There are a few things I want to talk about before I start this chapter.
1.) Someone asked in a review that if Naruto will meet Fuu and Yugito. I do plan to include the Jinchurikis at some point in the series. So the answer to that is yes, but when, you'll just have to wait to find out.
2.) This will NOT be a harem fanfic. I detest those kinds of fanfics.
3.) Naruto will not be OP/godlike/Goku/etc. If I want to read a fanfic where Naruto easily kicks everyone's ass, there are literally hundreds of other fanfics I can go to to read that. And it honestly gets boring after a while.
4.) The only other thing I will reveal about the story is that I won't be covering the Wave and Chunin arcs. Someone said that they hoped that I won't get caught up doing that, and I won't. Thousands of other fanfics covers the same arcs, so I would like to branch away from that.
5.) I'm not a huge fan of OCs. The biggest reason I'll use OCs is if I have a need for them to help move the story along. However, I'm not against using OCs as antagonists, but there won't be any OCs as a main protagonist.
That is all for now. Also, I do not own Naruto.
Before Hiruzen went to the Hokage's Mansion to discuss Naruto's Rinnegan with the village elders, he took Naruto to his estate. He got his son, Asuma, two members of the ANBU, and a medic-nin to watch over Naruto and heal him. The hokage trusted everyone who he assigned to watch him to take good care of him and not persecute the boy for being the Kyuubi's container.
Asuma sat in a chair as he watched the medic-nin work on Naruto's eyes as the latter slept in bed. The eye transplant performed on the blond was a decent job, but far from perfect. The medic wanted to do some last minute touch up so Naruto would not risk permanent damage to his eyes later.
As Asuma watched, his hand was really itching to grab a cigarette. His father had scolded him time and time again not to smoke around children, especially in an enclosed room like this. In an attempt to take his mind off of his coveted cigarettes, Asuma asked the medic, "So how are Naruto's eyes?"
The medic replied, "I'm just about done here. After this, Naruto's eyes will be perfectly fine. However, his eyes may still ache from the transplant for a while."
Asuma chuckled. "Yeah. I would think plucking out eyes and putting in new ones isn't exactly the most painless of operations."
There was a knock at the bedroom door, and a voice asking for entry. Asuma, recognizing the voice, allowed the visitor entry. In walked a man wearing a simple, blue suit with a basic, grey flak jacket. He wore a mask with a bear design on it, and he had short brown hair.
The ANBU said, "Asuma-san, you can step out for a moment if you want to smoke a cigarette. I'll watch over Naruto for you."
A wide smile appeared on Asuma's face. "Thank you," he said happily. "I've been itching for a quick smoke for a while now."
Asuma stood up and quickly left the room, ready to fill his lungs with the sweet nectar of nicotine. The ANBU leaned against the wall, keeping an eye on Naruto. The medic, having finished working on the kid's eyes, took a seat next to the bed. She wanted to be able to quickly give Naruto treatment in case a situation occurred where he needs it.
After a while, the sleeping blond began to stir, catching the medic's attention. Naruto began to mumble something, but his quiet mumbling turned into a horrific scream as he clenched his eyes. The kid's outburst startled both the medic and the ANBU. The ANBU instinctually took a defensive stance while the medic rushed to Naruto's side.
Naruto shouted out, "WHY ARE MY EYES IN SO MUCH PAIN?!" His hands reached up and covered his bandaged eyes. His face contorted with pain, Naruto rolled to his side and curled up, hoping the pain would go away soon.
"Naruto!" The medic called out, causing the boy in question to jump back slightly.
"Who are you?" he asked fearfully
"My name is Tokiko," replied the medic softly. "I'm here to help you."
Naruto crawled back slightly. "Stay away…" he told her, his voice shaky and fearful. He tried to open his eyes, but all he could see was darkness. Finally noticing the bandages covering his eyes, he reached up to take them off desperate to see. The medic, however, tried to stop him.
"Naruto, no! Don't take off the bandages!" Tokiko reached forward and gently grabbed the hand that reached for the bandages.
A chill ran down the boy's spine at the contact. "I told you to stay away!"
Naruto shoved his hand outward. An invisible force knocked both Tokiko and the ANBU back against the wall. Naruto took the bandages off of his face. He slowly opened his eyes, revealing his Rinnegan. He looked around, and everything he saw appeared blurry.
Despite his impaired vision, he soon found the doorway. Carefully avoiding the two shinobi who lied on the ground as they recovered, Naruto made his way out of the room and stumbled into the hallway. He looked around many times, barely able to make sense of what his eyes was showing him. It terrified him to not know where he is.
"Naruto?" A voice called out curiously.
Looking to his right, Naruto, through his blurry vision, was able to make out the shape of a man wearing what seems to be a standard jounin outfit. The frightened boy backed up slowly, a hand grasping at his eyes as he felt another intense sting of pain pass through them.
The blurry man, who was actually Asuma, called out Naruto's name again with concern. "Naruto!"
He started to rush over to the boy. Naruto backed up slight. "Stay away from me!" the blond yelled. He pushed out his hand again, and was shocked to see Asuma fly back in the opposite direction.
Naruto panted a little bit, looking at his hand and wondering what had just happened. He then turned around and began to quickly stumble his way down the hall, keeping his hand against the wall to support himself. He did not know where he was going, but with his eyes in pain, his vision blurred, and not knowing where he is or what's and going on, he just wanted to get away from there.
The ANBU and medic that was in the bedroom rushed outside and, along with the second ANBU who had noticed the commotion, helped Asuma stand back up. The Sarutobi thanked them for their help while rubbing the back of his head with an annoyed sigh.
The new ANBU, with a kunai in hand, asked, "What is going on?"
Tokiko replied, "It's Naruto. He's woken up, and he seems to be scared of everything around him."
The first ANBU commented, "I can't say that I blame him. With the way most of the villagers mistreat him, it only makes sense for him to be scared waking up in a strange place with strangers around. But what was with that force that knocked us back?"
Asuma replied, "It might be one of the jutsus that the Rinnegan possesses. And if so, he might be using it instinctively rather than consciously."
Tokiko held her chin and pondered, "I wonder what he'd be able to do with a full mastery of the Rinnegan."
Asuma waved off the subject and said, "That's a thought for another time, right now we need to calm Naruto down before he hurts himself or anyone else."
For a moment Asuma considered what they could possibly do to calm Naruto down. He soon remembered a time he saw his father spending time with the kid. Naruto looked so happy at the time. The jounin smiled as he came to a conclusion.
Asuma said, "You three, do what you can to keep Naruto from leaving the house, and try to calm him down if you can. I'll go get Sandaime-sama. If anything, Naruto will listen to him."
The four ninjas split up, with the two ANBU and Tokiko going after Naruto, and Asuma leaving the estate to bring back his father.
"I'm sorry that you went out of your way to come here for nothing, Ibiki," said Jiraiya apologetically as he rubbed the back of his head with a goofy smile. The smile quickly disappeared as he took a more serious look. "I do appreciate it, but your services won't be needed here."
The man Jiraiya spoke to, a grey-flaked jounin with an intimidating face wearing a bandana styled hitai-ate, nodded. "It's quite alright, Jiraiya-sama. However, if you do need me, I'll be right outside the door."
Ibiki Morino left the room, leaving Jiraiya alone with his guest, his old student, Konan. There was nothing to the dark room that they were in other than the single table with two chairs and a bright light hanging over the table. Konan sat in one chair, her face devoid of any emotions and her eyes lifeless.
Jiraiya sat down opposite of Konan. As much as he wish he could just have a simple chat with his former student, he needed to get some information from her. He kept up his stern appearance to the best of his ability.
"So tell me, Konan," he finally spoke up, "What happened to the three of you, and why did Nagato give Naruto his Rinnegan."
Konan looked Jiraiya in the eyes. The toad sage was almost startled by the dead look in the woman's eyes. Konan answered, "Yahiko died not too long ago when Hanzo, with some assistance from Danzo, led a huge assault against us."
Jiraiya's eyes widened slightly. "Are you sure Danzo helped out Hanzo?" Konan nodded, and Jiraiya grunted. He found it believable that Danzo would have had a hand. The power hungry man would do anything to obtain his goals. "Now I have another reason to hate that man."
Konan continued. "We were all part of an organization called 'Akatsuki,' and our organization grew so large that even Hanzo deemed a threat, which led to him attacking us. The attack ended with Yahiko's, our leader's, death. After Yahiko's death, the Akatsuki's size dwindled down to nothing. Soon, we were approached by a masked man calling himself Madara Uchiha."
"Madara?" Jiraiya repeated with shock. "That guy can't be Madara. Even if he survived his battle with Shodaime-sama, he should have died of old age by now."
"I too have my doubts that the man is actually Madara," Konan admitted. "He claimed he wanted to help bring peace to the world, so we joined him, despite our suspicions."
Konan looked downwards sadly. Taking a deep breath, she continued her story. "Even after a few month of working together, we were still suspicious of him. Nagato eavesdropped on a conversation Madara had with a weird venus fly trap man named Zetsu, and that was when we learned his goals were completely different from ours, and we were nothing but pawns to him.
"We soon launched a surprise attack against Madara, but despite how prepared we were for the battle, that man very easily defeated us. I took some serious wounds, but nothing life threatening. He gave Nagato serious internal injuries, and sadly there was nothing that could be done to heal his injuries, not with Madara after us. Nagato knew he would die soon, so we came here so he could hide his Rinnegan into Naruto Uzumaki."
Jiraiya asked, "And how is it that you knew about Naruto?"
Konan replied, "Madara told us about how he manipulated the Kyuubi to have it attack the village five years ago, and how the Yondaime Hokage sealed it inside of Naruto Uzumaki."
Jiraiya said under his breath, "So that's why Kushina's seal failed." The man leaned back, crossing his arms with a sigh. "This is a lot of heavy information to have dropped on me all at once." The Sannin spent the next few minute taking in all of the information his former student gave him. Konan sat there, not really concerned with what happens to her next.
Finally Jiraiya asked, "And what is it Madara is planning."
"We were planning to collect all of the biju," Konan answered.
Jiraiya sighed yet again. "That's not good. That's not good at all. Why does he want the biju?"
"He wants to merge them together to revive the Jyuubi, the Ten-Tails. Then he was going to use the beast's power to subjugate the entire world under a genjutsu."
Jiraiya raised a brow. "There's a Jyuubi?"
"Was," Konan corrected him. "The Rikudo Sennin separated the Jyuubi into the nine biju we know of today."
"And what were you and Nagato planning to do with the biju, Konan?"
Konan stayed silent for a moment, almost hesitating to reveal the plan Nagato had come up to her former sensei. She replied, "We were going to use them to develop kinjutsu capable of destroying entire nations in an instant. And we would give the kinjutsu to every nation in the world."
Jiraiya could not believe what he had just heard. He could not fathom that the kind, young kids he mentored many years ago would grow up to plan something so twisted. "Why?" he asked. "Why would you do something like that?"
Konan explained, "When the nations got their hands on such a powerful jutsu, then they would be bound to use it. The destruction that such jutsu would create would cause all of the nations to quake in fear. The pain and destruction would lead to a fear of conflict, and all nations would put a cease to war to prevent the use of such kinjutsu.
"Pain forced Nagato and I to grow up. Nagato always said that the world was still but a child, still slowly maturing. We would use pain to force the world to grow up, like it forced us to, and lead the world onto a path of stability."
Jiraiya leaned forward and stated, "But peace like that wouldn't really be true peace."
Konan retorted, "What does it matter? At the very least there wouldn't be anymore conflict in the world."
Jiraiya sat back in his chair. He got all the answers to his questions for the time being. With the information he got from his former student, he had plenty to discuss with his old sensei. After a minute of thinking, the Toad Sage decided there was one last question he wanted to ask Konan.
"You haven't answered the question I asked you earlier, Konan," said Jiraiya. "What do you want to do now?"
Konan looked her former sensei in his eyes. The man may have a serious expression, but she could see the concern in his eyes. She contemplated her answer for a moment. She looked down, and she answered, "I don't know."
Jiraiya looked at Konan sadly. With a sigh, he stood up. "Well, I have to go now, Konan. I'll be back later."
"Goodbye, Jiraiya-sensei," Konan said with a hint of sorrow.
Jiraiya exited the room where he found Ibiki waiting right next to the door. The special jounin asked him, "So how did it go."
Jiraiya leaned against the wall next to Ibiki. "Well, she willingly answered all of the questions I had asked her, but…"
"But what?" Ibiki asked curiously.
Jiraiya took a deep breath then shook his head. "It's nothing. Do me a favor, will you?"
"What's that?"
"I need to go speak with Sandaime-sama. Will you stay here and keep an eye on her for me? Just make sure no one enters in here. Especially not Danzo."
The interrogator was a bit curious as to why Jiraiya would specifically ask that he keep out Danzo, but he was not going to press the subject. Most of the shinobi in Konoha don't like the one eyed old man. Even he does not. With a nod, Ibiki replied, "Yes sir. I'll keep watch here."
Jiraiya smiled. "Thanks, Ibiki." He walked off, ready to share the information he obtained to the hokage.
Hiruzen and Asuma rushed back to the Sarutobi estate. Despite his old age, Hiruzen was moving at a speed where even Asuma was having trouble keeping up. They entered the house and ran down a couple of hallways before they found Naruto surrounded by the other ninjas who were keeping a safe distance from the blond.
Naruto was backing up from them as he said, "Please, just stay away from me."
Tokiko was about to speak up, but she was stopped when Hiruzen lightly grabbed her shoulder. She looked back to the hokage who gave her a reassured smile. With an exchange of nods with the two ANBU, the three shinobis backed off as the Hokage approached Naruto.
"Hello there, Naruto," Hiruzen greeted kindly.
Naruto looked at the Hokage, who appeared to be mostly a white blur to him. Recognizing the voice, Naruto asked, "Is that you, Jiji?"
"Yes, it's me, Naruto." Hiruzen replied. "Can you not recognize me?" he asked curiously with a raised brow.
Naruto shook his head, his hands grabbing at his eyes. "No. Everything I see is so blurry. And my eyes hurt so much." The blond released a small, painful grunt. "Jiji, why is this happening to me?"
Hiruzen slowly approached Naruto, careful not to startle him, and pulled the blond into a comforting embrace. "It'll be alright, Naruto. You'll feel better soon enough."
A few tears built up in Naruto's eyes. "It hurts so much, though. I never experienced this much pain before."
Hiruzen rubbed Naruto's back trying to comfort him. "It'll pass, Naruto. You just need to be strong, ok."
Naruto sniffed as he did his best to hold back some tears. He returned the hokage's hug, and he said, "Ok, Jiji. I'll be strong."
Hiruzen smiled. "That's the spirit, Naruto."
Naruto mumbled, "But why do my eyes hurt so much...?"
Hiruzen said, "I'll tell you why later, Naruto, but right now, you should go get some rest."
Tokiko slowly approached the two, and she said, "Naruto-kun, the reason your vision is blurry is because you're eyes are a bit damaged, and they need time to heal."
Pulling away from the Hokage, Naruto looked at Tokiko with a confused expression. "Who are you? What do you mean?"
"My name is Tokiko," the medic replied with a kind smile. "And those eyes of yours are a bit damaged at the moment, so you need to let them rest until they are better. The best way to do that is to keep them wrapped up under some bandages. If you keep using them to see things right now, you could cause more damage to them that will never heal."
Naruto gulped nervously and shut his eyes. "Ok. I understand."
"So can we go put some bandages on over your eyes?"
Naruto nodded. "Y-yeah."
Hiruzen observed Naruto with a smile. The smile soon disappeared when he saw Jiraiya approaching with a serious expression. The old man patted Naruto on the back. "Go on, Naruto. Tokiko will take good care of you," he informed the kid. "She'll patch up those eyes of yours, and she'll give you some medicine to help with the pain. Try to get some rest, ok?"
Naruto smiled. "Ok."
Tokiko gently grabbed onto Naruto's hand, and Naruto grabbed on tightly to her hand in return as the medic led them down the hall back to his room. They passed by Jiraiya on the way. Naruto, with his eyes shut, was not aware of the Toad Sage's presence. Jiraiya watched his godson be led away by the medic before he approached the Sarutobis.
Hiruzen asked with a serious tone, "So how did it go with your former student?"
"Well, I suppose," Jiraiya replied. "She told me plenty of disturbing things. Mostly about the organization she was with. And about Madara Uchiha."
Hiruzen's eyes narrowed seriously while Asuma's widened with shock at the mention of Madara's name. They both have a similar thought. This was going to be a long night.
A couple of days have gone by since Naruto has received the Rinnegan. The young lad was sitting on his bed, bored out of his mind. He wanted to get up and do something, but Tokiko had warned him not to remove the bandages from his eyes for two weeks. At the very least his eyes were no longer in any extreme pain.
Naruto smiled. It was nice that he met another person that would scorn him for seemingly no good reason. Even when he was sure that no one else was with them, Tokiko was nothing but kind to him. He wished that more of the people in the village could be like her and the old man.
Human beings are petty creatures that can never understand each other. All they can do is inflict suffering…and pain to others.
Those words that the red head spoke echoed in Naruto's head. He questioned the truth behind those words. For a long time, Naruto probably would have agreed completely with that man, but the past couple of days made him think otherwise. The people that have been watching over him have been treating him really nice. Tokiko goes out of her way to make sure he's feeling good, Asuma brings him ramen from his favourite ramen stand, and even the ANBU have been telling him funny stories of crazy incidents they faced as genins.
Naruto heard a knock and the door open. "Good morning, Naruto," greeted a voice that Naruto immediately recognized as Hiruzen's. He heard two sets of footsteps walking towards him. Naruto surmised it must have been Tokiko to come check up on him.
"Morning, Jiji!" Naruto returned the greeting energetically, causing the old man to chuckle lightly.
"It sounds like you are feeling much better," he commented.
Naruto nodded. "Yeah, I am. If I could see right now, I'd be off pulling some prank right now."
The Hokage chuckled. "I'm sure you would."
"So, Jiji…" Naruto started but did not finish.
With a raised brow, Hiruzen asked "What is it, Naruto?"
"Why were my eyes hurting so much the other day?" Naruto inquired. "You said that you would tell me why later, so you must know why they were hurting, right?"
Hiruzen sighed. He was not planning on telling Naruto today, not if the kid did not press the subject since they had something else to settle, but he figured now was as good of a time as any to tell him. The hokage glanced to the person he was accompanied, who gave him a quick nod, before he took a seat on the bed next to Naruto.
Hiruzen asked, "Tell me, Naruto. Have you ever heard of the Rikudo Sennin."
The name unfamiliar to him, Naruto shook his head. "Nope. Can't say that I have."
Sarutobi was not surprised. He would be surprised if any five year old had heard the tale. "The Rikudo Sennin is the man who created ninjutsu. He is considered to be the god of shinobi."
"Really?" Naruto asked in disbelief.
"Yes."
Naruto tilted his head curiously. "Ok, but what does this have to do with my eyes."
"I'm getting there," Hiruzen replied. "You see, the Rikudo Sennin had his own special eyes that has granted him special jutsu that only he could preform. They are known as the Rinnegan." Hiruzen got a nod from Naruto letting him know that he was following along. "Now tell me something, do you remember anything that happened the night before your eyes started hurting?"
Naruto looked up in thought, doing his best to recall his memories of that night. After a minute he said, "Some strange people appeared in my room."
Hiruzen asked, "Do you remember what they looked like?"
Naruto replied, "Well, one of them was a pretty lady with blue hair. There was another guy who had piercings all over his face with orange hair. And there was a third, super thin guy with red hair." Naruto thought for another minute before adding to Nagato's description. "He had some interesting eyes. They were purple with lots of rings on them."
"I see," said Hiruzen. "Do you know why they were there?"
"They said they were there to give me a birthday present, which made me really happy." Hiruzen made a mental note about how frightening it was that children can be so innocently naïve. "But I fell asleep before they could give me their present."
Hiruzen concluded that they must have put him under genjutsu with a good idea as to why they did. The hokage explained, "Well, Naruto, the reason why your eyes were in so much pain was because those people removed your eyes and put a new pair in their place."
Naruto suddenly felt a little sick. "You mean these eyes I have now are different than the ones I was born with?"
"Indeed," Hiruzen confirmed. "You described the eyes that the red haired man had. Those eyes were the Rinnegan." Naruto looked at Sarutobi with disbelief. "And the eyes you have now are the very same eyes that man had."
"S-so…a-are you saying… I now have the Rinnegan?" Naruto stuttered as he put two and two together.
Hiruzen answered, "You do, Naruto."
"The Rinnegan are supposed to be powerful eyes, right? Why would they go out of their way to give it to me? You would think they'd want to keep the eyes for themselves."
"The man who possessed the Rinnegan was on the verge of death when you met him. He must have wanted to pass the eyes on to a successor before he died," the Hokage replied. "As to why he would he chose you, I don't know, but I'm sure you'll find out one day. For now though, just think about how special and powerful of a gift you have, and be glad that you got it."
Shaking his head to get hIs questions out of his head, Naruto smiled. "Yeah! I'll make good use of these awesome eyes."
Hiruzen smiled. "That's the spirit, Naruto." Looking over to the other visitor, the old man decided it was finally time to move on to the main reason he visited Naruto today. "Now, there is something else we need to talk about, Naruto."
Naruto raised a brow. "About what, Jiji?"
"I made some new living arrangements for you," Hiruzen explained, piquing Naruto's curiosity. "Starting today, you'll be living with the Hyuga family."
"The Hyuga?" Naruto asked. "Aren't they one of the biggest clans in Konoha?"
"They are. They have agreed to watch over you."
"Why can't I stay here," Naruto asked with disappointment.
Hiruzen patted Naruto's shoulder. "Because with those eyes of your, some unsavory individuals will target you to try to get them. I can't guarantee you protection here, but the Hyuga has agreed to look after you and protect you."
The blond looked down, his hands gripping onto his blanket tightly. When he thinks about living with someone else, the people from the orphanage keeps popping up in his mind. "Will they treat me better than the people at the orphanage?"
Naruto heard the other person in the room take a couple of steps forward. "I can assure you, Naruto Uzumaki, that any mistreatment will not be tolerated. We'll take good care of you."
Naruto looked in the direction of where the voice came from. It was a voice he did not recognize. "Who are you?" he asked.
"I am Hiashi Hyuga," the head of the Hyuga clan introduced himself. "I am the current head of the Hyuga clan. You'll be living with us as of today."
Naruto thought about what he knew about the Hyuga clan. He has heard that they were a highly respectable clan, but to him that meant that they were also fun hating people. He felt a sinking feeling in his stomach at the thought of living with such people, but he has been assured that they would give him better treatment than the people who worked in that hole he spent his entire life growing up in. He figured he might as well give the Hyuga a chance. Besides, he kind of gets the feeling that the Hokage would not give him much of a choice of where he gets to stay.
Naruto introduced himself with a bright smile. "I'm Naruto Uzumaki, ya know. Nice to meet ya."
Jiraiya entered the room where Konan was being held. The woman sat at the table with a tray of food sitting in front of her. The sannin noticed how the food has remained practically untouched. He sighed as he approached the table. "I really wish you would eat more, Konan," he told his former student.
Konan simply replied, "I'm not hungry."
Jiraiya sat down and asked, "So have you decided what you want to do now?" The only response he received was a head shake. "Well then, I have an offer for you. It took a lot of persuasion on my part, but I managed to get Sarutobi and the elders to agree to this." He pulled out a Konoha hitai-ate and set it on the table in front of Konan. "How about you become a Konoha shinobi?"
Konan looked at the headband with surprise, then she looked at her former mentor. Try as she might, Konan could not hide the resentment in her eyes. She could not believe that he was asking her to join Konoha of all places.
Jiraiya saw the look in her eyes, but he couldn't help but smirk. "There we go. Nice to see some life in your eyes again."