Disclaimer: Naruto and all associated characters are property of Masashi Kishimoto

AN: This is my first fanfic attempt so, please forgive any common newbie mistakes.

This story is set in an Alternate Universe story so while some key events will follow the same timeline of canon, to some degree, many of the characters will behave contrary to how they normally do because of modified events and circumstances in this story.

I don't plan on having too many authors notes appearing in each chapter unless something grossly problematic is found and I decide to make some edits.

The central pairing will be NaruHina, but the development will be slow. There are many challenges, obstacles, and major events that need to be overcome before they can even expect to settle down. Don't expect this pairing to pick up any steam until my version of the Shippuden Arc begins.

Warning: This story is intended for readers age 17+ There will be occasional depictions of graphic violence and adult situations. I will include the warning on all chapters that I have deemed graphic for readers under 17.

Edited 3/2/16

The Battle for Ascendancy

Prologue

as·cend·an·cy: the occupation of a position of dominant power or influence.

In the elemental nations, most people revere the Shinto pantheon of Kami like Amaterasu, Susanoo, Tsukiyomi, and Inari. Others might follow the path of Buddhism in an attempt to reach the Pure Land and break the cycle of resurrection.

Humanity worships these deities or follows the path of enlightenment believing it triggers direct responses from the higher beings. In reality, the Kami that mankind worship no longer have direct influence over the world since they had almost destroyed the mortal realms due to their battles and rivalries against each other.

The Kami, barred from waging war in the divine realm, turned to the newly created mortal realm to fight against their celestial rivals with massive skirmishes and displays of power using the natural chakra that existed within the land until the cycle was threatened and the mortal realm nearly destroyed.

Izanagi determined that his children were incapable of being trusted with direct influence of the mortal plane without destroying it. He barred all direct access to the and removed all the previously controlled creatures from the world leaving only the land, plants, and chakra to be used as a base for reestablishing new life in the world.

The twin essences of Light and Darkness were created to be the proxies of which all divine will is enacted within the realm of mortals. The Kami would dictate their desires to the Essence, which suited their desired outcome and Light, or Darkness would be the ones to determine the course of action.

All actions they take are subtle so that no single deity gains more exposure than the other and that there is no threat of destruction to the realm itself. The essences then would take on dictates of all the Kami, who began to play a shadow game against their rival Kami by rewarding their loyal champions, or undermining the pawns of their opponents to gain more influence in the mortal plane through mortal followers and worship.

The Essence of Light was tasked with rewarding mortals deserving of gifts or benefits for pleasing one of the Kami. Most of the Light's time is spent establishing times of bountiful harvests and riches throughout the world, and guiding the various champions of the Kami with love and happiness.

The Essence of Darkness was responsible for distributing the punishment or displeasure of a Kami to any mortals that either failed them or served a rival Kami. The Darkness accomplished this task by manipulating events around the targeted mortal causing suffering or even death. Most of the Darkness' time is spent manipulating events to cause catastrophes in the world, or driving champions off of their desired path through suffering or death.

In this way, the balance of influence was ensured as the Light's rewards and gifts were counterbalanced by the punishments or harm rendered by the Darkness'.

Once these essences were created and their purposes defined, Izanagi then seeded the mortal plane with numerous types of creatures and granted them the capability to evolve on their own. These changes would allow the different Kami to pick and choose their mortal pawns and set them against each other as they developed, eliminating the necessity for physical warfare with each other. Since the creatures were simple and at the beginning of the evolutionary ladder, however, there were still massive reserves of natural chakra flowing throughout the world unused.

With the overabundance of natural chakra the potential for mortals to establish more power than dictated by the first gods remained. The essences determined that the safest course to maintain balance was to create massive constructs of chakra to keep this chakra from being utilized by the mortals and upsetting the balance of power. Thus, the nine immortal bijū were created to guard this excess chakra and regulate the flow of natural chakra in the world.

While the bijū started out as formless constructs of chakra, since they resided on the mortal plane, the will of Izanagi granted them the capability of evolution. The bijū began to evolve and eventually developed sentience. Being massive constructs of chakra, the bijū had no need for sustenance and instead roamed freely throughout the lands at their leisure, changing their forms and elemental natures to suit their current environments. As their sentience evolved, the bijū began to settle in different areas of the world based on their individual preferences. Eventually, they adopted physical forms to suit their personalities and newly adopted habitats, choosing to focus on controlling specific elements preferable to their selected natures.

Humanity, in the mean time, had evolved and began to flourish. Living a nomadic and balanced lifestyle, they would encounter the massive forms of the bijū and would either fear or worship them, passing down folktales and stories about the mysterious giant creatures. Being incapable of understanding the true nature of the bijū, the stories about their creation varied widely on how the bijū came to exist, what they looked like, and their purpose in the world. The only common themes that legends and folklore agreed on are that the bijū are forces of nature capable of devastating power beyond imagination.

For a time humanity was able to exist peacefully with the immortal bijū. The bijū would remain in their chosen territories, and the tribes of newly evolved humans would either stay away from those places through fear or settle nearby at a healthy distance and submit offerings out of respect. Fathers would pass down their knowledge to their sons, and the tales began to grow more exaggerated. The legends of the bijū would start to turn into cautionary tales, meant to scare children into obeying their parents lest the bijū come and devour them for wandering off.

As time passed humanity evolved even further, and instead of wandering in their nomadic lifestyle, they began to settle and grow. The stories of the bijū became more rare and obscure, with their chosen territories being forgotten after merely four generations had passed. Their real dispositions became unknown to humanity as storytellers altered the tales even further to suit their own goals and fit the lessons they wanted to move onto the future. Soon the existence of the bijū was thought to be simply a myth and humanity forgot their existence except for long lost tales from history that lacked any consistency.

With the nomadic lifestyle fading, humanity began to favor agriculture and technology, resulting in the population of humanity growing exponentially. The conflict began to rise as humans began fighting over land and resources. Soon humanity would experience a state of constant warfare between the various tribes or "clans" until the creation of the Hidden Villages.

For the most part, the bijū would steer clear of these conflicts until they spilled over into their preferred territory. Once the humans began to trespass, some bijū would simply relocate while others would retaliate with ferocity. As the populations grew, the bijū would lose more and more ground until all the bijū were forced to defend their territories with violence.

With the apparent "reemergence" of the bijū, word of their awesome power spread quickly throughout the newly established villages. Humanity began to see the bijū as mindless monsters or demons and sought to destroy them. The bijū began to develop a hatred for humanity as they attacked for, what they believed, was no apparent reason.

Using his Mokuton abilities, Hashirama captured and contained the bijū to prevent them from wiping out humanity. To end the constant state of war, Hashirama distributed the bijū evenly to the other established villages to prevent a power struggle. Since each village could potentially unleash the bijū on each other, he believed this would serve as a deterrent to massive open warfare with each other.

Hashirama's gamble appeared to work, and peace returned to the world for a time. However, the Kami and both Essences knew that with the bijū sealed and incapable of maintaining the balance of chakra, the world had suddenly become threatened with destruction. With the threat of destruction of the mortal realm, the Kami began to seek out ways to manipulate events to their favor so their champions could be the one to save the realms and gain them more influence and control over their living game world. The Light and Darkness, however, had begun to form their plans to maintain the balance.

The essence of Light determined that saving the immortal bijū from their imprisonment, and cleansing them of their dark emotions was necessary to maintain the natural flow of chakra. The Light decided that only a champion with a pure soul would be capable of cleansing the dark emotions that had built up in bijū over thousands of years of conflict with humanity. The problem arose in finding that soul since the souls of all living beings have existed in a constant cycle throughout all existence.

Souls enter the mortal plane when a new life is created and combine with the spirit of the newly created body. The spirit governs how much good (light) or evil (dark) actions that are committed throughout their life. The soul collects these experiences and accumulates them with the rest of the previous lives determining how pure or tainted the soul becomes. When the mortal life ends, the total accumulation of good and evil within the soul, and the actions were taken by the spirit in the current lifetime determine if spirit enters the Pure Land (a.k.a afterlife) or the Impure Land (a.k.a underworld.). The soul then returns to the soul plane unless it is completely tainted and becomes a demonic entity, or is completely purified and becomes a lesser deity.

The Essence of Light had a new soul created for the first time since Izanagi's decree was passed down over several millennia ago. This soul of unequaled purity entered the mortal realm and bonded with the spirit of the newly created child of Minato Namikaze and Kushina Uzumaki.

The Essence of Darkness, however, viewed mortal's accessing chakra as a threat to the realm. The fact that they had sealed the bijū in an attempt to gain more access to the natural energy of the world was proof that chakra needed to be eliminated or restricted from all the creatures on the mortal plane. Especially humanity. If the Light's plan were to succeed, the power the child would gain would be too much of a threat to the balance and would only encourage the mortals to continue to seek out such power.

Instead, the Darkness felt the best course of action would be to disperse the bijū completely. Mortals would also have to be dissuaded in their attempts at harnessing more power from chakra by a catastrophe so devastating that they would never seek to gain power from the natural energy of the world ever again. If a disaster so severe could be successfully engineered, even Izanagi might intervene and seal all mortal's access to chakra completely, and the mortal realm would remain safe from destruction.

The Essence of Darkness found it's opportunity, surprisingly, in the very child that the Light had put it's faith into. The Darkness knew that Kushina contained a bijū that hated humanity more than anything else, and the Darkness was certain that the pure soul would already become corrupted with dark emotions even before the child was self-aware and capable of defending itself.

The Darkness set out to manipulate events surrounding the child to ensure he would be ostracized and hated to the point where the child would seek out to retaliate against the world and create the very catastrophe it desired. With the power of the Kyūbi at his disposal, the child would be more than capable of bringing the world to the brink of destruction and forcing Izanami's hand in saving the realm once more. Then the Darkness could push to seal off chakra completely and free itself from the endless task of curtailing the power of mortals and maintaining the balance of the world.

In ten months, the mortal realm would become the stage for the Kami, the bijū, and humanity's battle for ascendancy.