Minato.
Inside the seal space, Naruto and the Fourth Hokage sat facing each other.
Kurama, seeing Naruto wasn't actually about to tear the seal open, decided to retreat for a nap. The whole ordeal had been unsettling, any more stress and the great Nine-Tails feared he might actually snap. The first Tailed Beast in history to suffer a nervous breakdown? He wanted no part of the Fourth Hokage's family drama and retreated into the deepest recesses of the seal.
"What exactly happened between you and the Nine-Tails?" Minato asked, breaking the silence. "I've never seen him want to get away from someone that badly. Not even when Kushina had crucified him on a giant boulder."
"Nothing much, just played a few games with him," Naruto said, brushing the question off. He didn't want to get into it.
"Oh."
Silence fell again, heavy and awkward. The two just looked at each other.
Minato felt a headache coming on. This was his first time... being a father. He had no experience, no idea how to talk to this boy who was his son. Did Naruto even know who he was? Had he understood what the Nine-Tails had let slip earlier? Guilt gnawed at him – the irresponsible father. The words, 'I'm your father,' lodged in his throat, refusing to surface. This suffocating quiet was worse than facing down an army of Iwa ninja.
Naruto, honestly, didn't know how to talk to the Fourth Hokage either. He couldn't say he liked or disliked this man who was technically his father. He'd grown up alone, never knowing Minato, so there was no real emotional connection.
Goku Sensei felt more like a father to him than Minato. His impression was based purely on stories and history: sunny, incredibly strong, devoted to his wife. And that was it.
If Naruto hadn't hit a wall with his ninjutsu training, he never would have intentionally summoned him like this.
'...'
"So," Minato finally ventured, "you did all that... to summon me? You know who I am?"
Naruto simply nodded. "Yeah. I sensed your Ki in the seal a long time ago."
'Ki?' The word was unfamiliar, but Minato sensed he didn't have much time left to dwell on it. "Then... what do you want?" he asked, choosing his words carefully.
Seeing the legendary Fourth Hokage looking almost apprehensive was faintly amusing to Naruto, but he answered plainly.
"To learn ninjutsu."
"Learn ninjutsu?" Minato looked stunned. He'd thought of a lot of reasons, accusations, anger, anything, but never that Naruto would summon him for that.
"If you want to learn ninjutsu, you can ask Sandaime-sama. Someone will teach you, you don't need to-"
"No one in Konoha will teach me," Naruto cut in, his voice suddenly cold, a mocking edge sharpening his features. The brief flicker of connection vanished.
Who would teach him ninjutsu? Who would teach him ninjutsu?
The Konoha villagers who hated him the most?
Those few 'loyal' Hokage guards that Minato trained, who vanished?
His own student, Kakashi, barely holding himself together after his own losses, kept going on suicidal missions in hope that someday he would get unlucky. He couldn't even look after himself, how would he look after Naruto?
The Toad Sage, Jiraiya, who hadn't shown his face once?
The hypocritical Third Hokage, Hiruzen?
Or Danzo, the snake hiding in Konoha's shadows?
'No,' Naruto thought bitterly. "No one. I've always been alone in this village."
Minato looked taken aback. "How could that be?"
"You don't believe me?" Naruto raised an eyebrow, his blue eyes fixing on Minato, searching, probing. His gaze held a complex mix of weariness and challenge.
Knowing the future, Naruto didn't actually hate Minato, but he couldn't deny the bitterness. Anyone else living his life would have broken, turned vengeful long ago.
Even with his older perspective, sometimes the pressure felt unbearable. Not everyone could just turn the other cheek and smile.
"Do you want to see it?" Naruto offered suddenly. "My past. Everything I've lived through."
"Minato," Kurama's voice rumbled from the depths of the seal space. "If I were him, I'd have leveled this pathetic village full of hatred ages ago. It's a miracle he's held on this long."
"Probably because he values the village you protected with your life."
That furball acted like he wasn't gonna interfere in their family stuff, but in reality, he'd been eavesdropping the whole time.
"I…" Minato started. Naruto's words gave him a bad feeling, and Kurama's words made him even more uneasy.
Naruto's situation seemed a lot different from what he'd imagined.
The desire to understand, to truly see, overruled his apprehension. "Yes," he said quietly. "Show me."
"Alright," Naruto said, his expression unreadable. "If you want to see, I'll show you."
He held out his right hand. A ball of light emerged, pulsed, then exploded softly, scattering motes of light like fireflies. The familiar, stark landscape of the seal space shimmered, twisted, and reformed into a series of scenes.
At the centre of it all: a young Naruto.
Ki had the power to share and sense emotions. Goku had once sensed their battles on Namek had gone by touching Krillin's head. Besides, this was Naruto's Seal Space. He could change its appearance as he pleased. Showing the past was even easier.
Age one: A blurred image of someone forcing something scalding hot down his throat. The memory of searing pain, of choking, nearly being mute forever. He'd survived, thanks to the Kyuubi's healing, but the damage left his voice with a permanent, distinct hoarseness.
Age two: Being roughly handled, punished harshly by a caretaker for some minor infraction, left dangling until the Third Hokage 'coincidentally' passed by. Another brush with death averted by sheer luck, or perhaps calculated intervention.
Weaning onwards: Food that was never just food. Sand, dirt, weeds, small stones were routine finds. Insects weren't uncommon. Sometimes, worse things he tried not to remember.
The Third Hokage's decree prevented villagers from calling him 'demon fox'. They settled for 'that thing'.
They were forbidden from direct violence, so the cruelty became insidious: shunning, cold shoulders, muttered curses. Parents poisoned their children's minds, encouraging them to torment him, to throw stones, to chase him.
This only eased when Naruto grew strong enough that none of the other kids could physically hurt him anymore.
Malice was the air he breathed.
Yet, somehow, Naruto pushed through it, masking the hurt with a defiant grin. It wasn't just stubbornness, it was the awareness from another life that kept him from shattering completely.
Refusing to eat the tainted food provided, he struck out on his own at age three, learning to cook for himself. No shopkeeper would sell to him, so the meagre allowance from the village piled up, useless. He scavenged materials, built a small, crude hut by the woods with his own hands. Taught himself to farm a tiny patch of land, to fish, to hunt, storing what little food he could gather. He imagined a quiet life, self-sufficient, away from the hate.
Until that home, the simple shelter he'd poured his heart into, was destroyed by fearful, hateful hands.
No one saw the wreckage of more than just wood and earth. They saw the destruction of a shack. They didn't see they were tearing down the last fragile walls around Naruto's heart.
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