Vengeful Sage

Chapter 1: Beginnings of a Path

Disclaimer: I don't own most of the stuff in this fic, including Naruto, and whatever other things randomly pop up.

AN: The first scene has been added on March 18, 2016.

In a dark dimly lit room somewhere below the ground, an old man sat behind his mahogany desk, quite upright despite his apparent impairments. Half his face and his right arm were covered in bandages, but that to no extent diminished the poise and sense of power that could be observed from his countenance.

Before him stood a man wearing an eagle shaped mask, garbed in ANBU armor from head to toe. The presence of the animal mask on his face concealed from the world his bland emotionless visage, but his master knew. His master knew that any order his servant was given, he would obey and execute without question. He had trained him himself after all.

"Eagle! You will go to the Redlight District and find a group of civilians who have intoxicated themselves from the festival. You will play upon their hate and suspicion of the Jinchuriki. Given your Kekkei Genkai, it should be child's play. Weave your illusions such that it becomes the most overwhelming thought in their minds. Lead them to the boy, but beware! The boy must live; and remember. Is that clear?"

"Hai, Danzou-sama."

"Make sure you are not discovered. In case you are, abandon the operation. Dismissed."

XXX

On a warm summer evening, a ten year old boy stared into the orange-streaked horizon, watching the sun set into the forest beyond, its shining radiance slowly fading into oblivion. Sitting atop a massive stone head carved into a mountain, he looked down into the village beneath him. The restaurants, the shops, the bakeries – they all reminded him of one fact; he was not wanted. He was hated by the village. Nobody needed or wanted him. He was alone, as he had been all his life, from the very day he was born. In the beginning, he tried. Oh he tried so very hard, to gain the recognition of the villagers, to earn their respect as a fellow human being, if nothing else. But to no avail.

Years ago, he had stopped trying. He had stopped crying too. It would do him no good. The more he tried to socialize with them, the more he was rebuked and rejected, called demon and monster. He hated them. He hated them all, and were it not for a few kind souls, he didn't know what he would do. One of them was an old man who would visit him from time to time, and help him buy stuff from stores that would throw him out. He was the Hokage, he realized a couple years ago – the strongest ninja in the village, someone everyone adored and revered. He wanted to be just like him when he was younger. But then… the academy happened. Even since he turned nine, the old man had entered him into the ninja academy, and his excitement knew no bounds. He finally had a chance to prove himself, to make others realize how great he could be, that he too could become an "embodiment of the will of fire", as the old man put it, whatever that meant.

However, it was not so long after that he realized the futility of his dreams. Whenever he succeeded at something the class was assigned, he would be scorned instead of praised. His assessments would be sabotaged, and he was failed on purpose. During sparring sessions, his teachers would fight at levels no kid his age could ever hope to match, and he would end up being beaten into unconsciousness, where he was dumped unceremoniously in the grounds, left to lie there till he woke up. However, despite these handicaps, he managed to just barely scrape by, and learned to harness his chakra. He learned about shuriken and kunai, and how to use them in a fight. He could shoot a bull's eye from ten feet away, which was pretty impressive in his books. He could use his chakra to henge himself into a perfect replica of almost anyone he knew. In fact, he had even created a technique of his own, where he transformed into a beautiful buxom blonde girl, almost completely naked if not for the technique's residual clouds covering her privates from the rest of the world. And it was quite the formidable jutsu indeed, for this technique was all you needed to bleed any pervert out there into submission – which he learned first-hand after a few trial runs countless souls who were caught in its deadly snare. It worked on the villagers who chased him around the village, shouting for revenge against the demon, it worked against his teachers, it even worked against the old man Hokage, and he was supposed to be the strongest ninja out there.

He was not the best in his class, but neither was he the worst; in fact he liked to think he was one of the better students, only being bested by the likes of Sasuke Uchiha, Sakura Haruno, Shino Aburame and others. That too was partly due to his teachers being completely biased against him, and partly due to his inability to perform the Bunshin no Jutsu, which was supposed to create an illusionary clone of the user, in order to confuse the enemy. But no matter how hard he tried, he could not create a single working clone that was not a devastating failure. In fact, he had already given up on that avenue, and come to terms with the idea that it was impossibility for him. Why, he had no idea… but he didn't really care, because he had something better.

Flashback:

Naruto fled the incoming mob as it stormed behind him - chasing him away from the shop he had painted orange overnight - running like his life depended on it (which it did, as a matter of fact). Seeing some bushes to his right, he leapt in, and hid, his head at ground level. Several minutes, he waited like that till he was certain he had lost them. He was almost about to emerge when he heard voices. He peeked out of the bush he was hiding in into the clearing behind it. It was a tall man, probably a jounin from the looks of it, with three kids, each wearing a Konoha Hitai-ate over their foreheads. The shortest one, a boy with short brown hair and a puppy sitting on his head was bouncing up and down in excitement.

"What cool new jutsu are you gonna teach us today, Sensei?" he asked.

"I'm sure all of you are already acquainted with the clone jutsu from the academy, now I'm gonna teach you a different type of clone, a solid clone in fact." Turning to the boy, who by the looks of it was an Inuzuka, he said, "Tashegi, since your dominant element is earth, you'll be learning the Tsuchi Bunshin no Jutsu. Same goes for you, Renji." He said to the taller boy.

"Here are the hand-seals, get to work. I expect you to be able to create at least three solid clones by the end of the week. And no slacking, Renji!" Showing the two the correct sequence of hand-seals, which was pretty short as far as Naruto was concerned, the jounin turned to the last member of the group, indicating for her to follow him towards the river.

"Maki, you being a water element user, will be learning the Mizu Bunshin no Jutsu, and that's why I brought you here, since the river water will help you train and makes it easier to create water clones for beginners." Showing her the hand-seals, and telling her to start practicing, he walked to do whatever jounin usually do….

Naruto - who hadn't moved a muscle ever since he spotted the team enter the training field - finally relaxed as the jounin left the area. He had found himself a new target.

Flashback End:

Over the next few days, he had practiced and perfected the earth clone jutsu, which he found, to his astonishment, to be far easier and more natural than the regular clone jutsu. By spying on the team again and again, he had even learned the water clone jutsu, watching the girl Maki practicing on it.

However what astonished him most wasn't the ease with which these jutsu came to him, nor was it the fact that these clones were nowhere near as dull looking and dead as his normal clones, rather it was the sheer number of clones he could make. Literally hundreds of clones appeared at his command, and Naruto could barely even feel the drain on his chakra reserves. It was tremendous. This mind-blowing discovery though, remained undiscovered, because Naruto knew exactly what would happen if word spread that the "demon" could summon hundreds of clones to his side at any time. And so, life went on.

Naruto sighed as he ran his hand through his spiky blond hair, opening his eyes to reveal blue orbs the color of the sky. Today was his birthday, but he expected no more than what previous years had brought him, pain and suffering, and a genuine loathing for almost all things Konoha. He got up, and found himself sitting at Ichiraku Ramen five minutes later. After devouring over ten bowls of his favorite miso ramen (I don't think stomach sizes actually differ by that much, but hey, Kishi's the boss!), and leaving the bill on his ever growing tab for the end of the month, the blond headed home, passing through dark side streets to avoid detection by the villagers, who apparently went over the edge with their demon killing tendencies on the day of his birthday, which also turned out to be a festival day, in commemoration of the defeat of the Kyuubi, the nine-tailed demon fox that attacked Konoha ten years ago, exactly the day he was born, in fact.

Now Naruto was far from stupid, and he immediately found it fishy when he put all these facts together, however the most he could conclude was that he was resented for being born on the day of mourning - and as petty as the villagers were, believing in this wouldn't be too far a stretch of the imagination – and the Hokage was quite tight-lipped on the matter.

So it was on one of these dark alleys that he was passing through when he heard a noise, a drunken voice, "Today's the day I avenge my comrades, you filthy demon! Die, die, die. You'll pay for your insolence."

A weight suddenly fell upon Naruto's back, and he doubled over. Just as he was about to stand up and push the weight aside, he felt a piercing pain in his left shoulder, as if a knife had just been stabbed through it, and then wrenched out with no care for the target's life (well that sums it up nicely enough).

As the blond pushed him off, he knew he was bleeding, which was evident from the stains on the ground, but he didn't care. His body was pumping adrenaline and he ran, turning into an aisle and then another till he found himself trapped. With a dead end in front of him, and a drunken killer behind him, he had nowhere to go. However, Naruto was never one to go down without a fight, and the man before him was no more than a common civilian, though his overwhelming height and weight were quite the intimidating factor. Nevertheless, Naruto being Naruto went for a frontal assault, before being stabbed once more, this time through the stomach, and once more between his ribs. However he did manage to uppercut the hulking figure (for him at least) in the chin and knock his feet out from beneath him, before ripping the man's kunai out of his hands and slitting his throat with it.

Within seconds, there were two or three violent jerks, and then all was still. As the adrenaline left him, he grew tired and collapsed onto the man, falling unconscious.

XXX

Naruto awoke to the sound of birds chirping. Peace and quiet, nothing to disturb nature but the sound of people bustling around, taking care of their day to day business. Wait a minute….where was he? As he opened his eyes, he was blinded by the dazzling light coming in from the window. He looked around, taking in the plain white walls and white bed sheets spread out on the bed he lay upon…. Oh he knew where he was; the bane of his short ten-year life, wherein resided the scariest and most cruel brand of professionals known to man, the Konoha Public Hospital. Giving himself a one over, he realized something, he was bandaged all about his torso and shoulders, but he could feel no pain, no wound, nothing. So then why was he here? What day was it?

The day of the festival! His birthday! And then it all came rushing back to him. How he was attacked by a drunken villager in the darkest of alleys in Konoha's Redlight district, how he fled from his assailant until he ran into a dead end, how had stood his ground, how he had so thoughtlessly slit the man's throat…. He should feel ashamed of himself, he thought, but surprisingly, he didn't. After all, he was just defending himself. He hadn't actively sought out the man in order to kill him. Besides, he had deserved it.

Before he could dwell further on this dark train of thoughts, the door opened up to reveal a young woman in a short nurse's outfit, leading the way for an old man wearing the ceremonial robes of the Hokage who entered in behind her. Though his face was set in an uncharacteristic frown, he allowed a slight shadow of a smile to creep into his expression before he resigned himself back to his previous demeanor. This was definitely not a social call.

"Ah, I see you're up and about Naruto-kun, just as usual," he began, breaking him from his morbid train of thought. "How are you feeling now? My ANBU found you bleeding out from several puncture wounds on your body, lying over a dead man who was reported missing for three hours before you were found. What happened?" Though the old man already had a pretty good idea of what probably happened.

"Oh hey, jiji. I don't feel a thing. How long have I been asleep? And what date is it?" Naruto replied, actually sounding worried for a bit.

"You were found late yesterday evening, and now it's the afternoon of the next day. What with the amount of blood you had lost, I'm actually quite surprised you were able to wake up so quickly. But putting those matters aside, we have some serious issues to discuss, primarily the case of the dead man you were found with…." The Hokage began, trying to steer the conversation to the matter at hand.

"Jiji, I was attacked by this unknown man, so I defended myself, and he ended up dying as a result. There's nothing I could have done."

"But surely, you didn't have to kill him. Do you not know how big of a deal it is to take a life with your own two hands? This is a very grave deed indeed. How do you feel about it."

"I don't know what I feel. Or rather, I don't feel anything. If you're expecting sadness, or regret, or even remorse, I'm not sure I feel any of them. Aren't you happy that I'm alive? Would you prefer that I was dead in his stead?"

"No, of course not Naruto-kun, but you must understand that killing everyone who antagonizes you is not the solution. Make the people trust you, and there just may come a time when you are the most beloved person in the village. You have a responsibility to your village Naruto; you cannot just go around killing its citizens…"

"But jiji I tried already, and nobody cared. Why does everyone hate me anyway. Is it because of the events at the time of my birth? Is it because of the Kyuubi?!"

These words, in the particular way and order they were said, though unknowingly, shocked the old man to his very core. Did Naruto know? If so, since when? He was baffled. How could he know…..Unless, unless the Kyuubi was contacting him?

"Do you know the answer, Naruto-kun?"

"I want to hear it from you."

Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Professor, God of Shinobi, and currently longest reigning Hokage sighed, as he lowered his head in defeat. Naruto knew. Would he ever trust him again? He didn't know. He would just have to come clean about the issue, and hope for the best.

"How much do you know about that night ten years ago, when the Kyuubi attacked the village?"

"Well, at the academy, they taught us that the Yondaime Hokage defeated it, and killed it with an awesome suicidal jutsu."

"Well, Naruto-kun, you see, the fact of the matter is that the Kyuubi cannot be destroyed, as it is merely a being of chakra, so there is no true and told way of killing it. The only option the Yondaime had was to seal it inside a newborn child. That child was you. That is also the reason why people see you as a demon, because they find you as a scapegoat for all of their hate that they hold against the Kyuubi."

Seeing the blonde's gob smacked expression, Hiruzen realized that he had been had….. by a ten year old boy no less. He must truly be losing it in his old age if things were turning out this way. So Naruto had no clue whatsoever? That was just sad.

On the inside, Naruto was smirking, 'Naruto: 2, Old Man Hokage: 0' Well, counting his use of the sexy jutsu that is. Anyway, he grew serious as he contemplated what he had just found out.

"But why did it have to be a child? Why me?"

"Because only a child, whose chakra network was yet undeveloped could hope to survive such a sealing. Had an adult been used, the sudden influx of so much chakra would have been too much, and the most probable scenario would be that the Kyuubi would escape, killing its host along with it."

"Umm, is it harmful? The Kyuubi's presence that is…."

"No actually, Jinchuuriki – that's what people like you are called – actually have special abilities because of the being sealed inside of them. For example, look at the wounds you sustained just yesterday. It would have taken any normal person over a week to recover from them, and even then, they would probably have scarred, but with the help of your regenerative abilities granted to you by the Kyuubi, they're already fading away the next day. In addition, the Kyuubi's chakra slowly seeps into your coils, forcing them to become larger, and so, even at the age of ten, your chakra levels by far outclass those of most chunin."

"So basically it makes me super badass….? Yeah, how cool is that!"

"Jiji, I want to be the strongest ninja ever!" 'So I can make sure no one ever belittles me like that again…..'

"That is an admirable goal, Naruto-kun. To be a strong ninja to serve and protect one's village, and those precious to them. I'm expecting great things from you." A glimpse of a true smile could be seen on the old man's face, reflecting his pleasure at seeing Konoha's resident Jinchuuriki setting himself on the path to becoming a true embodiment of the will of fire.

'As if….. Those villagers can go **** themselves.' Naruto thought, never once breaking the happy façade he had been displaying for the past half hour.

"But jiji, how will I become an awesome ninja if my teachers don't teach me anything?"

"I'm really sorry you feel that way, Naruto-kun. But there's always still the library. I'll make sure to let the librarian know that you're allowed in the ninja section. You know; Jinchuuriki privileges and all…" Hiruzen decided that endearing the young boy and making him feel indebted to him would make Naruto more loyal, and drive him to further improve his skill set more quickly.

"Thanks jiji. I'll be sure to make you proud."

Satisfied for now, the Sandaime Hokage stood up and made for the door, speaking to the nurse for a bit, and then finally bidding farewell, leaving Naruto to dwell on his thoughts. 'Jiji will never understand. The villagers' hate runs far too deep. There is no turning them. I will just have to fend for myself.' And so began, our favorite blonde's descent into darkness.

Right so somebody tell me if you like it or not, and if the writing is any good. First story so expect some issues. No promises with respect to updates.

Some changes to the storyline. Well, no Uchiha massacre. Naruto isn't as dumb as he's in canon. Not much has happened yet, just the run-of-the-mill sort of first chapter. I wanted to write a longer chapter, but I thought here is a nice place to break. Anyhow, I'm out.