Disclaimer: Naruto and Naruto Shippuden along with all the characters and settings in this story are the intellectual property of Masahi Kishimoto. This is a work of fanfiction based on his original creation.

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Chapter 1

Ⱥ Ɲɑɤμƭɵ ίȵ Ʈίϻϵ

Naruto Uzumaki grinned to himself as he sat down with the Forbidden Scroll of Sealing he had nabbed from the Hokage's office. It had been too easy: one look at his Sexy Technique and the Old Man had collapsed in a geyser of blood from his nose (the closet pervert).

Of course, Naruto knew the village leader had to be taking it easy on him, but it was always a thrill to pull off a prank. Now to learn a kick-ass jutsu from the scroll and Mizuki-sensei would pass him!

The young blond, dressed in a garish orange tracksuit with blue trim on the jacket pulled open the scroll and started reading—as best as he could—through the techniques. Truth be told Naruto didn't read so good (or was that well?), and there were a lot of words on the scroll that Naruto just didn't understand, although luckily, the techniques that warned the user would die or that he'd need to murder someone (whoever thought of that edo tensei technique must have been horrible!) to perform it let Naruto rule out a good half of the ones he looked through without having to try to decipher them.

As it turned out, that scroll was ridiculously difficult to understand! Geez, maybe he should have paid more attention to Iruka-sensei's lectures! But the young academy student quickly dismissed the idea. Even if he had studied harder, he was pretty sure he still wouldn't have understood half of what was in these scrolls. It made the Academy textbooks look like the childrens' pop-up books he'd seen back in the orphanage.

There was one technique, at least, that Naruto could follow the description and instructions for pretty well, but he had dismissed that right away because it was the one technique that had made him fail his genin exam. His worst technique—a clone jutsu. The bunshin, or clone, technique had been the one he had studied hardest as it was the one he always failed at, so it was not his first choice. However, seeing as how pretty much all the rest would kill him or he couldn't understand them, he gave it a second look.

So, the kage bunshin—a shadow clone.

It took a serious amount of work for Naruto to create a shadow clone, but he did it. A perfect copy of himself high-fived him, and then tested its own durability by stabbing its hand with a kunai. There was a poof of chakra smoke, and Naruto instantly realized how stupid it had been to try to test it that way. But he'd succeeded!

There was still a lot of time before Mizuki was supposed to arrive, so Naruto took another look at the scroll. Maybe he could learn something else?

The shadow clone technique, it turned out had a few variants listed at the end of the main entry. There was an exploding clone, a special Nara clan variant (whatever that meant), a reinforced variant, and the one that really caught his eye: the temporal shadow clone. There were a lot of words the young ninja didn't understand, like 'temporal', 'displacement', or 'bijuu', but the instructions on how to actually perform the technique weren't too hard to figure out.

What drew Naruto's interest to this variant was the cool ninja drawing on the side! It was a huge spiral—like the one on the back of his shirt—but this one had eight spokes coming out of it which were complicated jutsu formula writing that looked totally awesome. The thing about that was, he was pretty sure he'd seen that exact same swirl before. Like on his own abdomen in the mirror when he was practicing his Sexy Technique. Naruto molded some chakra, lifted up his shirt, and sure enough, that was it! Exactly!

Naruto skipped through the parts he struggled with, but there were some parts of the entry in the scroll he thought were probably pretty important:

Unfortunately, thus far this temporal variant is completely theoretical as the base amount of chakra for a temporal displacement of even a second is prohibitively high. Nothing short of one of the bijuu could produce the necessary chakra to even create the temporal instability, and on top of that an additional chakra cost would be incurred proportional to the magnitude of the displacement. Further, a functional fuuinjutsu seal to regulate the technique would need to be used to channel the chakra from the source into the technique. The Eight Trigrams Seal (see figure 2) could possibly serve as the interface, though this has yet to be tested.

Naruto checked his stomach again. Yep, he had the Eight Trigrams thingy, so he should be able to do it!

So, how to actually make a temporal shadow clone?

The ninjutsu hand signs used for this technique are the same as for the regular shadow clone, but with the addition of the Yin and Yang handsigns (see figure 3). The Yin handsign comes first, channeling the users initiation chakra into the seal array, followed by the Yang handsign to draw the chakra from the source through the seal before creating the clone as described in the main Shadow Clone Technique entry. Methods for controlling the temporal displacement can only at this time be surmised, though increasing chakra output should result in further displacement.

Again, Naruto didn't understand much of what that said, but the part about the two handsigns was clear enough. Though not part of the standard Academy curriculum these non-standard signs were pretty clearly illustrated, and Naruto had no trouble replicating them with a little practice.

"Oh well, here goes nothing! Jikan kage bunshin no jutsu!"

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Deep within the young ninja, a two malevolent eyes snapped open. What is this?

Naruto stared in front of himself in disappointment. "I guess it really was nothing," he grumbled. "Maybe I need to use more chakra?" The young ninja made the handsigns and poured a ton of chakra into the technique, so much so that a fine blue aura began to swirl around him. "Jikan kage bunshin no jutsu!"

Ⱥ Ɲɑɤμƭɵ ίȵ Ʈίϻϵ

The Nine Tailed Fox roared. HOW DARE YOU! INSOLENT BRAT! The great beast pounded at the bars of its prison, but the seal held. I will tear you apart! Eat you whole for this outrage! DO YOU HEAR ME?!

For a moment, Naruto felt as if all of his senses shifted, and then a sudden anger unlike anything he'd ever felt.

But other than that...nothing. No clone.

"Ah well, at least I got the regular shadow clone down. When Miz—oh hey Iruka-sensei!"

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Author's Notes:

Japanese terms used in the text for a bit of local color will be put in italics the first time they are used and then defined in the notes in case the context of the story is insufficient (though I will strive to make it clear from the story what it means). Frequently repeated ones will then no longer be italicized unless they are part of a ninjutsu technique or haven't been seen in a while

jutsu—skill or technique

ninjutsu—ninja techniques that create physical effects from chakra

genin—the lowest rank of ninja

Hokage—Fire Shadow: title of the leader of the Village Hidden in the Leaves

bijuu—Tailed Beast: one of nine massive sentient chakra constructs/monsters/demons each in the shape of a different animal

technique names

edo tensei—Impure World Ressurection: brings a soul from the world of the dead (the pure world) back to the living world (impure world), and places it in a living sacrifice body that acts as a duplicate of the one brought back. The person brought back is under the control of the user of the technique but there are limits to that control.

bunshin—Clone Technique: Creates an illusory clone of the caster that acts on a predetermined course.

kage bunshin—Shadow Clone Technique: Creates a perfect, but fragile physical copy of the user that is capable of intelligent thought, independent action, and can do anything the original user can do. Its memories are also transferred back to the original when the shadow clones is dispelled by being struck or by the clone willing itself to disperse.