Author's Note:

Hey guys! Welcome to my first story! I'll keep this brief, since I know that you really just want to get to the story. I will post one chapter of this story every other day until the chapter that coincides with the first episode of RWBY is posted. PLEASE read the longer A/N at the end of this chapter, as I have important information and a survey for you! Until then, enjoy!

Disclaimer: Naruto, Naruto Shippuden, all characters that appear in the aforementioned series, and all techniques that appear in the aforementioned series are property of Masashi Kishimoto and any company, organization, or individual he has chosen to sell the rights to. SilverFoxSage does not claim ownership of any of the aforementioned intellectual or commercial properties.

RWBY, all characters that appear in RWBY, all fantastical locations that appear in RWBY, and all named weapons that appear in RWBY are the property of Roosterteeth, Monty Oum, and any company, organization, or individual they have chosen to sell the rights to. SilverFoxSage does not claim ownership of any of the aforementioned intellectual or commercial properties.

SilverFoxSage encourages all readers to support the official releases of RWBY and Naruto. SilverFoxSage does not attempt to generate revenue or profit with the fanfiction "The Vulpine Huntsman of Vale." SilverFoxSage DOES claim ownership of any original Jutsu, original characters, and original weapons that are created for the fanfiction "The Vulpine Huntsman of Vale."

Chapter 1: From the Valley to the Void

Red Chakra and black Chakra pushed against each other beneath two giant statues in a place called the Valley of the End. The sources of these two Chakras were two boys, one surrounded by a fiery red cloak of Chakra, the other grotesquely transformed into a monstrous creature with webbed hands sprouting out of his back as wings.

The red-cloaked boy stared at the thing his friend had become. "I won't let you leave us. I will bring you back... SASUKE!"

The winged boy gathered black lightning into his palm as the cloaked boy began spinning part of his red Chakra cloak in his palm. The two boys leapt at each other, completing their attacks in midair.

"CHIDORI!"

"RASENGAN!"

As the two attacks collided, something went wrong. The Rasengan in Naruto's palm seemed to collapse in on itself, giving Sasuke's Chidori the space it needed to plunge into Naruto's chest, just barely missing his heart. The two boys fell to the ground under where they had clashed.

At the point where the Rasengan collapsed, a point of bright red light appeared. Before either boy could react, it began to slowly expand, and an unseen force started to pull both boys towards it. Naruto looked at Sasuke as both boys changed back to their normal selves. He couldn't be sure, but he thought he saw something in the other boy's eyes. Was that... regret?

As Sasuke removed his fist from Naruto's chest, the orange-clad hero began to sway unsteadily. The last thing he remembered before losing consciousness was being pulled upwards toward the sphere of strange red light that his Rasengan had created.

When Naruto came to, the first thing he noticed was that he felt like he was floating weightlessly, drifting gently along as if he was in a river. Opening his eyes, the second thing he noticed was that he was surrounded by black nothingness, with distant balls and points of light in every direction.

As he looked around, he realized that his body wasn't resting on anything, and he was floating slowly downward, in the direction his feet were pointing.

"Well... this is weird."

He tried moving around a bit, but quickly stopped as pain shot through his chest. Looking down at the origin of the pain, he saw that the last wound that Sasuke had given him was still open, but wasn't bleeding. He stared at the exposed flesh and bones of his ribs for a few seconds before looking around him again.

"What is this place? Am... am I dead?"

Not expecting any response, he was quite surprised when he heard a familiar chuckling coming from directly behind him. He immediately tried to twist himself around to face the source of the laughter, regretting it as his left lung screamed in pain.

"Calm yourself, Kit. No need to injure yourself any further. You're not dead, but then again, you're not too alive either."

Completing his painful spin, Naruto was able to fully glare at the small nine-tailed fox that was floating along with him in the strange void.

"What the hell does that mean, you stupid fuzzball? Are we in my mindscape? And how did you get so small?"

The now normal-sized fox grinned, preparing to torment his inquisitive jailer a bit to pay him back for all of the situations like their current predicament the young ninja got them into.

"In that order, it's complicated, no, and that's my business."

Naruto began to shake his fist at the grinning demon.

"YOU STUPID FOX! YOU BETTER START EXPLAINING RIGHT NOW OR I'LL SHOVE A RASENGAN SO FAR UP YOUR ASS THA- ACK!"

Naruto's tirade was cut off by a spike of pain from his open wound, which had begun to slowly bleed again. Kyūbi did not hesitate to fill the silence before his container could start rupturing his eardrums again.

"ALRIGHT! I'll explain what I know of this odd situation you've managed to land us in if you just keep QUIET! How half of Konoha isn't deaf between you and the Green Abominations I will never know..."

As the Kitsune trailed off, a red glow started to come from the hole in Naruto's chest, Demon Chakra beginning to heal the more critical areas.

"Alright, to start with, you're most certainly alive, otherwise I would be dead as well. Seeing as my chakra is still trying to heal you, that can't be the case. However, you are no longer in the land of the living either, as that wound really should have killed you. If you had any intelligence at all, you would realize that since we are NOT in a stinking, wet sewer, that we are, thankfully, outside of your mindscape at the moment."

Naruto's eyes widened. "But if we're not inside my mindscape, and I'm still talking to you... CRAP! Did you escape the seal when Sasuke hit me with Chidori!?"

Thinking quickly, Naruto pulled up his shirt and looked at his stomach. He began to channel Chakra, and was immediately relieved to see that the seal was intact. "So the seal hasn't been broken, but I'm talking to you outside of my mindscape. How?"

Kyūbi chuckled again. "Well I'll give you half credit, brat. Checking the seal was a decent idea, but you should have known that it was still intact when my Chakra started healing your wound. As to how we are having this conversation... that is a complicated matter. When you and the Uchiha bastard attacked each other that last time, something went seriously wrong with the stability of our world. That wasn't the first time that my Chakra was used in battle at the Valley of the End, and the stability of the world's energy hadn't had enough time to recover there. So when my Chakra was used AGAIN in such a violent manner, it ripped a hole out of our world that we slipped into."

It took Naruto a minute or so to let that information fully sink in. "So... where exactly are we then? And you still haven't explained how you are outside the seal!"

The fox looked around at their surroundings. "I can't actually be sure where we are. We might be in another world. We might have formed a new dimension. We might even be trapped in a realm of nothingness. But what is most likely is that we are in the space between worlds, heading towards another destination. If it weren't for the fact that that damned seal is so strong, we probably wouldn't even be close enough to have this conversation now. When we came through the hole in reality, the transition was violent enough to rip my soul out of the seal, while leaving the energy I was entrusted with behind..." Kyūbi's explanation trailed off, a strange, almost contemplative, look appearing on his face.

Naruto looked back and forth between the seal and the fox, confusion running through him. "What do you mean by 'the energy you were entrusted with?' I thought this was your Chakra."

Kyūbi snapped out of his thoughts. "Huh? Oh, well after nearly ten thousand years, the energy your Sage of Six Paths gave me to watch over began to act much more like my own energy. I suppose I affected it just as it often affected me. In fact, if it weren't for the fact that I'm now separated from that energy, I doubt that I would be discussing this matter so civilly with you. More likely I would have ripped you to pieces as soon as possible. In fact, as soon as I'm back in that seal of yours, I'll probably go right back to cursing you and the Yondaime Hokage and doing everything I can to escape and kill you... but I digress. The malicious energy that you humans have come to associate with me was not originally mine. It was once part of... something else." The way the fox spoke of this "something else," as if he feared it, was enough to make Naruto a little nervous.

"What... what was this 'something else?'" asked Naruto, whose wound was about a quarter of the way to being fully healed at this point.

The question was met with silence for several seconds before Kyūbi grumbled and said "I suppose you ought to know about it. All of the Jinchuriki ought to be told this story… Long ago, when humans were even more pitifully weak than they are now, unable to use Chakra or Jutsu, there existed... a Demon. Your people may call me and my brethren demons, but you have no idea the kind of power this true Demon had. It was called Jūbi no Yoki: the ten tailed demon, and it was considered unstoppable. The only reason the world survived its continued existence was that it would only awake once every thousand years to spread its destruction. It had as much power as myself and the other eight Bijū combined."

Naruto paled at the description of such an unbelievably powerful monster. "Does it still exist?"

Kyūbi chuckled and shook his head. "No, Kit. Thankfully, it was defeated. Nine thousand nine hundred and ninety four years ago, when it awoke, a Man came to challenge it. Somehow, he had found out where it rested, and knew of its history of destruction. This Man was not just any man. He was like a god among men. Some say that Kami actually lent power to this Man to do what he did. When the beast awoke, the Man fought it, and defeated it by sealing it within himself. Because of this, he gained power and knowledge beyond anything any human had experienced before. He discovered how to use Chakra, and began to teach others how to do the same. He was known as the Sage of Six Paths. The founder of Ninjutsu, and the most powerful Shinobi that has ever existed, and that will likely never change. Before his death, he realized that he needed to make sure that the Jūbi could never return, even after his death. So he created me and the other eight tailed beasts, and divided the Jūbi's Chakra between us for safekeeping. With the power that the deadly Chakra gave us, we were quickly made the heads of the nine demon clans, and were left to rule our realms in relative peace until you humans managed to figure out how to seal us into you and have been making trouble ever since."

Naruto narrowed his eyes at the Kyūbi and said "We've been making trouble? You were the one who attacked Konoha in the first place, you dumb fuzzball!"

With an angry snarl, Kyūbi bristled up and growled out "I didn't choose to attack Konoha you fool! I was sealed in someone else when some thrice-accursed Uchiha broke the seal and released me! Shattering a Bijū's seal is a sure way to make it go on a rampage! By the time I regained consciousness, I had already destroyed half of Konoha and was sealed inside of you."

As Kyūbi calmed down, Naruto asked "How could you have regained consciousness after destroying half the village? Do you sleepwalk or something?"

The once-mighty Kitsune let out an irritated growl. "Fool. When the Sage divided the Jūbi between the nine Bijū, he also divided its consciousness. Each Bijū got a different part of it. I received the pure malice of the Jūbi, as well as its proclivity for destruction. The Bijū are much like Shukaku's Jinchuriki: when we become incapacitated, the remaining consciousness of the Jūbi takes us over. Fortunately, it takes a great deal to incapacitate us, but when we do become incapacitated, things quickly go to Hell."

Naruto was about to say something else, but he suddenly noticed a funny feeling throughout his body. Looking at the wound in his chest, he noticed that the energy that was healing it had taken on a darker hue. As he looked away from the wound, he noticed something else that was odd: his fingernails were becoming more claw-like, just like they had when he was using the Chakra Cloak. Feeling his canines with his tongue, he realized that they were sharper, and looked at the Kyūbi accusingly. "Okay, what the hell is happening to me, fuzzball? Are you doing this?"

Kyūbi looked from Naruto's claws to his bared teeth and seemed to become concerned. "No. I am not doing this. I have no influence over the seal and the energy inside it while I am out here." His fur stood on end as he realized what was happening. "Oh my… You're channeling so much of the energy from the seal to heal you that it's changing you… You're becoming a half-demon."

This statement nearly made Naruto panic. "I'm becoming a what?! You can't be serious! There… There must be some way to stop it, right?"

Kyūbi just shook his head. "You ought to consider yourself lucky, Kit. There are many who would kill for a chance to become even a Lower Hanyou. Judging by how fast you're changing and how fast the wound is healing, I'd say you'll be a Greater Kitsune Hanyou by the time you've healed. When I return to the seal, you might even become a Grand Hanyou. There is nothing higher than a Grand Demon except for the Jūbi itself, and a Grand Hanyou is not far below a Grand Demon."

Naruto growled at Kyūbi, surprising the Kitsune. "What if I don't want to be a Hanyou? I've spent my entire life being treated like a monster and called a demon! Now they'll be right! They'll hate me all the more now that I'm an actual demon and not just the container for one!"

Once again, the Kyūbi shook his head. "Not to downplay what you've been through up to this point, but your treatment in the past is no indicator of how you will be treated from now on. You're going to a place that has no preconceptions of Jinchuriki or demons. And do not assume yourself to be greater than you are. Hanyou you may be, but demon you are not, and will never be. There is not a thing in your world or any that can turn you into a demon."

Calming down slightly, Naruto said "But I'll be different from everyone else. People fear what they don't understand, and they hate what they fear. They'll hate me…"

Rolling his eyes at Naruto's distress Kyūbi said "If you don't want to, you don't have to let them know you're a Hanyou."

Naruto looked surprised, and just a little hopeful. "But my appearance is changing. They'll know I'm different even if I don't tell them exactly what I am."

"You can just use Kitsune Transformation to assume human form. Every demon and Hanyou can do it. As a Hanyou, you'll even be able to look like a completely normal human. Although why you would want to give up the extra intimidation of a demonic human form is beyond me."

Naruto immediately perked up. "Can you tell me how to do that? As long as I can appear human, there's no reason anyone should hate me for what I am."

The Grand Kitsune rolled his eyes, but began to explain. "Fine, but pay attention, brat. With Transformation, you will be able to shift between three basic forms: human, fox, and Hanyou. As a Hanyou, you will have certain foxlike characteristics, such as ears, claws, slit pupils, and up to nine tails if you end up becoming a Grand Hanyou. Greater Hanyous can only manifest seven tails, Standard Hanyous can only manage five, Lesser Hanyous three, and Lower Hanyous only have one tail. You can also take forms that are between these three basic forms, but that will take much more effort, and may require constant concentration. For example, you may, with practice, be able to maintain a human form with only fox ears, rather than ears, claws, tails, etcetera. Or you may be able to take the form of a fox that walks upright. Note that if your concentration fails for one of these halfway forms, you will revert to your 'true' form, which for you is your Hanyou form. In a similar manner, I would revert to my fox form if I was halfway between fox and Hanyou, and to my Hanyou form if I was halfway between Hanyou and human. Since my 'true' form is that of a fox, I would move as close to that form as possible. Also, your body is the only thing that you can shift without supplemental skills, like Fuinjutsu, to help."

It took a moment for the implications of the fox's last statement to register for Naruto. "So... no clothes when I go from fox to human? No weapons either?"

These questions were met with a chuckle and a nod. "That's right. Unless you can find or design a seal that can let items transform with you. Just so you know, any seals you have on you will be completely undamaged and unaltered no matter how much you transform. By the way, you should be able to change the size of your fox form with some practice. You won't be able to shift it too much, but you should at least have a range from about cat-sized to horse-sized. I'm sure you'll find plenty of uses for that."

Naruto sighed and said "Well where the hell am I going to learn Fuinjutsu? It's not like I'm likely to find any seal masters where I'm going, and I get the feeling that this is a one-way trip."

"You're certainly right about the trip being one-way. Unless you think you can find a way to rip a hole in reality a second time and propel yourself back to the Elemental Nations and not some other world. That is if you would survive a second trip to begin with. And as far as finding a Fuinjutsu teacher... well I'll just say that you'd be surprised at the resources currently at your disposal and leave it at that." The fox seemed to smirk at his last comment, and Naruto had a confused look on his face. Before he could question what the fox meant, Kyūbi decided to continue with his explanation.

"Alright, last but not least, do NOT try to transform to or from your fox form if you are significantly injured. That means broken bones, lacerations, concussions, internal bleeding, or ruptured organs. If you start to transform and things start hurting worse, go back to whatever form you were in when you started. Letting your body shift naturally to your Hanyou form is the same as transforming. Transforming can make injuries like these much worse. Minor cuts, scrapes, bruises and scratches shouldn't be a problem. Then again, given how fast you heal, by the time you finish transforming, those kind of injuries will probably just be gone. Going from human to Hanyou and back won't be an issue since the anatomy of those two forms is so similar. Your tails can't really get injured, as they won't be like the rest of your body. The tails of a Hanyou are more of a physical representation of your Kitsune Chakra. They can still get cut and bleed, but transforming to human and back will restore them unless one of them gets cut off. If that happens, you will have to wait for it to regrow. To actually go about transforming, you need to manipulate your active Chakra levels. You have two types of Chakra going through your coils at all times now. Kitsune Chakra and human Chakra. If you want to become human, you want to repress your Kitsune Chakra and channel human Chakra. To become a fox, repress your human Chakra and channel Kitsune Chakra. To become a Hanyou, channel both kinds of Chakra about equally. One side effect of this is that you will be most powerful in your Hanyou form, since you will have all of your Chakra available to you. Any questions?"

Naruto thought for a moment before saying "Will I gain any other skills from becoming a Hanyou?"

Kyūbi nodded. "You will also be able to use Foxfire and create Kitsune Illusions. To be honest, you have had the illusion skill from the moment I was sealed into you. The reason you have always been terrible at Genjutsu is that the Kitsune illusions and human Genjutsu simply do not mix well. The main difference between the two is that Genjutsu focuses on manipulating the Chakra flow of the target's brain to make them think they are experiencing something, while illusions create false stimuli outside of the body that are detected by the physical senses."

Naruto's jaw dropped. "That makes so much sense! I've always focused my energy on trying to shift the surroundings to match the illusion I wanted to make when I tried to do Genjutsu! I didn't know you had to focus on the opponent's brain…"

The Kitsune lord would have facepalmed if he could have. "You are just realizing this now? Exactly how many times has your loud teammate tried to explain Genjutsu to you?"

Naruto rubbed the back of his head. "Uh… A lot? She would mostly just yell at me a lot though about not having good enough Chakra control to do Genjutsu, so I wouldn't pay attention to what she was saying."

Kyūbi looked at Naruto incredulously. "Fool. You must learn to be able to pull as much information as possible out of a situation, no matter what the circumstances are. We will have to work on that."

Naruto raised an eyebrow at the Kitsune in front of him. "We? What are you saying 'we' for?"

With a flick of his tails, Kyūbi said "Well I'm going to be teaching you a thing or two of course. As a Kitsune Hanyou, you will be a part of the Grand Demon Clan of Kitsune. I will not have any member of our clan bring dishonor and disgrace to the Kitsune name. I will teach you our skills and to be as cunning and sly as a fox. If you ask nicely, I might even show you a Jutsu or two as well."

So excited was Naruto that he failed to notice the fox ears growing out of the top of his head. "Seriously!? I'm going to learn Jutsus from the Kyūbi itself!? This is awesome!"

Kyūbi, meanwhile, growled with irritation. "You weren't listening, brat. I said 'if you ask nicely.' I make no promises as far as Jutsus go. You'll have to prove yourself to be intelligent and reserved enough to handle the kind of Jutsus I can teach you without blowing yourself or your surroundings to bits."

Naruto was about to protest when he felt a strange tingling along his spine, particularly in his tailbone. Looking behind him, he saw a long, furry appendage sprouting out of his tailbone area. "Huh. I'm growing a tail… How about that…"

Looking back at Kyūbi, Naruto saw that the Kitsune was staring intently at Naruto's chest. "That wound of yours is almost done healing, Kit. If you're growing a tail as well, that probably means that we are almost finished with our separation, and will soon be dropping into whatever world is nearest the Elemental Nations at the moment."

With a confused expression, Naruto asked "Closest at the moment? Are there other places closer at different times?"

Kyūbi nodded. "The various worlds drift closer and farther to and from each other all the time. The other Bijū and myself have traveled between quite a few of the worlds that are closer to our own realms, which are bound to the Elemental Nations similar to how the Summon Realms are with the Summoning Contracts. Now that I think about it, as my container, you could actually forge a Summoning Contract between our clan and humans given the right circumstances…" The demon lord trailed off with a thoughtful look. "It doesn't matter at the moment. I think I see our stop up ahead, so you should know that the recombining process may knock me unconscious. I won't be a danger thanks to that damned seal of yours, but you won't be able to ask me for advice or borrow any of my Chakra until I wake up again. See you on the other side, Kit."

Before Naruto could comment, his wound closed over and a great ball of light encompassed both him and the Kyūbi. He felt a searing, burning sensation where the points of the Bijū's seal were, and he passed out.

A/N:

So that's the prologue of this story done and over with. Now onto the important information. This story will only cover RWBY canon up to the end of Volume 1. I will post a second story as a sequel to this one that will cover the events of Volume 2.

Second bit of important information: I am going to be writing several chapters ahead of what I'm posting for this fanfiction. That means that as you're reading this, I've already written at least four or five more chapters. I have several reasons for doing this. One: I wanted to write all of the "setup" chapters and refine them before posting anything. This has already proven to be a smart decision as at this point, I've already written and rewritten the first three chapters three or four times each, since they are the ones that really set how Aura and Chakra work both separately and together in this fanfiction. So now I've got a really well-refined system for how Chakra, Jutsus, Semblances, and Aura will work together. Two: I really need some buffer chapters! I write in a really weird way. Some days, I have so much inspiration that I sit down and type for about six hours and get the rough drafts of three or four chapters done at a time. Some days, I have a really clear head with not much random inspiration to distract me, and I go through my rough drafts and random scenes I've typed up and refine them either to fit with this story or to file under another story idea I've had. The only problem is, I often get inspiration for parts of the story that won't come up for a really long time! So I may have chapters 4,5,6,9,12,and 16 done or really well mapped out, but no progress at all on chapters 7 and 8, so all of those other chapters might as well be a bunch of marshmallows. By keeping several chapters in reserve, I can continue to release them to give myself more time to write the in-between chapters for you guys.

Also, I throw out a lot of rough drafts of chapters, and even edited and refined drafts of chapters that I decide don't accomplish what I want them to. Even if a version of a chapter doesn't end up making it into the final cut, I may post it as an Omake because I like how the chapter was as an individual chapter, but didn't like the effects it had on the story as a whole. For example: I have had Ruby and Naruto meet and properly introduce themselves to each other at a few different points in the story and in several different ways that I have discarded already.

Now the final order of business: the survey! This is probably the only major input that you readers will be able to have on Volume 1 unless someone gives me a great idea in a review or a PM. And if that happens, it might cause me to rewrite half of the story and delay posting. Anyways, as you may have noticed in the brief few crappy paragraphs that took place in the Elemental Nations, it was never revealed whether or not Sasuke also fell into the rip with Naruto. I have had amazing ideas about what I could do if Sasuke was also sent to Remnant, but that also makes a few other ideas that I had either unusable or kind of awkward to implement. So, I decided to let my audience decide. I will post a poll on my profile, so please vote!