Meanwhile, in Konoha, they were facing the darkest night in their history.
The night when Konoha was attacked, by a masked man, and the legendary Kyuubi.
In the village, every single able-bodied man, woman, and even a number of children were struggling, hoping to repel the disaster on their doorstep.
A swipe of a claw, and a neighborhood was crushed. A thick tail comes crashing down, and dozens lost their lives. But it was when the Fourth Hokage appeared, that events took a turn. An immense chakra bomb was being charged up, when a massive toad creature slammed down atop the Kyuubi's back. Lord Fourth had arrived, and in no time at all, he, the toad, and the Kyuubi vanished from the village.
For many, that was the end of the terror of that night. The events that followed were left in the hands of only a few. But that story is not our own.
...
Emerging from the wilderness, two shinobi were greeted with a sight they could not comprehend.
Konoha, in ruins.
"What... What the fuck happened?" One of the men ran toward the damaged gate, as the second man decided to hang back slightly. In his arms, the infant.
"Hello! Is anybody alive here?" He called out, concern apparent on his face. He was full of fear for his friends, his family members. After several moments of silence, and a building of tension, multiple people arrived at the gate. Relieved, the man called out again. "Sensei! Thank goodness. What on earth happened here?"
"Chihiro, Satoshi. You are alive. Good... Listen, the village is in dire straits right now. Less than an hour ago, a battle against the legendary Kyuubi was ended by the Fourth. Unfortunately... He did not survive. We need to secure the village now, before we come to a decision on what we can do."
Both men paled in shock upon this news. The village was destroyed by a living calamity, and even the Hokage was killed in action... Bloody hell... And then, a soft cry was heard. The men remembered, and Satoshi stepped forward with the wrapped baby.
"Sensei, we need to speak with Lord Third immediately. This matter is of immense importance, likely equal to the current situation." Satoshi bowed slightly, comforting the child. The older man nodded, and immediately sent a messenger to retrieve him. He then turned back to Satoshi.
"You never make those comments lightly, Satoshi. What is going on?"
"This baby, sensei. I cannot tell you, but... This baby may become someone quite scary, one day."
"And what would make you say that, Satoshi-san?" A different voice spoke, now. An older, more mature voice, but currently tinged with grief. The Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi. He stood, accompanied by five ANBU members, watching Satoshi warily. After a moment, he approached the young shinobi, to get a better look at the infant in his arms.
"What on earth is this seal? How strange..." He stroked his chin, examining the infant closely as he thought for a moment.
"Everyone present, the information about to be revealed will be classified at S-Rank. Discussion beyond this moment will result in execution. Now, Satoshi, Chihiro. Explain."
The duo nodded, before they began to recount their mission. They told of how they had been hired by a rouge shinobi from the Hidden Sand. How, while traveling to bring him to Konoha as a defector, they were attacked on multiple occasions. And they told of how their mission failed. But then, they told of the beast that appeared during their final conflict. The way it appeared from seemingly nowhere, and how it performed a sealing jutsu itself, marking the child as a Jinchuriki. When they uttered those words, Hiruzen frowned deeply.
"Such a strange creature Fate is... For two Jinchuriki to be born on the same day. You described the creature as a spider? I will look into it. For now, we will raise this child within the village orphanage. What is the child's name?"
"Yuuto Amakuri."
...
Five years after the attack of the Kyuubi, Konoha was once more in relative peace. The village rebuilt, gave the dead their respects, and tried to move on. However, a dark undercurrent lived within the village. Though many would not admit, there was an unrest within some of the citizens. The two sources of this unrest... The demon child, and the Uchiha clan.
But within the orphanage in the heart of Konoha, only one of those seemed to be a problem. Naruto Uzumaki, tormented daily, and treated as though he was a curse. In the same orphanage, there was another child, one who seemed to always be overlooked. He was quiet. Unnaturally so. It was like he was exhausted half the time, and bored for the other half, wandering around as if he was trance. Many left him be, mostly due to lack of real concern.
This boy was Yuuto Amakuri.
...
Another dull day.
Nothing interesting is ever happening in this orphanage. Nobody plays with me, and hardly anybody talks with me. My only comfort is when I sneak off to go train in the forest.
Well, I say "sneak off," but really I just walk out, and nobody ever really notices. Must be something about me, but... I dunno, sometimes I just feel a bit invisible.
I also got into the habit of visiting the Academy, and reading in their library. I've been caught a few times, mostly by some shinobi, but they tend to let me off the hook when they see that I'm just reading introductory-level books. It's a bit of a guilty pleasure of mine, learning about ninja arts and practicing them in the forest. I even figured out how to cast an E-Rank genjutsu on myself. I use it most of the time when I'm not doing other things, so I can train my resistance to them.
Today, though, I was in my normal training grounds. I lacked proper equipment, so I am making due for now by practicing chakra techniques.
You may ask, why am I training my chakra? Shouldn't I wait until I'm in the Academy when I'm seven? To that I say, you're an idiot. I don't know much, but I've learned some things from history books. Clans start training their children way before the Academy. That's why they are always topping the scores. Meanwhile, I'm an orphan with nobody backing me. I've gotta be better than them, if I wanna live a good life. So, I train.
Right, so... I started to focus on my internal energies, feeling the flow of my chakra. It sat stagnant, like a muddy pond. I started my normal training, slowly prodding and guiding the dense energy, as it slowly started to swirl to the left. This, I had to be careful about. If I swirled it to the right, it could cripple, even kill me. So I took things slow, gently compressing the thick chakra into itself.
I had read in one of the manuals, that a good beginning point for chakra control was to spiral it into a tight, small ball. Once you can get it down to the size of you thumb nail, you'd have achieved enough control to pass the Academy exam. Of course, I wasn't quite there yet. As of yet, I couldn't get it smaller than the length of my thumb. But every day, I felt the progress.
I planned to continue this training for another hour, as per my routine. But today... Today had an incident.
While I was in the middle of my meditation, a certain blond boy came crashing through the trees, crying to himself. When he entered the clearing though, he tried to quickly wipe the tears away. Naruto Uzumaki. He was pretty close to my age, I think. And everybody seemed to hate him. But... To me, he felt kinda familiar. Like a distant friend. So I never really tried to bother him, leaving him to do what he wanted to. After all, he never caused me trouble. But now, he seemed a bit upset.
"What are you staring at?" He asked me, and I felt the hint of embarrassed anger in his voice. Instead of answering, I just gave a slight shrug. "Ugh... Why did I even ask? You don't talk to anybody."
He seemed desperately trying to change his mindset at the moment, so I stood up and roughed through my bag. After a moment, I tossed him a small snack. His eyes went wide, and he caught the little packet. He started to pull it open, sitting himself down beside me. After he took a bite, he got kind of sheepish, before speaking again.
"Uhm... Thank you, Yuuto. So... What were you doing?"
"Chakra training."
"Oh. Wait, you can talk?!" He seemed genuinely surprised, staring me in the eyes. I simply nodded in response, which made him narrow his eyes at me. I watched him for a tick, and then decided to speak again.
"Want to join?" I asked him frankly, before showing the various books and materials I had with me. Some were borrowed from the Academy, others were loose papers with notes I took, or ideas I had. I watched as he considered for a moment, before he came to a conclusion, and nodded.
"Okay. Here." I passed him the book titled "Introduction to Chakra" and started to point out different parts as we read it together. Honestly, it felt sort of fun to engage in an actual conversation for once. I don't really know why, but... I just felt more calm when I was in my own head. I rarely felt the need to talk. But talking with Naruto, and teaching him these things... It just felt right. Before long, the sun started to set, and we decided to call it a day. We walked back to the orphanage together, though I noticed a bit of hesitation in Naruto's steps as we started getting closer.
As we came to the street it was on, I stopped walking. Without even asking him, I grabbed his arm and pulled him in the opposite direction. I pulled him along for a good five minutes, before we came up to a construction yard.
"Let's sleep here. I don't think anyone will mind."
A bit of relief crossed Naruto's face, before he nodded his head. I set up my bag near a half-built wall, pulling it close to my chest as I laid down. After a moment, I heard Naruto wish me a goodnight, and heard him start to softly snore not five minutes later. Sure enough, I soon followed him into sleep.