A three-year-old boy with yellow hair and whisker-like scars on his cheeks stood in the shallow part of a lake, his blue eyes focused. He was dressed in a black shirt and short pants, both soaked through. After much effort, he had finally managed to catch two fish.
He was wet, tired, and frustrated. After all that hard work, he had only two fish to show for it.
"Fuck," he muttered between heavy breaths.
This child was Uzumaki Naruto, and he was a reincarnator. It had been three years since he was reborn into this world, and he hated it.
'I hate everyone,' Naruto thought. If he could just buy food like a normal person, maybe it wouldn't be so bad.
He got up from the ground and prepared his meager meal, using a knife he had brought from his home. After cleaning the fish, he skewered them on wooden sticks and held them over a small campfire to grill.
As he waited, he stared blankly into the flames.
Suddenly, a kind-looking old man emerged from the forest. The man opened his mouth to greet him, but the moment Naruto saw him, the boy scrambled for a handful of stones and began hurling them with all his might.
"Thief, get away!" Naruto yelled.
The old man was shocked by the violent reaction, dodging the stones thrown with surprising strength for a toddler.
"I come in peace!" the old man said.
Naruto paused for a few seconds. The old man thought the boy had calmed down, but then another stone flew through the air.
"LIAR!" Naruto shouted, continuing his assault until he had no stones left.
The projectiles did no damage to the old man, who had easily avoided them. Seeing this, Naruto snatched the two half-cooked fish from the fire and ran out of the forest without a second glance.
The old man was left both confused and understanding. This was the Third Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen.
Naruto, on the other hand, stopped halfway through his escape from the forest.
'Damn it, the knife!' He had forgotten his most important tool. Turning back, he headed into the forest. The old man was gone.
Seeing the campfire was still going, he returned to it and continued cooking the fish. When they were ready, he dug in. Even without any seasoning, the meal tasted good to him.
Yet, after eating both fish whole, his stomach still growled with hunger.
'I hate this village. If I could leave, I would've left a long time ago. I'm still wondering how the hell the original Naruto handled this as a child,' he thought bitterly.
To waste time, he started to train. It was the only thing he could do to stave off boredom. Sure, he would get hungry again later, but this was his only form of entertainment.
'I feel like I'm in a prison.' He then made a joke to himself, chuckling darkly. 'Too bad... you are in one.'
Naruto began a routine: push-ups, sit-ups, lunges, and squats. He even managed four handstand push-ups, which he considered a success.
Once he was tired, he sat down to meditate, hoping to clear his mind. He carried a lot of anger within him. These exercises were a way he had found to improve himself; living alone and in hardship had changed a person.
As he meditated, his mind began to relax. And then, something happened.
He awoke within his own mind, his mindscape.
A low murmur echoed in the void. "Hmm, this is new."
Naruto frowned, his voice cutting through the silence. "Shouldn't I be meeting with Kurama?"
He stood upon a vast, endless expanse of water, its surface perfectly clear and reflecting the boundless sky above. The depths below were impossibly deep, yet he could stand on the surface as if it were solid ground.
Curious, he tapped a foot on the water. The moment the thought of diving down entered his mind, a terrifying pull tugged at his very core, threatening to drag him into the abyss. He shook his head violently, banishing the idea, and the sensation vanished as quickly as it had come.
With nothing else to do, Naruto began to walk across the endless plain, hoping to find something anything in the featureless world. Finding nothing, he tilted his head back to gaze at the empty sky. I want to wake up.
He blinked.
Suddenly, he was back in the familiar forest, but the sky had turned a deep orange with the setting sun. Without a moment's hesitation, Naruto grabbed his knife and started the trek back to the village. This was the part of the day he dreaded most.
The moment he stepped onto the main street, the hostility began. Insults rained down as hard as the occasional rotten fruit.
A mother yanked her child away, whispering loudly, "Don't go near him, sweetie. You don't know where he's been. He's... unclean."
A drunkard staggered out of a bar and sneered, "Look at him, skulking around. The village should've gotten rid of you when it had the chance."
Between two women at a market stall, a hissed conversation carried, "It's a shame Lord Third is so soft. Letting that thing walk freely among our children..."
An old man nodded toward Naruto and said to his friend, "Some scars aren't on the outside. That one has a darkness in him. You can see it in his eyes."
A whisper slithered from a crowd, "If it weren't for him, my brother would still be alive. He doesn't even have the decency to look sorry."
But one comment, thrown by a passerby, cut deeper than the rest, perfectly capturing the village's collective sentiment
"I wish you would just disappear."
The villagers' comments still stung, but Naruto ignored them, focusing only on getting home. He needed to clean up again after they had pelted him with food, expired, rotten, and even trash.
Once inside, he scrubbed his body raw with soap, washing once, then twice, as if he could scour away the memory of their hatred. Next, he washed his clothes by hand. He hated the chore, but it was something to do, a simple, manageable task.
At least he could be grateful for one small mercy: whenever his supplies like soap ran out, they were mysteriously replaced by a fresh, full one.
After his shower, he stood motionless for a moment, staring blankly at the wall as the water dripped from his hair and onto his skin.
'I don't think I can take this anymore,' Naruto thought, the warm water doing nothing to ease the cold knot in his chest. 'Maybe I should go to the Uchiha compound. They treated me better than this... far better.'
With a heavy sigh, he turned off the water. He stepped out, toweled himself dry, and hung his freshly washed clothes on the drying rack. After pulling on a clean outfit, he slumped onto the couch and gazed out the window at the night sky.
He was bored, and restlessness quickly set in.
Driven by a sudden determination, he decided to start his training regimen again. He was clean, and he needed to focus his energy. Tonight, he was determined to break his personal record.
About thirty minutes later, a triumphant smile spread across Naruto's exhausted face as he collapsed onto the floor.
"I did it... I broke my record," he panted to the empty apartment, lying on his back and staring at the ceiling light.
After a few seconds of catching his breath, his eyelids grew heavy. A few slow blinks, and he was asleep. It was an instant transition as if one blink carried him from his apartment floor right back into the same vast, watery mindscape.
Naruto sat alone in his mindscape, adrift in a sea of uncertainty. He had no idea what to do next. Suddenly, a figure materialized a few meters away, a muscular man with spiky black hair, dressed in strange, foreign garments. The man stood with his index and middle finger pressed firmly against his forehead.
"Goku?" Naruto shouted, his voice echoing in the vast emptiness.
"You know me?" the man replied, pointing to his own chest with a brilliant, welcoming smile.
'Am I dreaming? Is that really Goku in the flesh?' Naruto's mind raced, trying to confirm the impossible. Whether this was a dream or not, he couldn't let the chance slip away.
"Wait, don't go yet!" Naruto called out, scrambling to his feet and rushing toward the Saiyan.
"Okay," Goku said amiably, lowering his hand from his forehead. He glanced around, his expression turning curious. "But where am I, anyway?"
"My mind," Naruto answered simply.
Goku raised an eyebrow, holding his chin in thought. "Is that even possible?"
Naruto couldn't help but smile at Goku's genuine, puzzled reaction. "Where were you going with that technique?" he asked.
"Oh, just heading home," Goku said with a shrug. "Why?"
"You're not busy, are you?" Naruto pressed, a hopeful edge to his voice.
"Not right now. What's on your mind?"
"Can you teach me?" Naruto asked urgently. "How to use Ki? How to feel it?"
'If this is real,' he thought, 'I can't waste this opportunity. I've already been reincarnated; what's one more miracle?'
"Sure! Take a seat," Goku said, sensing the boy's desperation. He opted for the fastest teaching method he knew.
They both sat down cross-legged, with Goku positioning himself behind Naruto. Goku placed both hands firmly on the boy's back. "Now, close your eyes and focus. Just feel it," he instructed.
As Goku channeled a gentle stream of Ki into him, Naruto gasped. A wave of pure warmth flooded his veins, followed by an incredible surge of vitality. His senses sharpened to an impossible degree; he felt stronger, faster, and more alert than ever before. It was like a massive adrenaline rush, but purer and more controlled. His entire being thrummed with excitement from the influx of power.
"Remember this feeling," Goku's voice cut through the sensation.
Naruto concentrated, committing every detail of the energy to memory. Then, as abruptly as it began, Goku stopped. The magnificent power vanished, leaving Naruto feeling hollow and acutely aware of its absence.
Naruto stared at his right palm, frustrated. He couldn't sense a trace of the energy he had felt so vividly moments before.
Seeing his discouragement, Goku got to his feet. "Don't worry about it," he said cheerfully. "If you keep trying, you'll sense it for sure."
Naruto stood up and bowed slightly. "Thank you for teaching me."
"It's no big deal. Just keep at it!" Goku replied, giving Naruto's head a friendly pat. "Well, I'd better get back home. Bye!"
With a wave, Goku touched his index and middle fingers to his forehead and vanished in an instant. Naruto waved back at the empty space, a wide smile spreading across his face.
"That was real," he whispered to himself, the truth dawning on him. A surge of excitement shot through him, and he concentrated, trying to wake himself up.
After a few disorienting blinks, he found himself back in his small apartment, lying on his bed. He didn't question how he got there; his mind was racing with the possibilities that Ki mastery could unlock.
'The forest is full of natural energy... life force. That's where I need to be,' Naruto thought.
Too excited to sleep, he rushed out of his home and sprinted toward the river where he usually fished. The village streets were mostly empty, the few people awake paying him no mind, which suited him perfectly.
When he reached the forest, he immediately sat down and began to meditate, pouring all his focus into sensing the elusive Ki. He didn't give up, trying again and again as the night wore on.
By the time morning arrived, Naruto's eyes were heavy with exhaustion, but his spirit was undimmed.
'Maybe my own Ki is too small to sense right now,' he reasoned, a new idea forming. 'I need to train my body first. A stronger body might make it easier to feel the energy inside!'
A grin stretched from ear to ear. His new goal was clear.
In the shadows, the Anbu shinobi assigned to watch him exchanged a silent, confused glance. What, they wondered, could have possibly made the boy so happy?