw to his horror that he was going to be late for academy. All thoughts of last night's events disappeared from his mind as he took a quick shower and dressed in a pair of green boxers, his orange sweatpants, strapped on his waepon holster on his right leg, a skin tight black shirt, and his orange jacket. Naruto quickly jumped into his blue ninja sandals, dashed out his front door, locked it, and bolted towards the academy.

'Crap, I hope I'm not too late. I really don't want to have to listen to Iruka-sensei's lecture about tardiness, again," Naruto thought as he took to the rooftops and continued on his way.

Several Minutes Later

Naruto arrived at the academy and ran to his class. When he arrived, he noticed that almost all of the seats were taken except two.

One of the available seats was next to a loud pink-haired girl in a red combat dress and black bicycle shorts who went by the name Haruno Sakura. The other seat was next to a quiet dark-haired girl who wore a oversized tan jacket and tight black ninja pants. Since he did not fully know the shy girl, besides that her name was Hyuuga Hinata, and not one to pass up the chance to make a new friend, Naruto went over to the girl.

"Is this seat taken?" He asked her. The girl jumped at the sound of Naruto's voice and faced him with bright red blush present on her face.

'Naruto-kun wants to sit next to me and not next to Sakura?' Hinata thought to herself. Suddenly Naruto's face fell when she did not give him an answer.

"If you don't want me to sit here, than I'll just sit somewhere else," He made to the other available seat when a small squeak drew his attention back to the Hyuuga. "What was that?"

Hinata silently gulped and gathered up all of her available courage. "Y-you can s-sit he-here, N-N-Naruto-kun." She gave a quiet sigh of relief when his famous foxy grin appeared on his face.

"Thanks, Hinata-chan," Naruto said as he sat down. Hinata turned red at his thanks and began to fiddle with her fingers.


To be continued...

Next Time... You'll find out what happens in the next chapter.

R&R

Nuff' said