Welcome to the Gates of Hell, my most freaky and faithful of Darlings!

Read this, or you're going to be a bit lost. By a bit lost, I mean if I get a review asking about something I answered, I am sending the most annoying demons I can find to steal your left sock, right shoe, and all forks in the house.

I came to a conclusion with Naruto, The Bloody Maelstrom... I can't write it any more, because I wrote it alongside my dear brother Phantom. It was our little bastard-love-child, and Blood was a personification of his own inner sadism and humor. Because of that, I honestly didn't think I could constantly recreate the mind of an indescribable man for every scene with Blood.

I can, however, do something very interesting in it's place. I've finally matured mentally to the point of understanding Blood. His actions are only for the sake of entertainment. He doesn't spread chaos for the sake of spreading chaos, he doesn't kill just to kill, he doesn't fight for the sake of fighting; he does it to entertain himself. So, why would Blood honestly need Naruto as a mortal vessel? He wouldn't. There is, however, one little cosmic loophole that Blood would like to exploit. I won't ruin it here though. That would be bad.

In terms of differences between Bloody Maelstrom and the Redux... well, let's list the two big ones: Naruto, and the world around him. Yeah, that pretty much covers EVERYTHING in the bloody story. Now, I won't give any spoilers, but let me say it in a more general way:

People have more legit reactions and personalities.

Naruto has his own character sheet. I'm going to use it to actually level him up and track his progress. His class is admittedly homestyle, but it's more for reference than anything. His species... is also different. Why? Because Blood... well, you'll see.

Enough of that long-winded bullshit! Let the redux begin!

]_'/}0{\'_[

Naruto was decently sure he had an evil twin somewhere that he was catching the Karmic backlash for; at this point, he had no better explanation for his situation.

Being attacked by a Sannin in disguise in the Forest of Death: Unlikely, but he supposed that it wasn't overly far-fetched. He wasn't too dense, and though he didn't know what that ninja's hickey did to Sasuke, he knew that the Sharingan were valuable and the dark chakra that Sasuke was putting out, coming from that mark, felt a bit too much like the snake-man's for comfort.

Being attacked by three Oto genin claiming to be sent by Orochimaru to kill them. Again, unlikely, but he still figured that worse things had happened to him.

Having a second Oto team show up a few minutes later that was just as strong as the last group –that is to say, stronger than team 7 –was a bit too much for even Naruto to believe to be simple coincidence or bad luck. There was a deity somewhere, and he or she was having a ball tormenting the young boy.

"Might just be catching the Karma of the Kyuubi.", he thought to himself, watching Sasuke get thrown back into Sakura, a few feet to his left. "Which means I'm going to die here. Painfully."

He had always thought that he was going to die a hero and a Hokage; perhaps he had merely convinced himself of that. A cry of pain tore itself from his throat as a kunai lodged itself into his thigh, penetrating bone. "Yeah; gonna die. So much for that Hero bullshit; I guess I've been fooling myself the entire time. I'm weak, and now I'm going to die."

Yet Power lurks in your body and soul,

more than enough to preserve thine goal.

Yet here you stand, you hesitate,

Now tell me boy, why do you wait?

The voice sent a jolt of terror down Naruto's spine, but he realized a moment later that the jolt hadn't actually resulted in movement. In fact, nothing did; moments later he realized the nothing in the clearing was moving. The leaves themselves were frozen in midair.

Speak Child; you stand to die

I ask a single question: Why?

Not answering is Ill-advised,

lest you desire the end Death devised

The voice pierced through the petrified world with the sharpness of an executioner's axe and the force of a wildfire. Then, creeping forth with the predatory purpose of a nightmare, the darkness of the forest seeped forth in a choking blanket. Heavy footfalls shook the ground and writhing shadows, each beat bringing a red glow from the heart of the darkness beyond the trees.

"Wh-what the hell?", the words rang through Naruto's head, unable to escape his frozen mouth. His lungs screamed for oxygen while something in his core screamed for him to run.

Good Guess.

It had to be at least eight feet tall; broad in the shoulders and body rippling with muscle hidden under crimson fur. It's torso was bare, displaying several scars where fur no longer grew; everything below the waist was covered in some sort of heavy metal armor—not quite a samurai's, but similar. On it's shoulder was a metal band covered in runes, and a similar one rest on it's wrist with hundreds of chains connecting the two. Naruto paled as it neared, starting to see things he had hoped were tricks of the twilight.

The bands looked to be grafted into the being's flesh, but it's head drew his eyes from that—they seemed to be the only thing he could move. The mouth was too broad to be a wolf's, but it was definitely a canine head, though the long, sweeping black horns added only further horror to the image.. Alabaster fangs gleamed in the crimson twilight while red eyes—more akin to pools of blood and fire than the word red could ever come—stared at Naruto, burning into his soul and judging him.

For the sake of not making you lose any more sanity on the spot, I'll skip the usual rhyming routine; it was getting boring anyway. The beast said, adding the last bit in an offhanded tone.

Naruto wasn't entirely sure this wasn't some sort of premortem hallucination, though he wasn't entirely sure it wasn't a postmortem mindfuck given to him by the deity he was contemplating a few minutes earlier.

No, I'm quite real; much like your impending doom, as it happens. I don't envy you, not one bit. The one in bandages intends to corpsefuck you, you see. The beast snapped it's clawed fingers, causing Naruto to almost fall with the sudden return of his ability to move.

"Wh-...What are you?", was all he could manage to get out. The monster before him was something far worse than the hateful bijou that had been baiting him from a young age.

Who. Calling someone a what is just rude. The beast replied, chuckling. Naruto noticed that, despite the dialog, the beast's mouth didn't move. Yes, I'm telepathic, and you need to learn how to think at a lower volume. Moving forward, before this gets boring, my name is Blood. Preferably Lord Blood. I'm the King of Hell, so I deserve that much at least. If not, I'll just kill anyone who disagrees.

No need to get so tense; I'm here to make a deal, not to kill you. Blood said with a chuckle, seeing the young human tense at his words. I'll keep this simple, since you seem to be busy with the whole about-to-die-and-get-corpsefucked thing. Basically, I'm bored as hell, and I couldn't help but notice that your world is ripe for a little... hell...

There's only one issue: I took a little vow when I became a God of Death not to directly interfere with a world. Luckily, there's a little loophole: as both a deity and the King of hell, I can skip around that little vow if I have enough followers in a given world. Due to how young your world is it's barely connected to hell, let alone established enough with all the planes to know of me. Of course, I could always just open up the gates of hell and step into your world, razing everything to the ground, but that got old after three worlds. Having followers tends to be more entertaining anyway.

"You're... saving my life for your own amusement?"

I didn't say anything about saving your life. I'm just going to give you a little test; if you pass, the enemies will be dead. If you get corpsefucked, you fail and I find the next fuck to test. Quite frankly, you're the fifth fucker I've tested in the last twenty four hours.

"...This is a hallucination.", Naruto said, facepalming in hopes of waking himself up.

If it's just a figment of your imagination, what's stopping you from trying?

There was a fair amount of truth in Blood's statement. If it was a hallucination, there was little reason to refuse.

"What happens if I pass this test?", Naruto asked, wanting a plan in case this wasn't some sort of dream. Blood smiled, revealing even more of his alabaster fangs.

You'll gain my blessing; which one, however, I don't know. I like to roll dice when handing out blessings-It keeps things more interesting, you see.

"Right... and how do I pass?". The question brought an edge of seriousness to Blood's bemused expression.

There's a very powerful spell that is available to those who embrace chaos; unsurprisingly, it's known as Chaos Hammer. Normally, it's only really effective against those who follow a strict moral and social code with a great deal of discipline; someone of a lawful disposition, if you will. True Chaos, however, has the capacity to disrupt anything, including itself. The ninja you are fighting are of mixed codes; you only have enough strength for one chaos hammer, so you had best make it count. Or you can just die and get corpsefucked, but I don't think you particularly want that.

"...And how do I do this fabled Chaos Hammer?", Naruto asked skeptically. He was starting to think this wasn't a dream or a hallucination though; he simply wasn't this creative.

Don't ask me; the way I do it would blow your little head off. Blood replied, cleaning his nails, I'd say aim your arm at them, focus a lot of conflicting emotions in their general direction, and then shout "chaos hammer" at the top of your lungs.

"Is the shouting really necessary? I think one of my lungs was punctured to be hon-"

I'm the King of Hell, thank you. I know what I'm talking about. Now, you have ten seconds to get ready. Try not to get corpsefucked.

Naruto turned to face the Oto nin, realizing a moment later that he still had a kunai in his leg. Needless to say, he swore and dropped down to a knee.

About two seconds later—which was definitely not the ten he had been told—the world started moving again; Naruto looked up to see the Oto nins getting ready to finish the fight, various weapons at the ready. All of Blood's passing comments about being corpsefucked came to mind in a rather disturbing moment for the blond. In a moment of inspiration, he thrust his arm towards the Oto ninja with two words on his mind.

"CHAOS HAMMER!", he shouted, putting a lot into the gesture. He wasn't entirely sure what happened, but there was a fairly painful impact that preceded the world going black.

]_'/}0{\'_[

"What... the hell... hit me?", Naruto asked, throat feeling dry. He forced himself to sit up, finding that even his eyelids were fighting his attempts to move. When they finally opened, Naruto had to fight the urge to vomit.

Body parts and guts littered the clearing, staining the ground and hanging from branches. Scorch marks, ruts in the ground, and frost radiated out from a small crater that looked to be roughly where the oto ninja had been standing. Apparently the Chaos Hammer had worked.

It was a terrifying thought, Naruto realized; it was by his own hand that this carnage had happened. He had killed several people with two words given to him be some terrible, eldritch beast.

The urge overtook him; leaning to the side, Naruto lost the contents of his stomach, retching even further once there was nothing left.

Not bad for your first Chaos Hammer. It's a pity you missed one.

Blood's voice cut into Naruto's mind like a spike of flaming ice, if such a description was possible. Naruto forced himself to look up, hoping the monster's shadows would hide the carnage. Nothing had changed though; it was still a horrific scene, and no shadows moved to hide it in crimson twilight.

I'm talking to you from Hell; I don't need to manifest now that you've completed my little test.

"But... I... you said...", Naruto was scrambling to piece together a reason for him to not have passed the test; anything to keep the beast out of his mind. "Y-you said I missed one! I failed!"

You passed because you didn't fail. If you recall, I said you only failed if you got corpsefucked. The fact you only had enough strength for a single Chaos Hammer and only had one shot, the blast of which knocked you out, by the way, was of little importance. The one disabled everyone, including your allies, so you passed.

Allies.

Naruto began frantically looking around the clearing, searching for some sign that Sasuke and Sakura hadn't been blown to pieces by the Chaos Hammer. There was some amount of relief when he finally saw them intact several meters away, though he felt his heart drop when he saw the state Sasuke was in.

The blast had apparently blow him into Sakura, knocking her out and shielding her from the majority of the blast. For the unintentional chivalry however, Sasuke had burns on multiple parts of his body; most notably was the seared flesh where his eyes were. It was gruesome sight, but they were both breathing. There was someone in between the Naruto and his teammates, who was also breathing, though far from unscathed.

It was the girl with the long brown hair; the one who had grabbed Sakura by the hair. Her clothing had been burned and singed, though enough remained to be called decent, and most of her hair was fine, though there were a couple spots where a few inches had been burnt off. For the most part, her injuries were light and were confined to her right side, though there was a single exception that made Naruto almost retch again:

Her right arm, about halfway down the bicep, had been torn off by the explosion. The only reason she hadn't bled out was the fact that the blast had also seared the wound shut, though there were still burns and ragged strips of flesh hanging off her arm.

The ninja you aspired to be would have done far worse.

"NO! The Hokage-"

You aspire to be the leader of assassins and murderers; those who delight in causing undo suffering for the right amount of coin, and then profiting from the revenge as well.

"How is this any different?", Naruto shouted, trying to stand up. The kunai in his leg made it hard, but he managed to make it a few feet before falling to his knees.

This is the gateway to something far greater. I may only be interested in my own entertainment, but I do not condone the slaughter of the innocent. I am the King of Hell, the one who torments the sinful and spiteful for their crimes. You, Naruto Uzumaki, have displayed enough talent to be both entertaining and useful. Become my champion, and you can have your fill of heroism against the truly wicked.

"And what? Tear people to shreds with words?", he shouted, fingernails digging into the ground. The smell of burnt flesh was heavy in the air.

And so much more.

Naruto tried to block out Blood's words, covering his ears and gnashing his teeth.

Why are you so upset? You save you friends, and the girl in front of you has the scroll you need. Beyond that, power beyond imagination is beckoning you.

"I don't care about power! I almost killed my friends, and I blew up people I didn't even know! To hell with power!"

Might makes right. Without power, you will never be able to protect anything, let alone yourself. Besides, the gears are already in motion, little mortal.

There was a powerful, foreboding tone to the beast's words.

"What...?"

Your world is torn by war; it always has been and always will be. Hatred and pain fill the air and taint the earth; demons are being born outside of hell, and are wreaking havoc on mortals across the land. That is something I cannot allow; all demons must answer to me. Failure to do so is to invite my wrath... which is currently a job opening I'm offering to you.

"You... want me to be a demon...slayer?"

I want you to take my blessing and become my champion; go forth and spread my symbol. It's a declaration of war to those who would dare to oppose me, and an offer of power to those who would follow me. You, mortal, would be my high priest and champion. Call yourself a demonslayer if you wish, but know that the hearts of mortals hold darkness that is far blacker than the most vile desire of a demon.

Gruesome images and hard facts whirled around Naruto's mind, causing him to clutch his head and grind his teeth even harder. Then, in a moment of anger, he threw his head back and screamed, letting out his frustration and hatred in one primal surge.

Your humanity is what is stopping you, you know. My blessing will kill you, then resurrect you in a blaze of glory; from the ashes of your humanity you shall rise as a higher being. All you have to do is pledge your loyalty to me. Do that, and the power to protect that which you hold dear will be yours.

That was it. A chink in any remaining armor that Naruto had clung too.

He was weak, and would never be able to protect anything; his attempts only caused more harm than good. Blood, however...

"I pledge... my loyalty... to Lord Blood."

]_'/}0{\'_[

And there's what I would call the prologue. I've decided to get the first actual "chapter" done before posting this, so be grateful. Also, don't expect the 40 page chapters I used to do; I'll be doing 15-20 page chapters, as they're more manageable(Read: Easier to proofread and a little less stressful when I fall behind in writing)

Ja Ne, My most Freaky of Darlings. I suppose I'll see you again in a few seconds.