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In search of Freedom 1: Scars

In the middle of the night, a young blond boy sat alone in his apartment, thinking about everything that had happened recently. Unlike the thought of the usual eight-years-old boys, which would be concentrated on his family, friends or pretty much everything happy, this boy's thoughts were darker than the night itself.

The boy, whose name is Uzumaki Naruto, got the answer for the very thing he always wanted to know tonight. The question he wanted to be answered?

Why was he hated by the whole Village?

And now, knowing that the only reason why he was an outcast was because of the Kyuubi sealed inside of him, the blond couldn't help but be angry, no, not just angry, but furious!

How dare they hate him for the Kyuubi's doing? How dare the Sandaime allow them to hate and scorn him! it wasn't his fault, it was the damned Yondaime! He didn't do anything, but they all hated him!

The blond silently clenched his fists, trying to stop the traitorous tears from pouring.

He was sick of it, he was sick of being abused, he needed to do something! But what to do... what to do?

Suddenly, an idea struck the young blond as he remembered a particular lecture at the Ninja academy, a lecture about the Legendary Sannins. If the blond remembered correctly, each of them was very powerful, in fact, so powerful that each of them was an S-Ranked Ninja.

The fame and power they had allowed them freedom, unlike any shinobi. Each of the three was allowed to venture away from the Village until they were called back for an emergency or a mission.

A small smile formed on Naruto's face, if he would get as strong as them, he would be allowed the same freedom as them. This was the conclusion to which Naruto's young mind came.

His these was strengthened even further when he remembered about the five Kages. Each of them was the strongest Ninja in their Village and no one told them what to do. They weren't chained to the rules like the blond himself, they were completely free, they held their future and fate in their own hands.

If the blond, no, when the blond would become the strongest person alive, there would be no one who would control him, he wouldn't be chained to the rules and controlled by someone.

With this, the grinning blond went to bed, he had some planning to do tomorrow.

The next day after Naruto woke up and ate breakfast, he decided to do some research. After all, if he wanted to become the strongest, he needed to learn from the strongest.

Adoring a simple black shirt with white shorts, the blond was about to head out from his apartment but stopped in the corridor. Naruto went back to his bedroom, almost forgetting to wear the bandages the medical-nin told him to wear around his mouth.

The blond didn't understand why he should hide his grin, after all, it looked beautiful.

After wrapping the bandages, the blond set out for the Hokage's office.

As the young boy walked through the streets of Konoha, he finally understood why those people looked at him with fear, anger, and hate. He finally knew their reasons, but at the same time, he had no idea why they hated him.

Slowly, dark ideas about making those people suffer the same thing they made him suffer formed inside his head. So engrossed in his dreams about making those people pay, he never noticed when he entered the Hokage's residence.

The blond went straight towards the Hokage office, the secretary and the ANBU knowing how close he was with the Hokage and let him in, even if they didn't want to do it.

"Good morning, Hokage-Jiji!" naruto shouted in his usual tone as he entered the office, his voice muffled slightly by the bandages. The Hokage's head snapped upward, not expecting the visit.

"Naruto-kun, how are you feeling?" The old man asked seeing the young boy he came to see as a grandson. A grandson he had let down. As the Sandaime looked at the bandages face, he couldn't help but remember the night a few days ago.

It was a beautiful evening in the Village of the Hidden Leaf. As usual, Sandaime was sitting in his office, cursing the paperwork he had been forced to do. He would very much rather spend the time reading the newest edition of Icha Icha that has been released a week ago.

As he once again cursed Minato for leaving him with all this work, an ANBU rushed into his office. The Sandaime, feeling the nervousness of his Ninja as well as seeing that the man was panting, knew that an emergency has occurred.

"Rat, report," The Sandaime ordered and the elite Ninja wasted no time.

"Sandaime-sama, earlier tonight me and my Squad had found a group of civilians torturing Uzumaki Naruto in one of the training grounds. We caught all of them and transported them to T&I department while bringing Uzumaki-san to hospital under Tokito Kenshin's care,"

When the old man heard this, he stood up and wasting no time, used Shunshin to arrive at the hospital as soon as possible, the Rat-masked ANBU not far behind him.

When they arrived in the hospital, the Sandaime rushed towards the special section of the hospital in which only the best and most trusted medics worked. When he arrived, he rushed into the operation room and to say he was horrified would be an understatement.

Naruto's face has been massacred. He had six deep cuts where usually his birthmarks would be, his nose was so smashed that it looked more like the Sandaime's Tsuchikage nose.

The blond's left eye had been hit several times with something very hard, the black bulge was oozing more blood than a cut on one's temple. And lastly, the thing that made Hiruzen freeze on the stop was Naruto's mouth.

Or more exactly the long cut going from each cheek towards the mouth. It made the child look as if he was smiling, but in reality, it was spilling so much blood it made the war veteran freeze.

Naruto's body had been littered with many more wounds, most of them on the body's torso and back. Some of them were from drilling a shrub into the boy's bone, some of them were wounds from being burned.

As the best medics in Konoha worked furiously on the boy, trying to somehow save Naruto's life, Hiruzen took a seat outside the room and trying to control his emotions.

Firstly, there was sadness and sorrow. The grief for failing the boy, as well as his parents, weighted greatly on the aged Kage. Those feelings were quickly crushed and overwhelmed by an untold fury and hatred.

As the Sandiame started to calm down, the same Rat-masked ANBU kneeling in front of his leader. "Awaiting orders, Hokage-sama," The man requested and waited for an order.

"Tell Anko and Ibiki to play as much as they wish with the culprits, whether they are poor merchants or on the council, they are to be punished. Don't kill them, I will talk with them before their execution," The Sandaime order, with a cold touch in his voice.

When the ANBU heard this, the man saluted and vanished to relay the information for the two most sadist people in the Village. The man shuddered slightly, knowing well that the tortures would be nothing compared to the wrath the Sandaime would release on them.

After this accident, Naruto was in a coma until yesterday, where he woke up like nothing ever happened. The only thing he remembered was that one of the civilians, a councilwoman, Haruno Ichika, had called him the Kyuubi before everything went black.

Even as the old man looked now at Naruto, he couldn't help but wince when he got the report from Kenshi, the current Head of hospital and best medic in Konoha.

He and the rest of the staff were able to heal Naruto almost completely. The only wounds that they were not able to heal were the big scar adorning the blond's lower part of the face.

Kenshi requested from the blond that he was to wear the bandages around his mouth. They were special bandages meant to make the scars less visible and the medic said that with the healing factor from Kyuubi, which helped the blond more than once, the scars would vanish one day, or at least he hoped for it.

The reason why the smile-like scar was still on Naruto's face was that medical Chakra did nothing to heal them. Kenshi theorized that those cuts must have been done by either some kind of poison they had no idea about or with wind-natured Chakra, which was very unlikely, seeing how civilians attacked the boy.

The other thing they were not able to heal was Naruto's left eye. When the bulge finally vanished there was nothing left from the eye. Fortunately, Kenshi and two other medics were able to transplant Naruto a new eye.

Less fortunately, blue eyes were rare in Konoha and the hospital had none, so they used a green one, seeing how it would look better with the blue one than a brown eye.

The old man was forced back into reality when Naruto snapped his fingers in front of his face. "Ne, Jiji, so can you help me?" The blond asked and the old man was sure he saw a grin under those bandages.

"Can you repeat, please? I haven't drunk my early coffee yet," the man answered with a bashful chuckle.

"I asked if you can give me permission to go to the Genin section of Library, pretty please?" Naruto asked and waited with a batted breath.

"No, it is only for Genin and above for a reason. I am sorry Naruto-kun, but you will have to wait. Now, if I remember correctly, your first lessons start in an hour, so it would be wise to prepare yourself for the school," The Sandaime explained and with a heavy sigh went back to his paperwork.

The young boy gritted his teeth and with a scowl that neither the Sandaime or the ANBU in the room saw, the blond left the room. When Naruto left the office, a shiver went down Hiruzen's spine, but the man chalked it under a cold.

As Naruto walked down the corridor of the Hokage residence, he passed an old man with short black hair and bandages over his right eye. The man's single eye bored into Naruto's blue-green eyes as if searching for something.

The two stood in silence for a few tense moments before the man smirked slightly and nodded, apparently having found whatever he searched for. When the man passed the blond and vanished behind a corner, the blond shrugged and went home.

As the man walked towards the Hokage office, his smirk got only wider. 'Yes, he has the same potential as his father, but unlike Minato's golden heart, this young one has darkness inside of him, even greater than Orochimaru's. Now, just to find a proper way to groom it and use it to make him someone powerful,'

Without even knocking, the man entered the office and strolled inside as if he owned this place. Hiruzen cursed under his breath again and narrowed his eyes at the man.

"Danzo, what do you want?" The old man barked out, unknowingly amusing the ROOT leader. With a single flare of the Sandaime's Chakra, his ANBU vanished and a privacy seal activated, to make sure no one would hear their little chat.

"I won't beat around the bush. The boy, Uzumaki, needs to be trained," Danzo stated boldly, not flinching when the Sandaime released his Killing Intent on his life-long rival.

"Don't you remember what I said eight years ago? I will never allow you to pull the boy into darkness. No, not after what you have done to Orochimaru and Itachi,"

Danzo scowled at this accusation. It wasn't his fault that Orochimaru turned this way, he wanted to make sure the Snake-summoner would be strong enough to lead the Village. It was Sarutobi's fault that Danzo was not allowed to properly teach the boy how to control his darkness.

Itachi and the Uchiha massacre was an entirely different topic.

"And as I said, he is the Jinchuriki, we will need him to be strong, stronger than A-Rank. Are you truly so blind Hiruzen? Kumo is much stronger than us, they have superior Ninjas and superior numbers. Iwa's Jinchurkis are both game-changers, Suna is catching up to us. The only great Village that is weaker than us is Kiri, that's because they have been in a civil war for a few years," Danzo explained.

"And your point is?" Hiruzen asked cooly, his eyes narrowing even further.

Danzo scowled and slammed his hands on Sandaime's desk. "Damn it, Hiruzen! We swore to make sure Konoha will not be crushed and what are you doing? Do you really believe that other nations won't use this opportunity created by Kyuubi's attack and the Uchiha massacre to finally destroy us? They will, I can guarantee this!"

"So what do you want me to do?!" Hiruzen shouted as he stood up, his face twisted into a scowl as well. "Do you want me to let you take Naruto and hope that he won't be swallowed by the darkness and turn on our Village?!"

"No, I want you to let me teach the boy how to control the darkness that is already present in his heart. If left uncontrolled we will have another Orochimaru on our hands, but even more dangerous!"

"He won't turn out like this!" Hiruzen shouted, the pressure of his Killing Intent crashing the wooden desk.

"You said the same with Orochimaru, but you can't even control your own pupils! How do you see it with Naruto, huh?!"

"Out. Get out or I am going to kill you. OUT NOW!" Hiruzen shouted, his face a mask of nothing else than pure fury.

Danzo scoffed and walked over to the door. A moment before leaving, he looked over his shoulder, gazing deep into Hiruzen's eyes. "You have become blinder than me. The Shinobi I once respected over anything is long gone,"

The black-haired man had to move out of the way as a Kunai was thrown where his head previously was. "NOW!" Without another word, Danzo strolled out of the office, none of the previous emotions shown on his face.

As the man mulled over the conversation he shook his head. 'I will not let Konoha stay weak, Hiruzen. I will make the boy strong, stronger than anyone, so when I die, I can be assured that Konoha will not be crushed,'

"Uzumaki Naruto, I will groom the darkness inside of you and unleash it on Konoha's enemies," The man muttered and went back to his base, he had some planning to do if he wanted the blond to progress adequately.

So, this is the first Chapter, the second one will come out sometime in the next weak. Hopefully, you enjoyed it.

As to pairing, I think I will go with something unique and either have him paired with someone rare or with a girl from a different Shonen anime/manga. I am not sure yet.

Thanks for reading, Ja Ne!