FicWad

The next day, Shion took in the crisp mountain air as she ventured towards the chapel, with her daughter, Mirai in tow. The young maidens were in the company of Galatea, Riful, Luciela, Priscilla, Harja, and Little Teresa, gaining the attention of many a villager as they passed on by. The half-abyssal kids and former Numbers were just tagging along so they could return to their duties as acolytes… at least for now. The so-called “Three Titans” among Naruto’s wives, however, had much to discuss with Shion and Father Isaac about expanding their hubby’s influence, and were liable to bring any kids who wanted a piece of their daddy into this grand conspiracy.

“Glad you could finally come,” a voice called out as they entered the courtyard. It was Sistina as she awaited the group’s arrival, accompanying Neideen as she always did, nowadays. Both of them were garbed in the nun’s uniform of the Twin Goddesses; their outfits sported a pair of black Mary-Janes; white, thigh-high stockings; a black dress dress; black armlets; and a headdress comprised of the white guimpe and black veil. The bandeau and cap, however, were conspicuously missing. She has bits of gold lace to go with the white and black. The dress also showed a generous amount of cleavage and had a shorter, leafy skirt.

Sistina gave Shion a polite, and respectful bow, her vision of the future had shown her who this young woman and the girl beside her were. “I have been looking forward to your arrival for some time, Lady Shion.”

Said blonde replied with a respectful bow of her own. “I’m glad to finally meet you, Lady Sistina,” she said, before turning her attention to the one-eyed woman and playfully added, “and especially you, St. Nymphetamina~!”

Neideen giggled at that. “Oh, I have a feeling we’ll get along swimmingly.”

Shion gave the eye-patch wearing blonde a polite, if mischievous smile, one that she readily returned. “I believe we will,” then she looked to the chapel and gestured to it with a look of expectancy, “So shall we enter the chapel and begin our discussion?”

Sistina and Neideen both smiled at her, with the former gesturing to the chapel itself. “Of course,”

After that they all entered the chapel to begin their discussion.

----

Naruto meanwhile was personally scouring the nearby lands for any youma or Awakened Beings not afflicted with him. With him was a small group of four Kumogakure ANBU, and several women and girls of the latest and last generations from the now-defunct Organization.

For the trainees, Henriette, Erica, Hanna, Regina, Lytelle, Ava and Eva were there. For the warrior hybrids, Heidi, Tanya ‘the Evil’, Leia, Savra, Charlotte, Audrey, and Rachel were there as well. This made for a group of 14 hybrids.

Naruto was currently in the process of jump-starting their chakra systems among other things. His intention was to bring them with and train them on the road as they sought out the remaining youma and Awakened Beings. The ANBU were tagging along as extra protection; if they happened to be ambushed by bandits, or youma, then they would have war veterans protecting them.

Suddenly, Naruto came to a stop and he held up a fist prompting everyone to stop. He looked around before focusing on one area to his left: a tree.

“You’ve gotten good at hiding yourselves.” he called out. Everything was quiet for a moment, before three people dropped down from the tree in a crouch. Naruto smiled at seeing three familiar faces.

The three in question were the Awakened Beings, Chronos, Lars and Gwyn.

“What are you three doing all the way up here? Shouldn’t you be at Westvale Keep?” Naruto asked them.

Chronos smiled goodnaturedly, “It’s rather boring staying there all the time. Besides that, the youma in the area have all but fled farther westward upon noticing the spectacle you made of the Organization. We figured that now was a good time to inform you of that.”

Lars grunted in agreement. “Not much excitement happens there, nowadays. anyway. Not since that ‘flying one’ and her group came across us.” he said, referring to Anastasia.

Gwyn took note of the group behind him; the silver-eyed ones maybe the last generation of warriors and trainees he guessed. But the ones with the blank masks puzzled him greatly. “Who are they?” he asked, inclining his head at the group of four.

Naruto looked at them. “They’re special forces from my homeland - the best of the best, and the elite. They’re also war veterans. They’re here to act as a buffer in case the Organization comes back, or their enemy comes along.” he looked back at the Awakened Beings, “So the youmas have moved further in… probably holing themselves up in an isolated location... or worse case scenario, in a town… do you know where they’re heading exactly? Lautrec’s full of mountains, and valleys, including a desert. There’s plenty of places for them to hide.”

“The majority of youma in the West have collected into a massive herd well over 1000 strong,” Chronos said with a nod. “When they were last in range, they were heading toward Raby Castle.”

Naruto slowly nodded as he took that information in. Then, suddenly, he snapped his head to the others behind him with a smirk, “Looks like we’re having a little detour.” he looked back to Chronos, Gwyn and Lars and asked, “Want to come with?”

“I certainly don’t mind,” Chronos said with a grin. “It’ll give us something to do.” Lars and Gwyn nodded concurringly with that. They were bored, Westvale Keep may have been on the western edge of Naruto’s territory, but there was little action there, which wasn’t all that surprising considering they were awakened beings. Powerful ones at that.

“Alright, everyone grab on. We’re taking a detour!” Naruto declared, quickly producing a small group of clones to hold down the fort. They quickly fanned out and with that everyone grabbed hold of Naruto, and they were gone in a massive yellow flash. There was a very real threat of a potential army that needed to be dealt with. This would be one good test run for the warriors and trainees with him as well.

----

Over in Raby castle, the group of 22 men and women appeared in the bailey of Raby Castle. Savra and Audrey immediately perked up, sensing a massive concentration of yoki, north-by-northeast of their position. It would appear that they’d found the herd.

“The youma are approaching a small town, about a day’s walk from here,” Audrey stated. “At their current pace, we should just make it before they do if we head out within the next five minutes.”

“Naruto,” one of the ANBU started, getting the young man’s attention, “You’re able to cross entire battlefields in a matter of seconds, are you not?”

“Yeah… when I’m in Bijuu Modo, I’d be a beacon to them and they’d scatter before we even get to them. We should approach more stealthily.” Naruto replied. He rubbed his chin and started to think. “...Given their numbers, I doubt they’d be deterred if they sensed the girls. Gwen, Lars and Chronos can also hide their yoki pretty damn well, seeing as how they’d been hunted by the Organization for decades, and they can’t sense chakra, at all.” A figurative light bulb flickered above his head and then he turned to the ANBU in charge, a large, bald black man who stood well above two meters in height with muscles that made him look capable of crushing a baby elephant to death.

This man was codenamed Kuma.

“Would you happen to have any soldier pills?” Naruto asked.

Kuma turned to the sole female among the ANBU who’d come with, a pink-haired black woman wrapped from the lower half of her face on down to her knuckles and ankles in sarashi bindings. Her codename was Bara. She quietly nodded and presented Naruto with a small sack.

Naruto nodded politely and smiled. “Thanks.” Then, he turned to the Awakened beings and other girls before saying, “alright, we’re going to be saving some time by double-timing there, using a basic chakra dash. Just focus your chakra into your legs while you’re running, like you’d use yoki for the same effect. These pills will give you a massive boost in chakra so you can last longer while doing so. This should halve the time we take to get there, assuming we stop to rest every now and then. We’ll come up with a battle plan when we get there and see what kinda terrain we have to work with. Any questions?”

----

Meanwhile, back in the Chapel of Morris, the grand conspiracy had begun.

Father Isaac sat in the middle of the meeting hall, flanked by Neideen and Sistina. Shion and her daughter Mirai were sitting opposite of them, alongside Riful, Priscilla, Luciela, and their respective daughters. Finally, those also present were Undine’s daughter, Damia; Glissa’s daughter, Lyesse; Clare’s daughter, Teresa; and Cynthia’s twin daughters, Hana and Susan.

The young ones were all quite curious to hear what this meeting was all about. They were also garbed in acolyte’s uniforms, though the younger ones had more modest variants on than their elder sisters for obvious reasons.

“So, you’re from a country named the Land of Demons?” Isaac was legitimately curious.

“You’re not the first one to wonder if there are actual demons there,” Shion giggled. “In truth, it got the name from being the birthplace of the Nine Bijuu - massive, mountain-sized animal-themed demons that now serve as the guardians of my continent.”

“Uncle Kaku and Auntie Tabi are quite friendly,” Harja chimed in, drawing a giggle from Shion.

“I never thought I’d see the day Shukaku would be called such a thing,” the priestess commented with a warm smile. “How times change… That father of yours is nothing short of a walking miracle, I must say.” With that out of the way, she decided to get to business. “So, now that we’re all here, what is the plan?” Shion was mostly asking for the benefit of the less-informed participants of this conspiracy.

“Once we get that unseemly boy, Garth, to take take the blame for impregnating Harja and Teresa,” Sistina started, “Hana, Susan, Lilith, and Samantha’s pregnancies will easily be pinned on him after the fact. No one will question it if they point the finger at him.”

Several of Naruto’s younger daughters were visibly surprised to hear that their sisters had gotten themselves knocked up, but kept quiet.

“After that, we make preparations for the dispersal,” Riful added. “With the Organization gone, several of Naruto’s wives will undoubtedly wish to return to their hometowns if possible… or settle down somewhere they don’t feel all cooped up. Naruto’s planning on having some of the girls who’d like to serve as a replacement for those bastards - dealing with bandits and the like, once any remaining youma have been exterminated.”

“The Twin Goddesses wish to spread their influence to your continent.” Neideen said with a smirk, much to the surprise of everyone else excluding Sistina and Isaac. The woman’s smirk only grew at their looks, “Thanks to being their Champion, I am able to communicate with the Twin Goddesses. I know for a certainty that Teresa and Clare have had an eye on him during his early years, and wish to spread their religion to your lands because of it. It’s one of the favours they want Naruto to do, when the time comes, and while they are planning to get him to help with that, the Goddesses believe it would be easier if he had help.”

“I see... “ Shion mused with a deep, thoughtful look on her face. She hadn’t seen the Goddesses themselves, but even she noticed how many girls and women have taken an unnatural amount of interest in Naruto. And with Neideen confirming that these Goddesses have been watching over Naruto for years, that pretty much told the Priestess that it was the divinity responsible for the amount of fuckery Naruto’s been going through with various women and teenage girls after the end of the Fourth Shinobi World War.

It was...well...depending on the opinion of the person...amusing to think about; having divinity take an interest in you for the longest time. Yet it can also be worrisome for the exact same reasons: if two goddesses took an interest in someone, then their interest on that individual could spark the interest of other gods and goddesses.

But back to the matter at hand.

“Having their influence in the Elemental Nations may prove beneficial…”

“I’m sensing a ‘but’...” Neideen said with a knowing look.

Shion chuckled at that. “But... it will take some time for anyone to believe in them. Let alone make their presence known.”

“You have a point.” Neideen agreed, “But there is two people from the Elemental Nations that can confirm their presence.” here, her smirk turned to a full blown grin. “You know of them.”

It took a moment for Shion to connect the dots. “It’s Naruto and Kurama… isn’t it?”

Neideen giggled impishly at the astonished looks on everyone else's faces-those who weren’t aware of him being able to talk to them. “Yep~! Naruto and Kurama are on a talking terms with the Twin Goddesses… and Rabona herself as well.”

“When did that happen?!” A wide eyed Riful asked.

“Back when we were in Nile.” Neideen replied. “They talked to Naruto through me and then brought myself, Naruto and Sistina to their realm for a brief moment to talk. Cassandra, Roxanne and Miranda know of it too. They were there when it happened.”

“So he’s kept it from us…” Riful muttered darkly. Someone was going to get a harsh talking to once they were done here.

“Naruto’s most likely forgot, due to everything that’s been happening lately.” Sistina defended for him. “Not to mention due to his experiences in his past, he most likely kept it to himself out of self preservation: anyone who claims they can talk to the gods themselves are usually deemed insane, or are reduced to laughing stock. Besides… would you have believed him?”

“...No. I admit, if he had come out and said that, I wouldn’t have believed him.” Riful replied with a sigh, an expression of understanding showing on her face.

“It certainly doesn’t help that he has grown up alone and was treated as an outcast.” Sistina added with a sad, yet angry frown, one that was shared by all the women, and girls in the room. “That may have been another factor for his decision to keep it to himself.”

“...why did he allow them to live again?” Priscilla asked herself aloud.

“Because Riful fucked him for a week straight and it made him calm enough to think rationally,” Luciela answered with a shrug. There was no need for her to censor herself, here. With everyone else talking about the plan, and the daughters knowing their father had fucked some of their half-sisters, she saw no reason to.

“She wasn’t the only one,” Sistina pointed out. “A woman named Anko was immensely helpful in that regard, as well. Ironically, she’s an outcast, too, because her mentor betrayed the village and turned out to be an evil mad scientist.”

“We seriously need to do a headcount and check on his previous lovers…” Riful muttered. “Naruto wants to do that already, but I’m thinking we should light a fire under his ass when he returns.”

“She’s not as much of a lover, as what Naruto’s people would call ‘A one night stand’.” Sistina told the Abyssal One correctively, lest she and the others get the wrong idea. “Anko was pretty desperate on getting Naruto to not destroy Konoha… and she was also a part of the team that got his first love killed - though she was the only one who wasn’t fighting to kill. Hell, she wasn’t even there willingly. The parties who’d caused Naruto so much hell in his childhood had extorted her into participating.”

“Noted, but, it is still worth checking on her,” Riful pointed out.

“No arguments there,” Sistina replied with a smile and a nod.

“Out of curiosity…” Priscilla started, drawing Sistina’s attention to her. “Do you know how many lovers Naruto’s had on his homeland?”

Sistina smiled a mysterious smile. “Some. Not many are actual lovers, mind you. But they did have an encounter with him. I know he has had a lover who would be a Queen here, seeing as she is the leader of her own country. She cannot leave there for a large amount of time, due to her responsibilities to her people however.”

“...But how many are there?”

Sistina shrugged. “I lost count… and my visions are not always accurate.” The former Number One made a ‘hmmmm’ sound as she thought on it, “The last I checked, he’s had close to fifty. Though many of them were one night stands… and the twelve in that country called ‘Nami’ weren’t his fault… they pretty much ambushed him.” Sistina and several others giggled. “Not that he was complaining. It felt nice to be so appreciated, even though he did nothing to initiate it.”

“The Twin Goddesses were responsible for that.” Neideen revealed with a helpless shrug. “And plenty of other things around him too... besides, have any of you wondered just why so many women are falling head over heels for him lately...?” And she then pointed towards the ceiling with an exasperated, yet amused smile as the answer.

“The twin goddesses…” Priscilla slowly began.

“Are responsible…” Riful continued.

“For all of that?!” Luciela finished, looking at the Saint with wide eyes. Did that mean they were responsible for her too…?

“Not all of it, but certainly a sizeable chunk,” Sistina clarified. “Mostly, the women that walked in on and started fucking him. And in case you were wondering, no, they weren’t responsible for you falling for him. That was all you… they just gave you a little nudge is all - urged you to look in his direction and see if he was a good mate.”

“Being love Goddesses and all, they knew he would take good care of you.” Neideen added, before letting out quite the perverted giggle, “And then some.”

“They’ve been watching over Naruto for years.” Sistina continued, “Even when their influence was limited in the Elemental Nations, they were still watching over him. They, along with me, know him better than he knows himself.”

“I…I see…” The redhead mused with a thoughtful expression; it looks like she owed her happiness to the Twin Goddesses themselves. She sent a silent prayer to them in thanks.

“That certainly explains a lot.” Riful muttered. She didn’t know whether or not she should feel proud or irritated that her man has the Twin Goddesses themselves watching over him… she went for feeling pride instead, lest she offend them or something.

“Before we get anymore sidetracked, let’s get back to the main discussion.” Luciela told them. “We know of the plan about Garth, we also know the Twins themselves want to spread their influence to the Elemental Nations… so what else is there?”

“Combining the church of the Twins with that of Rabona and inserting our children into positions of power to further the influence of said goddesses,” Neideen chirped.

“We know all about your plans to take over the world,” Sistina giggled, waggling her fingers dramatically at those last words. “You scratch our backs, we scratch yours.”

“Ohhh~” Priscilla had an wide, evil grin on her face that would make Roxanne green with envy. “I like the way you two think.”

As she listened to them all talk Damia looked to her half-sister Lyesse and leaned over to whisper. “...Daddy’s not going to be happy if he finds out about this, is he?”

Lyesse slowly shook her head and whispered back. “No. I don’t think he will.”

----

Clarice stretched and let out a tired sigh as Tsunade checked her handiwork. Healing the bones on that amphibian took a lot out of her. She had to go through many of them, but the brunette had hoped the job was done.

“I must say I’m impressed,” Tsunade said, drawing a blush from her. “You’re improving quickly. Go ahead and take a break, for now. You’ve earned it.”

Clarice smiled and nodded happily and enthusiastically. A break sounded good to her. Upon sitting down on one of the beds, she perked up as the door opened. Shizune and Inonon entered with the Feeders in tow. The young blonde had just gotten up not too long ago and had rounded them up with Shizune’s help.

“Good to see you’re up again,” Tsunade greeted the young Yamanaka. “Are you ready to go again?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Inonon chuckled nervously. She smiled at the strawberry blonde who pressed up against her hand and rubbed the Feeder’s scalp. “Now that they’ve taken a liking to me, they should be much easier to deal with. It’s much harder to heal someone who doesn’t trust me, because their subconscious tries to eject me from their mind and resist the changes I make.”

Gaki grunted happily in agreement.

Inonon giggled, “Alright, let’s try this again. I think I got a better understanding on what I need to do now.” she said with enthusiasm. Gaki was all to happy for the girl to have another go. She didn’t find it too bad last time, not to mention she did feel better. The Abyss Feeder scampered on over to one of the beds and laid down on top of it, the previous experience of this session having told her it would be wise to rest. Inonon went to one of the beds as well and sat down on it, with Shizune being with her every step of the way.

With all that said and done, she cast her Shinten Saisei and hopped into Gaki’s mind, Shizune catching the blonde as she went limp and lying her down.

“I don’t think I’ll ever get used to seeing that…” Clarice muttered.

“You’re not the only one.” Tsunade agreed. “But it is useful for suppressing memories you don’t want to remember. Or outright removing them.” She gave Gaki a smile, who was now on the bed, yawning as the effect of the jutsu was taking effect on her again. “Let’s hope she keeps up the good work, eh?”

“Y-yeah, let’s hope.” Clarice hoped she wouldn’t have to have someone running through her head. She liked the way her head worked, thank you very much! But, she understood the necessity of Inonon’s efforts on the Feeders. She couldn’t help but feel sorry for them, despite how creepy they still managed to be. At least they had eyes and normal teeth now.

The remaining feeders, meanwhile, seemed to take an interest in the dead frog, sniffing at it and looking expectantly at Tsunade as if to ask, “Are you gonna eat that?”

If nothing else, it was amusing… and creepily adorable.

“No. You can’t eat it. Clarice is using it to train,” the blonde said gently, prompting the Feeders to cock their heads in curiosity, not quite understanding what she meant, but they nodded nonetheless.

Speaking of Clarice she was looking at the other frogs that were in… various mangled states, due to her fuck ups in the amount of chakra she used. There was more than enough for each of them and Gaki to chow down on at least one. “If we’re done with those, perhaps they can eat them?”

The Feeders perked up at the sound of that.

Tsunade looked at the other frogs Clarice pointed out and shrugged. “Leave some for later,” she said after a moment of thought. “We only have a limited amount and they can be used again for other uses.” Like amputations.

Clarice nodded and fetched one for each of them, giggling as the Feeders beamed. A few of them even licked her face in appreciation.

Meanwhile, in Gaki’s head, Inonon slaved away, trying her damnedest to fix the woman while ignoring the memories of Naruto’s orgies. That… proved rather difficult. But, she managed. Letting out a tired sigh, the disembodied blonde took a gander at her handiwork and felt that was about as good as it would get for the day. She felt that Gaki’s mind should be given time to adjust, before she tampered with it anymore. With that thought in mind, she cancelled the technique and returned to her body.

Not long after that, Inonon groaned as her eyes fluttered. Her eyes nearly popped out of her head when the strawberry blonde Feeder looked down at her in curiosity, half of a mangled frog in the woman’s mouth. It took every fiber of the young blonde’s being not to cry out, thoroughly startled as she got up. Inonon let out the breath she didn’t know she was holding and patted the Feeder on the head. Then, she turned to Tsunade and asked, “so, um... who’s next?”

----

Much later that day, back with Naruto, he and his group were fast approaching the village that was being threatened by all the youma. It took them about twelve hours, counting the times they took a break to let the trainees and younger warriors take a breather, but they were here with time to spare.

Naruto made a few Kage Bunshin to go to the perimeter of the village in order to set up a barrier to protect the civilians. Though one of them had gone to the town’s mayor in order to inform them what was going to be happening. Nevertheless, once the clones got into position they quickly set up their fuinjutsu formula and watched as a dome of chakra, red in colour, appeared around and over the village.

“A barrier-ninjutsu?” Kuma stated in a questionative tone.

“I had to learn something when I was on my way to this continent for the first time.” Naruto said with a shrug. “The Six Burning Barrier Formation; it’s not as strong as the Four Red Yang Formation, but it’ll do for this situation.”

“What’s it do?” one of the other ANBU asked.

Naruto chuckled in amusement at the blatant attempt to get information. “It’s does what all barrier-ninjutsu does: it keeps things out; keeps things in; it traps; it protects. But this one requires six people with high jonin level chakra to maintain. The clones are behind the barrier so this will be up for as long as it needs to be. Anything that touches the barrier itself will be immediately incinerated.” Of course, he left out that the barrier becomes stronger the more people that is maintaining it. And since he has six clones with above Kage level chakra, the barrier is pretty damn strong and will be constantly up unless they’re removed.

Naruto blinked and had to stop himself from punching himself in the face; he had a barrier-ninjutsu all this time and he didn’t use it at Pieta! Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!

“...Are you okay?” Audrey cautiously asked Naruto after seeing the rapidly twitching eyebrow of realization.

“Peechy.” Naruto exhaled with a look of mild irritation and self loathing. But he quickly pushed his negative thoughts aside and got back to the situation at hand. “Alright, we should have a few minutes to rest up before the horde arrives. Take the opportunity to do so.”

“And what are you planning on doing?” Lars questioned, his eyes following Naruto as he sat cross legged on the ground.

“I’m going to sense just how far out they are.” The blond answered. Then he closed his eyes, slowed his breathing and went absolutely still as he prepared to intake the nature energy around him. Senjutsu gave him the ability to sense others around him, and it doesn’t require him to use Kurama’s chakra/yoki, so the army of youma wouldn’t know he’s here.

Since Audrey said the youma were short of a day away from this village, and they themselves would get there just before the youma, Naruto just had to know how much time his group had to rest before they’re beset upon. They should have several hours, but in situations like these it never hurts to be sure.

Besides, while he may have above Kage level reserves, even his Kage Bunshin had limited amounts of chakra. They couldn’t keep the barrier-ninjutsu around the village up indefinitely.

And it would seem that they’ve sped up. If he had to guess, Naruto would wager that they sensed the trainees and warriors approaching and decided to try pick up the pace so his girls didn’t have time to dig in and prepare. Unfortunately for the youma he was there. And he was an army killer by himself. With Chronos, Lars, Gwyn here as well as the Kumogakure backing up the warriors and trainee’s they didn’t stand a ghost of a chance.

“Alright,” he announced without opening his eyes. “It seems they’ve sped up - most likely from sensing the girls. I’d say we have a few hours, four from the feel of it, before they reach us. I’ll keep an eye on their approach just in case, though. I don’t want them to catch us with our pants down, so to speak.”

“So, what do we do until then?” Audrey asked.

“Rest for one thing. We’ve been on the move for the past 12 hours, with little breaks in between.” Then Naruto opened a single eye, showing the toad-like iris that has replaced his normal blue, “Or you can practise to use your chakra, just not extensively.”

“We should also formulate a plan,” Henriette chimed in, reminding Naruto once more of Miria. “Their numbers are absurdly higher than our own.”

“They have an army, we have a Naruto.” one of the ANBU said, before he, Kuma and the other two guys among his unit chuckled as if sharing a joke between them. The man in question was a light-skinned blond codenamed Crane.

“...not that joke…” Naruto whined with childish annoyance and exasperation. He thought he got away from that one!

“Uhhh… context please?” Rachel asked politely.

“Naruto here can make thousands of himself.” Kuma said, gesturing to the blond in question. “It saved our asses during the war we had back in the Elemental Nations. Trust me, if there’s anyone who should be worried it’s those so-called ‘demons’ you have here.”

That got nervous looks from Audrey and Rachel; if he could do that, they wouldn’t have had a ghost of a chance of fighting him back in Nile! He would have massacred them on the spot had he wanted to kill them! Damn, they were lucky!

“Duly noted,” Henriette replied with a nod. Then, she turned to Naruto and asked. “Should we scout the terrain and see what ‘we’re working with?”

“It would be advisable, but I suggest anyone who can make a Shadow Clone to make one now. Anything they learn, you’ll learn once they’re dispelled.”

Audrey and Rachel got to work in doing just that, along with the four ANBU. After the clones were made, all six of them went off in the direction the yoki was coming from, with the clones of Audrey and Rachel taking the lead since they were the only two of the six that could sense the youma.

“Right now, I need to keep absolutely still… if I don’t balance my chakra with Nature Chakra things will get… nasty.” Naruto said before closing his eye once more. He may not have been in Sage Mode, but he was still taking Nature Chakra into him. Just the slightest mistake can end up being fatal to him if he’s not careful. Even talking to them in this state is pretty damn risky. Though the risks for that have been lessened thanks to his ever constant training in Sennin Modo over the years to keep himself from going stagnant it was still better to be safe than sorry.

“Nasty how?” Tanya asked.

Naruto however didn’t answer; mainly because he was focusing on keeping his chakra and Nature Chakra balanced. So, one of the ANBUs, Crane, had answered in his stead.

“I don’t know the specifics of Sennin Modo, but, I did hear a few stories of people dying when they tried to undergo the training for them. I’ve heard some decades ago that his sensei, Jiraiya, had an incomplete Sennin Modo and it gave him toad like features due to the imbalance of the two chakras.”

“How’d you know about that?” Charlotte asked.

“Jiraiya travelled a lot.” Crane answered with a shrug. “He’s been in Kumo plenty of times in the past, mainly to publicise his books, and has told a lot of stories of past toad summoners. I thought his first one was the best, to be honest. It’s a shame it didn’t sell too well. I would have loved to have read a sequel.”

“You just wanted to know if Naruto found the answer to the hatred in the Shinobi world in that book.” Kuma said with a shake of his head. “If you ask me, Naruto was bland and too optimistic.”

“Naruto’s an awesome character!” Crane said in the defense of the fictional character, who was, in his opinion pretty damn cool. “He never gave up! Even with the odds against him, he never gave up!”

“Kinda like me?” Naruto asked, no longer taking in Senjutsu Chakra. If they were going to talk about the character from the Tale of the Utterly Gutsy Shinobi, his namesake, and the character that was inspired by Nagato, then he’d might as well join in.

Why? Because the Naruto from that book, is just like him.

“Yeah, kinda like-” Crane began, only to pause as if he had a sudden realization.

“Yeah. I share the same name as the character in the Tale of the Utterly Gutsy Shinobi. I’m named after him, and I share the same attitude as him.” While he couldn’t see the expressions on their faces thanks to the blank masks the men and woman were wearing, he can feel the wide-eyed, gobsmacked expressions behind them. He smirked at them. “Surprise?”

“Holy shit! You’re the Naruto in real life!”

Naruto glanced to the sky for a moment, puckered his lips in thought and slowly nodded. “Yep. Pretty much. Though there are a few differences, we’re very similar. Though Naruto was inspired by Jiraiya-sensei’s first disciple.”

And it was his words, the words that Naruto said in the book, the words that Nagato told Pervy-sage, that convinced him to have a change of heart in the end.

With that Crane turned to Kuma and said with victory in his voice, “See! I told you that Naruto was real!”

“He’s not the same Naruto!”

“They share the same name, and a similar personality, close enough!”

Though she couldn’t talk, Bara’s opinion of the exchange was made abundantly clear when she went over and whacked them both across their heads. They both fell to the ground due to the force the mute woman put behind her fists.

They were being so unprofessional… someone had to be the straight guy here. Or woman, in her case.

Naruto couldn’t help but chuckle at that. He was reminded of his team dynamic with Team Seven back when everything was much simplier.

Getting to his feet and straightening himself up Kuma cleared his throat and said, “right, I suppose now’s as good a time as any to check on the clones.” He turned to another man in his group, a small, dark-skinned man with dreadlocks. “Lion, how far out are they?”

“A good few kilometers,” the man replied. “They’ve almost arrived at their destination.”

Kuma nodded in acknowledgement with the news. They’ll know what to do once they get the information needed.

----

Meanwhile, with the clones, all six of them were unnerved by the sheer number of monstrous purple creatures dashing forth to the village. Not far out from where the main party was resting, they’d seen a hill flanked by two others that would serve as a good choke point bottleneck them. Once they’d been routed, it shouldn’t be too hard to finish them off,

It was still unsettling, though; like Chronos had claimed there were thousands of them, though their number seemed to have doubled, as there appeared to be around four-thousand.

“Well… it’s a good thing we have Naruto with us.” Crane’s clone said with a heavy frown behind his mask.

“A very good thing.” Lion agreed.

“I’ve never seen so many youma in my life…” Rachel said, trying to hide her nervousness. Where the hell did they even come from!? “Hell, I didn’t know there were this many!”

“You think some of the Handlers, or the council got away before Naruto blew Staff sky high?” Audrey asked as she looked at her friend from the corner of her eye. “We know they’ve been making the youma and Awakened Beings… and they had to have made them somewhere.”

“Are you seriously saying one of those bastards got away and released these assholes as payback?”

“Considering all the shit they’ve been pulling for centuries? Killing those who’ve been asking too many questions? Killing those who have outlived their usefulness? I’m saying we shouldn’t rule that out - it’s a very high possibility.”

“...Naruto did let Rubel go, so he could go to the Mainland and say there’s nothing here. He could have done it.” The former Number 5 said after a moment of thought.

Upon hearing that, Kuma decided to ask, “what are the chances that this is the handiwork of the mainland Organization?”

“Uncertain,” Audrey muttered with a deep frown. “They’re in a middle of their own war, and Naruto wiped out Staff and everyone in it…” she paused for a moment to think on it some more. “We don’t know what they’re capable of, though, so it could very well be possible.”

“And Rubel is a spy for enemy of the Mainland’s Organization. After seeing what Naruto did I would like to think he’s not dumb enough to antagonise someone of his caliber.” Rachel added, having been informed of rubel’s true loyalties by Miria herself. “But humanity does tend to do stupid things, so it’s a possibility too.”

“It’s possible that he told the Organization on the Mainland everything to try and distract them while the faction he’s working for takes advantage of that weakness,” Kuma pointed out.

“And risk drawing the ire of Naruto, and in turn the ire of several thousand warriors and demons who are all capable of controlling the elements and reshape the landscape?”

“Never underestimate the hubris of an empire,” Lion pointed out. “We’re saying it’s a possibility, but you also brought up a good point, there. I certainly hope they’re not that dumb.”

Audrey and Rachel’s clones exchanged looks. They certainly hoped they weren’t that dumb. Besides, Rubel was a Handler, he wasn’t that far up in the hierarchy; only the Elder, like Rubel, would know the most important of information. That would include the locations of secret facilities where youmas are being made.

Then again… if Naruto of all people was able to sneak into Staff with nobody knowing, and steal a bunch of documents dating back to the creation of the Organization, then who’s to say someone else didn’t?

Besides, when Audrey really thought about it… they can’t actually pin this on Rubel anyway. It’s only been a few days since the Organization’s destruction and it would take the man himself a few days to find a dock - Sandy Crotch being one of them. And then it would take him around…12 months, assuming its the same distance to the Elemental Nations, to get to the Mainland. And if it’s not, then it would still take him more than a month or two.

And Camilla killed her Handler, Ingmar, proving there may have been some Handlers still around that wasn’t at Staff. And that turtle destroyed the boats before anyone could have used them to escape. So any Handler’s that managed to survive had to have gone inland... and it certainly gave them enough time to find hidden, youma making facilities and set them free.

And again, Rubel can’t be used to pin this on. They know that Yamanaka girl, Ino, went through his mind and she didn’t find anything related hidden youma facilities in that brain of his. And she went through everything, and even wiped out some of his memories for that matter!

With all that in mind, Audrey came to a conclusion. “It can’t have been the faction opposing the Mainland Organization. Rubel wasn’t that high up in the hierarchy of the Organization, and neither Naruto or Captain Miria discovered any youma making facilities from him and Ino went through his memories like a fine comb. He was also with us in Morris for a while too. He wouldn’t have had time to do this. The Organization, on the other hand, may have had people that were away at the time of the attack.”

“So you’re saying these people had the knowledge on where the facilities are located and set these bastards loose on us?” Rachel said questioningly .

“To keep us from getting into their enemies hands? Yes. It’s the only explanation I can think of that makes sense.” Audrey replied with a nod.

Rachel can’t help but chuckle darkly. “Well, at least there’s one silver lining to all this.”

“What would that be?” Audrey asked, giving her friend an arched eyebrow.

Rachel let out another morbid chuckle. “If those bastards did set them loose, then they didn’t live long to gloat about it.”

The Youma would have torn the survivors to shreds and eaten their guts the second they got out of their cages. They were too dumb to live if that was the case.

“...I have to agree with you there.” Audrey said with a morbid chuckle.

----

Back with the main group, those who’d made clones perked up upon receiving their memories. Audrey and Rachel reeled at the sensation, not nearly as used to it.

“We may want to head forward about sixty meters,” Kuma declared after shorting out the memories he got from the clone. “It’d provide us with a better choke point.”

“We also got some info on their numbers. Their a lot bigger now, there’s over 4000 of them in total.” Lion added.

As they told everyone what was learned, Naruto took in their reports with a level head. And after Audrey finished relaying her theory on how this army was made, everyone was surprisingly calm. Understandable, considering the Awakened Beings, trainees and warriors learned that Naruto is able to make thousands of copies of himself. It’s as Kuma said: the ones who should be worried are the youma, not them. Naruto is a one man army in the most literal way possible.

Naruto took a moment to draw in what he needed to go into Sage Mode, still keeping an eye on the massive horde as he got up. “Looks like we’re heading out, then,” he said. “Lead the way.”

With four nods, the ANBU did just that…

It didn’t take long for them to reach the area specified. As expected the trainees were shaking in their boots at the sight of all those youma they could see swiftly approaching. Taking a quick look around, Henriette noted that they had the high ground and the only way they could get through was a narrow passageway between two large hills that would bottleneck most of the creatures. Unfortunately, not all of them were restricted to the ground.

Seeing the wheels turning in the girl’s head as well as Tanya’s, Naruto patted them both on the head and said, “you don’t have to worry about the flying ones. We’ll take care of them.” He then flashed an evil, but oddly charming grin as he added. “Consider the rest of them to be practice dummies, okay?”

Both girls blushed and nodded, as Henriette took the initiative. “There’s too much room to form a shield wall,” she declared. “Everyone with a shield, take position between two girls with a claymore!”

“There’s no need for that,” Naruto told them with a chuckle. “Chakra is more versatile than yoki… but instead of explaining, how about I show you?” He stepped in front of the group, “Make sure you all stay behind me.”

That was the only hint Naruto gave them; and the ANBU were the only ones to know what he was talking about. Turning to face the approaching horde, Naruto crouched down and pressed his hands against the floor. It wasn’t long until everyone felt the ground tremble.

Then there was a spray of purple blood, along with agonised cries and deathly wails as the ground itself seemed to come alive and attack the youma in the form of numerous deadly spikes jutting out of the Earth.

“Holy SHIT!” Audrey exclaimed in wide eyed surprise. What the hell was that?! Did Naruto make the ground of all things come to life?!

“...Doton: Doryūsō, or in your language, it would be called ‘Earth Style: Falling Earth Spears’. It allows the user to make mud or stone denser and shape it into spikes that then juts out from the ground in order to impale their target.” Naruto explained for them. The numbers of the youma has been reduced a bit, but there was still over 4000 left.

“Audrey, since your nature affinity is Earth, you can do this too.”

“B-be that as it may, it would still be advantageous to take up a defensive position while the youma are picked off from a distance,” Henriette pointed out.

“Did I mention that those with the Earth Affinity can make their skin as hard as diamonds?” Naruto added with a hint of mischievousness in his voice. “And those with Lightning affinity can give themselves ‘Lightning Armour’ that enhances their speed, reaction time, and pushes your physical prowess to their absolute limit?”

“That’s true,” Crane said in agreement. “Before Naruto and his father came along, our Kage was hailed as the fastest man alive, thanks to his Raiton Chakura Mōdo. And his father, our Sandaime Raikage who also had the Raiton Chakura Mōdo, had faced a force of Ten Thousand Shinobi alone for three days. He died in that battle, but he took over 6000 with him.”

“I fought the man when he was reincarnated during the war. He was no joke.” Naruto added as he stood back up. Then he walked back to the group and ruffed Henriette’s scalp affectionately, drawing an embarrassed blush from the young girl. “But still… this is meant to be you training to use your chakra. But if you want to act more defensively, I won’t stop you.” he concluded with a shrug.

“With… all due respect, there’s far too many of them for us to handle otherwise.” Henriette said while she tried to keep her nerves under control.

“Well, she has a point sir.” Crane respectfully pointed out. “We’re outnumbered two-hundred to one, if they were to go out there with such a disadvantage, they would get overwhelmed.”

Naruto looked at the masked blond and came to the realization that he had a point. These girls weren’t soldiers like Heidi, Tanya’, Leia, Savra, Charlotte, Audrey, and Rachel. They were still in training. Heck even Ava and Eva, who were soldiers were still young girls - they were younger than Miata!

“Fair enough, I have to stop thinking they’re soldiers when they’re not.” he conceded. Then, he turned to the trainees and smiled. “Don’t let that get to you, though. I have faith in all of you!”

No one present could help but be amused by the girls’ blushes.

Then Naruto got right into what he liked to call ‘serious business’ mode. “Audrey, Rachel, as the highest ranking single digits here, you two are going to be in charge. The ANBU along with myself and the Awakened Beings will be on support.”

“Roger that,” Audrey said with a salute. Rachel, meanwhile, nodded respectfully in acknowledgement.

“This reminds me a lot of the war…albeit with less numbers on our side.” Crane said reminiscently.

“Yeah…” Lion said, with Kuma and Bara nodding wholeheartedly in agreement. They have no idea how tough these youma are, due to them never fighting one before. But the ANBU have been informed on their capabilities by Miria, so they have some idea on what to expect from these so called demons.

On the bright side of things, they didn’t have the fate of the entire world on their shoulders. And this wasn’t a war either. So, while they can’t rest on their laurels and take things easy, there was a silver lining in there, somewhere.

----

Depending on the perspective of the person, it was lucky that the army of youmas had not gone past them. And despite Naruto killing off several hundred of them in one move, they continued on their path.

Chronos, Lars and Gwyn were on top of one of the two large hills the hybrids were positioned inside. The ANBUs were on the other. Behind Audrey and Rachel was Naruto himself; he was standing absolutely still with his eyes closed in concentration. The orange pigmentation around his eyes that showed him being in Sage Mode was still there. As the giant army of youma approached, the sounds of thousands of moving feet reached their ears.

The trainees were still shaking out of fear. The warriors were frightened but had more control over their emotions. After what felt like an hour, when it was nearly ten minutes of tens of hundreds of feets, the purple skinned humanoids, of various shapes and sizes - several thousand of them with wings - came into view.

All of them came to a running stop.

At the same time, the orange pigmentation around Naruto eyes faded away as he opened them. He took out a dozen of his father’s tri-pronged kunai and held them in a loose, but firm grip.

“Audrey,” The former Number 3 to look back at him questioningly. “Just say the word and I’ll pepper the battlefield with my kunai.” he told her, raising said kunais in question with a calm, easygoing smile.

Audrey quirked an eyebrow at that as she looked at the kunai in question; they were small, and had three pointed edges on it, similar to a trident. The handle was made of wood and had a fuinjutsu formula on it, with a ring at the end. While perplexed at the request she nevertheless nodded.

“Alright.” she looked ahead for a moment, before looking back to Naruto again. “You, uh, may want to do that now then.”

“Alright,” with a grin Naruto tossed the tri-pronged kunai into the air, towards the horde and formed several rapid hand seals while muttering under his breath, “Kunai Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!”

Before their everyone's eyes, the twelve kunai suddenly became twelve-hundred and while many of them harmlessly struck the ground, a lot managed to find itself lethally stabbing many a youma.

Then, as the horde drew closer, two of the ANBU erected an earth wall behind it, cutting off the only route of escape, while Chronos,, Lars and Gwyn transformed. The two parties then started sniping the flying youma out of the air. Now more frenzied at the realization of what these insects were doing, the horde stampeded forth. Some tried going up the hills, but they were too steep for a handful to scale at a time and they were promptly cut down. The bulk, however, were now bullrushing the trainees and warriors before them.

“Just give the word,” Naruto reminded Audrey. Once she does he can ‘flash’ to the twelve-hundred tri-pronged kunai and take care of business.

The former Number Three smiled at him, before giving the orders. “Alright, ladies, prepared your spears and chanel chakra into your blows rather than yoki. Any full-fledged warriors are to serve as support!”

“Shields up and brace for the charge!” Henriette shouted. Those who had the shields did as they were ordered and braced themselves.

“Send a constant flow of chakra to your feet to make sure you don’t move,” Naruto advised the trainees, “It’ll help in making sure you don’t get pushed back..”

“Right,” the girls all replied in unison. Then, when the wave hit, several youma died almost instantly - impaled upon the spears, only to be decapitated by the claymores. The girls’ weapons then became a blur of motion stabbing and chopping their way through the waves of youma. Any who tried extending their claws only had them chopped off. In the center of the formation, Ava was butchering the youma like cattle,

“Alright, Naruto,” Audrey called out, “you mind thinning the herd to make them more manageable?”

“Not at all,” the blond replied.

He was gone in a yellow flash; the next thing that happened was pure chaos. Youma’s began to fall enmass as Naruto flickered around the battlefield in several rapid yellow flashes, a rasengan in hand that was driven into the backs, heads or fronts of any youma that was unlucky enough to be in range. He never appearing in one place twice and made his reappearance unpredictable, let alone hard to track. It seemed like he was in many places at once!

“W-woah…” Charlotte whispered in amazement, carefully taking a moment to actually watch the carnage Naruto was wrecking on the youma. Unfortunately, her ogling was cut short as she evaded a cheeky youma and lopped his head off, but still… it was quite the spectacle.

Up on the hills flanking the horde, the Awakened Beings and ANBU followed suit in butchering the youma, bombarding them with ranged techniques and shuriken. Though they had to be careful in where they attacked since Naruto was right in the thick of youmas. The ANBU and Awakened Beings saw many of the remaining winged ones take to the sky, most likely to try and preform hit and run attacks.

The muscular male humanoid with thick, tube-like tentacles for hair that was Chronos wasn’t having any of that, however. He hasn’t had much of an opportunity to train using chakra in his awakened form, for obvious reasons.

But he has been testing out a few things.

This was a good time to see if it’s good or not.

Chronos opened his mouth wide, looking as if he had almost dislocated his jaw and suddenly lightning began to crackle in the back of his throat. He took aim at one of the youmas and lobbed it out of his mouth. The lightning took on the shape of a large formless mass of blue coloured energy that had lightning crackling off it. When it struck the unlucky youma that was slow to not get out of its trajectory, the energy enveloped the youma, shocking him in place and frying his nerves and organs… before it shot out and latched onto several hundred youmas in rapid succession before they could even react and suffered the same fate.

They all died before hitting the ground.

Gwyn, who was now a black and brown, titan-sized minotaur with red glowing eyes and three horns, tended to be a little more practicable. He had his three-fingered hands enveloped with blue fire that seemed to never go out, as he was throwing sizable fireballs into the horde that was on the ground. Though he was aiming at the ones towards the back. They were incinerated the second the fireballs exploded.

Lars, meanwhile, was playing more of a support role, knocking any cheeky youma that tried scaling the hills back into the killzone where they belonged with a whip of water. The technique provided some frightening reach, as it allowed him to knock over youma on the other side of the narrow valley.

The trainees, meanwhile were holding their own quite nicely. The advice Naruto had given them to send chakra to their feet had helped out immensely in holding their ground, and the energy itself was surprisingly easy to channel into their attacks. It wasn’t quite as potent, due to being less… thick, but it was much easier to control. The poor girls could do without Tanya’s maniacal cackling, though, as their ‘evil’ comrade clearly enjoyed herself just a bit more than she frankly should have. At least she was focusing on the youma…

Naruto took a moment to stop and see how the hybrids were doing, and was legitimately impressed by how they were holding out, despite their lack of experience. Though the trainees were mostly just wounding them so they could be picked off by the actual warriors, they were almost shockingly effective. Naruto smiled brightly. Every now and then, Ava and Eva - bless those twins - would switch places and roles while everyone else carried on, butchering the youma in front of them into oblivion. All in all, it took only about 30 minutes to achieve such a feat.

Of course, Naruto was forced to ‘flash’ to another spot when a youma tried to take advantage of his brief distraction. He gave the youma at that spot - a female with long, straight, blonde hair - a rasengan to the stomach the second he reappeared. He vanished in another yellow flash and drove two rasengans into the front of another youma blasting him back when the spheres of chakra exploded. Then he vanished and reappeared above the head of another youma, and drove yet another rasengan right into the middle of his scalp turning his brain to mushy goo right then and there when the sphere grinded through skin, muscle and bone when gravity took hold.

Erica smiled at him both shyly and thankfully, that last one having nearly speared her leg when he killed it. He smiled back, drawing a deep blush from her. The blond couldn’t help but chuckle at that.

Clearing his throat, Naruto surveyed the pile of bodies stacked so high the last waves of youma had started using it as a ramp. The slaughter was nothing if not morbidly impressive. “Good job, everyone,” he praised. “That’s one less threat to the people of this continent.”

But to make sure they didn’t miss any…

Naruto bent his knees and chakra leapt very high into the sky. The blond then formed many Kage Bunshin, who proceeded to make very, very large rasengan between them. This was a very similar to the attack he had used against Kurama all those years ago, back when the war was still kicking off. These ones were weaker, but still packed enough carve away an entire mountain when they exploded.

As gravity took hold and they started dropping to the ground, the ANBU, Awakened Beings, Hybrids and any youma who may have been playing possum all heard Naruto and his clones exclaim, “Chōōdama Rasen Tarengan!”

The ANBU knowing just how dangerous the original rasengan was thanks to the exploits of both Minato and Jiraiya, got the hell out of dodge. They made clones of various elements and started carrying the protesting trainees and warriors before the clones and the original Naruto managed to do what they wanted.

And when they all struck the mass of corpses rasengan first, it felt as if the earth itself was shaking! The pile of bodies vanished the second the massive rasengans collided with them, and soon after that the ground began to crack, and collapse in on itself shortly after. Then everything went up in a massive explosion of blue.

Naruto, the real one, landed a ways away from the blast, with the twelve tri-pronged kunai in hand. Of course, the blast would not have hurt the warriors and trainees; at worst, it would have knocked a few of them down, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

The young women stared in amazement at the destruction left in Naruto’s wake, several of them feeling an urge to… do something unmentionable to the strong, manly blond as he approached.

He exhaled, “I think that’s enough excitement for one day, don’t you? Let’s head back to the village and tell the mayer the situation’s been taken care of. After that, we can head to Dabi to rest up before continuing our little training trip.”

“Wouldn’t it be better to rest at the village?” Kuma pointed out.

“Would you rather stay in a fortified location - aka, Dabi - or a village that has little to no defenses apart from a small militia?” Naruto asked with a pointed look. “I’ll leave my clones there to make sure everything’s okay over there, though… just in case.” Not to mention there was still that barrier-ninjutsu his clones had to take down. The blond quickly made a clone, who promptly dispelled himself to take care of that. The other six he left behind should be taking down the Six Burning Barrier Formation right about now.

The four ANBU nodded in understanding at that.

Then Naruto turned to the Awakened Beings, who were now in their human forms and still clothed. They must’ve stripped down before they transformed, pretty damn smart thinking.

“What about you three?” the blond asked.

“We set out to warn you of these youma,” Chronos answered.

“We’ll be heading back to Westvale Keep now,” Gwyn added with a shrug. “Have a safe trip, Lord, Naruto,” the man concluded with a respectful bow.

“You too,” Naruto replied with a respectful nod. After that the awakened beings dashed off back to Westvale Keep and Naruto turned to the rest. “Alright, now let’s get going!”

----

Sometime later in Dabi…

“Wednesday, 24th day of Ahmun, Year 2117AS:

I’ve got to say that today was an… eventful one.”

Erica giggled as she sat upon the bed and scribbled away in her little journal.

“Many of the others and I are learning how to use this ‘Chakra’ stuff that everyone’s raising such commotion about. It feels… weird, but it’s so much easier to use than Yoki. I saw those On-boo guys and the Awakened Beings of the Lost Generation using it in some ridiculous ways and I’m so excited! I’ve GOT to learn how to use a whip of water and shoot lightning bolts! IT WAS SO COOL!!!”

She was positively shaking in place by this point, barely able to keep her excitement bottled up as she added.

“And he said, those who have the Earth Element can make their skin as hard as diamonds! Admittedly, I’ve never seen what a diamond is, but I did hear they’re incredibly tough to break. Let alone scratch! And there’s this Lightning Armour thing that makes someone fast. Like really, really fast! If that white haired man in Naruto’s Homeland was hailed as the Fastest Man alive before Naruto came along, then the Lightning Armour must be something that the best of the best can do!

It’s a shame I don’t have Lightning. I think…? I never did get to see what my element affinity was. So maybe I can figure it out tomorrow?”

It was certainly worth asking, if nothing else…

“All that aside, I keep noticing Ava and Eva staring at Naruto oddly and every time I do, I can’t help but feel… jealous for some reason? I don’t know why. It’s weird. Oh! Ava and Eva are the names he gave those twins that pervert from the Crimson Guard called ‘Twitchy and Squeaker’... there’s a story behind that, I’m sure. I’m not going to ask how they got those nicknames, something tells me it’ll scar me for life. They seem to like Naruto, too… like a lot... But, they’re not the only ones.”

She had to turn the page before continuing. “Tanya and Savra seem to have been flirting with him… and Henriette… and Hanna… and Regina… Now that I think about it, Audrey and Rachel seem to be the only ones not interested in him… yes, that includes me… he doesn’t seem to be taking any action though, outside of ruffling our heads with a grin. I have to admit, the head ruffles feel nice. It brings up a feeling I can’t describe, but the closest thing to it is… parently? Only, more than that.”

There was a little doodle of herself blushing up a storm for added effect.

“Oh, by the twins, I HOPE I don’t embarrass myself in front of him! The others would NEVER let me live it down!”

Erica sighed, doing her damnedest to fight down her blush as she closed her journal and tucked it away.

----

Meanwhile, Naruto was in the bailey where he had installed the copy of the simulation that was in Morris. He was having a… rather interesting conversation.

“You’re… real?” Naruto was having trouble keeping the disbelief out of his voice as he talked to be person in front of him.

It all started when he had turned on the simulation. And Naruto was surprised immensely when a creation of his showed up, outside of his control.

He was garbed head to toe in all black, with a hood covered his head. His eyes were completely bloodshot, with the irises red, and his white shirt was dirtied with splatters of blood. His face was dirted with the life fluid, and his hands were covered in blood too. The ever present, unsettling grin of insanity on his face, was no longer there.

This was what Naruto dubbed, ‘Insane Naruto’. The version that Chloe went up against and was forced to retreat.

“No. No no no. Out there? Not really. Not really.” The Insane Naruto was a lot calmer, and seemed less… insane. But there was that insane glimmer in his red eyes, that showed his true nature. “Sentient? Real inside of your simulation? Very much so. Hehehehehehe…” the dark-clothed blond went off into a fit of insane giggles as he rocked back and forth on his feet, like he was swaying unsteadily.

“This is…unprecedented.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Insane Naruto replied concurringly. “Tell that woman I said ‘Hi’ the next time you see her. No! Actually! Get her to come back. I like her. I like her, I like her!”

Naruto sighed at the giggles that followed, inwardly glad that Chloe wasn’t here. The poor thing would undoubtedly be mortified. So would the others now that he thought about it.

“I think you scared her for life,” he pointed out to the insane version of himself, in the blandest tone he could muster.

“Her fault. She attacked first. Wouldn’t have otherwise… maybe… possibly… I’m still learning as I go. Don’t judge me!” Insane Naruto said to defend himself, only to snap at his creator at the end.

Naruto raised his hands placatingly, “I won’t, I won’t.”

Insane Naruto huffed in satisfactory, “Good…” then they went into an uncomfortable silence, for the Original Naruto anyway. Then the other blond huffed once more and said with a sigh, “I’m booooooooored!”

“Don’t look at me! I didn’t tell you to do anything!”

“I want to see that woman again. She’s pretty… so were the other ones, now that I think about it. Not sure they like me though. Many were giving me those looks.”

“Well you did leave one hell of a first impression on them.”

“I did, didn’t I? That was FUN!!” Insane Naruto let out another series of insane cackling.

As for Naruto himself? He just gave the Insane version of himself quite the flat stare before saying, “I’m turning changing the simulation now,”

“What?! N-” whatever he was going to say was abruptly cut off when Naruto pressed his hand against the barrier, and the ink substance slithered its way up the barrier in a matter of seconds.

When the ink-like substance slithered back down into the ground, Naruto was, suffice to say, immensely surprised when the Insane Naruto was still there. His red, bloodshot eyes were hauntingly wide and he had the most horrifyingly, no-nonsense look on his face.

“Don’t. Do That.” his tone was cold. Icy. Sounding as if his voice could kill an elderly woman by the sound alone.

To say Naruto was worried about this development was an understatement. He may have inadvertently created a monster.

“Uh…”

“Seriously though. Don’t. You have NO idea what it’s like, to suddenly have your. Entire. Being snuffed out of existence.” then the dark-clothed blond let out a sigh and tilt his head to the side. “But I get it, you’re sick of me… hypocrite.”

And then before Naruto’s eyes, everything behind the barrier went pitch black for just a moment, and when he could see again, the Insane Naruto just… upped and vanished.

“Creepy…” That was all Naruto had to say about that. He didn’t think his own creation could become so self aware...did that mean all of his creations for this simulation are self aware?! Did that mean his dad was self-aware?!

So deep in his thoughts was he, that Naruto jumped in startelement when he heard Kurama say, “Huh. You know, you do have the Creation Of All Things, father used to make me and the other Tailed Beasts. If that’s the case, does that mean the souls of the dead can invade your simulation? Minato was very amused, now that I think about it…”

Kurama thought back on the training simulation in question and remembered one specific part that he didn’t think too hard on.

“Yeah!” easier said than done, though. Naruto drove his fist into his palm and glared at Mukade determinedly. Then he looked back at Deneve from over his shoulder, and grinned at her. “I don’t know who you four are, but you did good; we’ll take it from here.”

Zelda couldn’t help herself as she giggled. “Oh, you will know us rather well, honey~! Thanks for the help!”

The blond recoiled comically at her flirting, much to the women’s amusement and Minato’s.

Kurama realised that Minato did look amused. Very amused. He looked almost proud of his son... while he looked behind Team Undine and Glissa… and Kurama had that strange feeling that the blond responsible for sealing his magnificent self away inside of his son was looking right at them, fondly, like he knew they were on the other side of the barrier, but thought it was the trick of the imagination...

Suddenly, the realization hit him like a sack of bricks. Inside the seal Kurama stood straight up with his eyes comically wide as he shouted. “HOLY SHIT! HE WAS THE REAL DEAL!!”

Naruto jumped yet again and fell down on his ass. “The hell!? Who was the real deal?! Who are you talking about?!”

“YOUR FATHER MORON! BACK WHEN TEAM UNDINE TOOK THAT SIMULATION WITH MUKADE AS THE ENEMY, MINATO WAS LOOKING PAST THEM! RIGHT AT US! HE WAS THE REAL DEAL!”

“Bullshit!”

“BRAT I’D NEVER LIE!” Kurama shouted. “I’M TELLING YOU MINATO WAS REAL! HE WAS LOOKING RIGHT AT US!” The fox clicked his tongue, now much calmer, “The smug bastard. He probably knows he’s got so many grandkids and daughter-in-laws by this point...”

“...You’re actually serious.”

“If you don’t believe me, then drag Minato up. That’ll clear up any misconceptions you have.”

“...Alright…”

With that, Naruto got up off the ground and did just that. Pressing his hand against the barrier Naruto closed his eyes and focused on bringing the simulation version of his father out.

When he was finally brought forth Minato blinked and took in his new surroundings. He hummed and looked at his son, then he smiled. “Well, I have to say, this is a lot better than fighting Mukade. It’s peaceful.”

That got Naruto’s attention. “Hello,” he greeted. “I just wanted to ask you a few things.”

“Oh?”

“Uh, y-yeah. Do you remember the green-skinned elf eared lady?”

“Who was with those women with silver eyes and pale blonde hair? Yes. I remember.” Minato replied with a chuckle. “I’ll admit, those women were unique in their own way. I couldn’t talk to you in person...but seeing you again, even if he wasn’t the real, was worth it.”

If he didn’t believe Kurama then, Naruto really believed him now.

“Then you’re…”

“Real? Somehow back from the dead? Very much so.”

Naruto was a war veteran. He faced down Tailed Beasts; invincible undead shinobi; he even fought the boogeyman of the Shinobi World and a Goddess. The blond’s reaction, to discovering that after all this time, that his father was real, was pretty straight forward.

He fainted right there on the spot, to Minato’s bemusement.

“...That went better than I thought it would.”

----

Naruto didn’t know how long he was out for, but he didn’t mind discovering that he’s woken up with his head in Savra’s lap as Tanya chatted it up with the simulation of his father.

“I must admit that I’m certainly tempted to join,” the young former Number 13 giggled. “That boy of yours is quite the stud, I must say~!”

“Tanya! Don’t say such things! Show some respect!” Naruto heard Audrey say from somewhere nearby.

“I am showing respect,” said blonde giggled. “Calling a man a stud is a complement.”

Minato couldn’t help but chuckle at that if his life depended on it. “I think she meant showing respect to me. But, uh, thank you nonetheless?”

“You’re awake!” Savra exclaimed in relief, drawing everyone’s attention to the her and Naruto who was now being helped to sit up by the blind woman.

“Yeah, I am.” The blond said with a chuckle. He looked between Tanya and his dad before saying, “I see you’re getting along with my dad.”

The former Number 13 grinned widely at that. “He’s very polite and easy to talk to,” she chirped, before giving Naruto a concerned look. “You okay?”

“I’ll be fine,” Naruto chuckled. “Just a... bit of shock is all.”

“What about?” Audrey asked as she came into view.

“Well...that’s my actual dad.” Naruto revealed, to the shock and surprise of those who were in the bailey, which was everyone. “I don’t know how, but, he’s the real deal. I wonder if that means...” could he bring back Pervy Sage in the same way? Could he bring back his mother as well for that matter?

“I’m not so sure how it’s possible, myself. I should be in the Pure Land with the others. I don’t remember what happened on the other side, but, I’m sure Kushina is worried sick that I’m missing.”

“...I wonder if you’re sent to the Pure Land when you’re, uh, ‘dismissed’?” Naruto wondered aloud.

Minato shrugged. “It’s entirely possible, but there’s no way to confirm it because I don’t remember anything from there.” then he looked down at the seal matrix and hummed, impressed by its design, “This is the first time I’ve ever seen Fuinjutsu this complex. Jiraiya-Sensei would be stumped by the sheer complexity of it. He would be so proud of you, I’m sure of it!”

Naruto couldn’t help but blush and smile at the praise.

“I wonder how your mother would react to you having so many wives and children,” Savra asked impishly.

Both father and son looked a bit nervous at that. Kushina was known to have one hell of a temper.

“She’d kill me.” Naruto gulped as he began to shiver. “She’d be happy she has so many grandchildren, and then she’d kill me.” he was so certain of that. His mum can manifest chakra chains that can restrain Kurama and suppress his chakra, it’s not that far fetched of a guess that she can do the same to him before beating the living shit out of him.

And he saw how scary mum can be when she’s angry…

Unknown to Naruto, his father was in agreement with him. He knew her well enough to know she would be ecstatic to have so many grandchildren and that the Uzumaki Clan was on the road to recovery. Then she’d probably take her temper out on Jiraiya, since he was a known pervert and would think he corrupted her son.

“It’s a good thing she’s not here, then,” Minato chuckled sheepishly.

“She sounds scary,” Minato snapped his head around and he, along with everyone else, was surprised to see the blood covered, dark-clothed wearing, and bloodshot, red-eyed Naruto standing there. The Insane Naruto started giggling insanely as he held the side of his head through his hood. “Good thing she’s not here though, not here not here not here…”

“Naruto, who the hell is that!?” Oh, so Rachel was around too?

“That is me in the worst case scenario…he’s an Insane version of me.” Naruto answered as he turned to look at the woman in question.

“Yep yep!” Insane Naruto giggled, and he started smacking the side of his head repeatedly as his grin became more and more disturbed. “A version that was driven insane from loneliness, hate and abuse of Konohagakure.”

“What are you doing here?” Naruto asked his insane self with exasperation.

“Just wanted to see the Yondaime Hokage in person…” the dark-clothed Naruto stared up at the blond man, who had a dangerously stoic look on his face. If the Insane Naruto was put off by the cold look on the man’s face, he didn’t show it.

“He’s so cool…” He gushed looking less insane now that he was in the presence of a living legend, and Naruto - the real one - blinked in bewilderment. It’s like...being in dad’s presence was making him more sane. Interesting.

Naruto blinked once more and the Insane Naruto was gone. “I think I made him a little too unpredictable. I didn’t think he would become sentient…” though what he did after Chloe got out of her ‘simulation’ should have been a dead give away that this version of him was more than he seemed.

“That was… a thing.” Minato stated, before turning to look at his son on the other side of the barrier. “So you made him?” Though his tone sounded accusative, he wasn’t. Not really. The man was just curious.

Naruto flinched at his tone. “Yeah. A…girlfriend of mine wanted to fight me…and she tends to act first and ask questions later. So I gave her a fight against a version of me that forced her to think. Insane Naruto, as I’m calling him, was the end result.”

“I see,” Minato sighed, “Naruto you should be more careful. You have not just the power of all nine Bijuu, but the power of the Rikudō Sennin as well. Fuinjutsu is still an vastly unknown branch of jutsu.”

“I know, dad, I know.” Naruto sighed. Then he brightened up considerably. “Still… there is a silver lining to all of this!”

Smiling Minato cocked his head to the side. “Oh? What would that be?” he asked, now curious as to what was going through his son’s head.

“You can meet your grandsons and granddaughters now!”

Minato smiled a little wider at that. His son was right, he could see his grandsons and granddaughters now.

“NARUTO UZUMAKI!” Both father and son went stiff as they went ashened skinned at the enraged voice. They both recognised who the voice belonged to. Though the latter was wondering how she could be in the simulator when he didn’t even implement her yet. Was this the work of the Twin Goddesses? Did they finally get through to Shinigami?!

“WHAT’S THIS ABOUT YOU BEDDING MULTIPLE WOMEN!?”

Looking around for a place to hide, Naruto did what any sane man would do when faced against a woman with a fierce temper. Savra squawked when Naruto hid behind her as if she was a protective shield.

It wasn’t long that a long-red-haired woman whose hair was defying gravity, whipping around around her like several tails, appeared before the small group of hybrids and ANBU, stomping up towards the barrier with a comical look of outrage on her face. Her clothes are made of a high-collared, sleeveless blouse under a long, loose-fitting dress, some standard shinobi sandals, and lastly, a wristband on her left wrist.

“A-Ah haha… Hi mom…?” Naruto nervously greeted the redhead from behind the still bewildered Savra.

Kushina, still outraged, pressed her hand against the barrier the second she got to it and shook her fist at him with the other. “DON’T ‘HI MOM’ ME, YOUNG MAN! YOU’RE LUCKY YOU’RE NOT IN HERE WITH ME! I’D GIVE YOU SUCH A SPANKING FOR BEING A MASSIVE PERVERT!”

Minato wasn’t surprised to see that the young girls, Tanya included, all hid behind the older women. Even the ANBU from Kumogakure no Sato were cowering before Kushina’s temper. The only one who didn’t was Savra, and that was because she was blind!

“I’m 21, mom! I’m old enough to make my own decisions!” Naruto weakly protested.

And just like that, all the anger that was welling up within Kushina deflated, and as she slumped forwards, her hair fell down against her back as gravity took hold.

“I know… but I wanted you to find a nice girl, settle down, and have a family…” Then Kushina looked at him with wide, tearful eyes as her bottom lip trembled, “And Jiraiya corrupted you into being a womanizer! Waaaaaah!” then she started wailing as she pulled a very bewildered Minato to her and buried her face into his the crook of his neck.

“U-uh… Actually… I have multiple wives. These ladies here are just some people I rescued from some very bad people.”

Kushina suddenly stopped crying and looked at him with a scarily focused face. “Wives…? As in plural? Does that mean I have… grandchildren?”

Naruto nervously dampened his lips before answering. “Y-Yeah? You have lots of grandchildren; just under 50 last I checked. There’s a couple of more on the way.” He was talking about the ones that were born on Testing Ground One of course. He’s got plenty of more in the Elemental Nations, which takes it up to 56.

“Under… 50?” Kushina didn’t know how to take that news.

“I have a lot of wives.” Naruto, now feeling a bit more confident, stepped out from behind poor, confused Savra. “None of these girls are them, though.”

Tanya was very tempted to say ‘Yet!’, but she didn’t want to bring this woman’s temper down on her. She was scary! So the 13 year old did the wisest thing and kept her mouth shut.

And just like that, Kushina’s mood brightened up considerably as she clasped her hands together to the side of her face, “I have so many grandchildren! Eeeeeeee!” she squealed gushingly. “Where are they? Are they here? Can I see them?”

“They’re in Morris, the town I’m the leader of. No, they’re not here and you can’t see them. This is a fortress called Raby…” Naruto told with her a shake of his head; he then trailed off at the end with a thoughtful look on his face. “Though this simulation is the copy of the one in Morris.”

Kushina blinked, not connecting the dots. “Meaning?”

Minato on the other hand, did. “I think it means you can go see them when that one is turned on,” he looked at Naruto and asked, “right son?”

Naruto nodded with enthusiasm, “Yeah. Exactly!”

“Okay!” Kushina exclaimed, driving her fist into her hand with a look of fierce determination. “I’ll go there now!” And then she vanished, fading away like a mirage, before Naruto could say another word.

The bailey was overcome with awkward silence.

“...She’s your mother?” Tanya eventually asked, breaking the silence.

“Yeah.”

“...She’s scary when angry…” Ava said from behind Audrey with Eva, who was also hiding behind the former Number 3, nodding in agreement with her twin sister.

“That’s mom for you.” Naruto said with a sheepish chuckle. Then he blinked and drove his palm into his face as he came to a sudden revelation. “I just realised the simulation at Morris might not even be on.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it to much,” Minato reassured, “I’ll be by her side and get her to wait if that’s the case.” He smiled while adding, “Besides, when I was ‘gone’ between then and now, I didn’t notice any differences in time. It felt as if seconds had passed since I saw Mukade and you in person. I’ll see you later, Naruto. And possibly Jiraiya-sensei too.”

“Yeah,” Naruto chuckled sheepishly. Knowing him, that old pervert would either curse him for getting so many beautiful women, or cry with joy for getting so many beautiful women. “I’ll see you later, dad.”

With a smile Minato gave him a single nod, before fading away like a mirage himself, leaving Naruto alone in the company of 14 hybrids and four Kumogakure ANBU. Turning off the simulation, Naruto then looked back at the silver-eyed, pale blonde/platinum blonde girls and women.

“So, are you girls ready to start training in using chakra some more?” After seeing what the Awakened Beings and ANBU did to those youma, the blond got a round of enthusiastic smiles and nods from them.

----

Back in Morris, a good thirty minutes later.

Team Undine was performing a teamwork exercise with their new squadmate, Glissa, under the supervision of a Naruto clone, when they noticed the Simulation seal acting weird. The seals were glowing and the barrier was flickering on and off, before the whole thing went silent for a bit and started acting up again.

“That’s odd,” Zelda commented. “Never seen it do that before…”

Then, just as the Naruto clone went to check on it, the array came to life entirely, the simulation having been turned on from within.

“I did it!” A female voice cheered in elation. Naruto recognized it immediately. The barrier then turned black and a woman with long, red hair and purple eyes faded into view. She let out a sigh of relief. She had to give her son some mad props! The security he gave this seal were nothing short of unbelievable, especially for his age! But, Kushina was entrusted with the Kyuubi all those years ago for a damn good reason. Her mastery of Fuuinjutsu was nigh god tier - rivaled only by her husband, his mentor, and Mito, at the time. That said, hacking this seal from the inside was difficult, but manageable.

She looked around and noted that this ‘courtyard’ was much bigger than the previous one. It was also more sparsely populated, though that was because of everyone else being in the keep or the town. She immediately spotted four women with her son - whom she’d assumed to be a shadow clone and smiled at them. “Hello~!”

The clone, who had no knowledge of her being back, had a understandable reaction. And it was nothing short of spectacular. Quickly backing away from the simulation, the clone pointed a shaking hand at Kushina and shouted.

“What?! Who!? How?! Ah-guh-HUH?!”

“Well… this is exactly how I expected his reaction to go.” Minato said with a chuckle, appearing beside Kushina like a mirage. Kushina looked a bit sheepish at that.

“Oops?” The redhead then turned to the young man and four women and asked, “So, what’s going on here?”

“Naruto here, is helping us with a teamwork exercise so we can get used to our new teammate,” Deneve said, gesturing to her husband and Glissa respectively as she approached. She didn’t see any harm in revealing that. She then gave at the duo in the sim an odd look. “May I ask what’s going on here?”

The clone opened his mouth to say something, only for whatever it was to die on the tip of his tongue, when he suddenly received the memories of his creator. Now he knew everything from the massive youma army that was threatening Daby, to him discovering that Minato was real.

“...I just got the memories from the Boss.” the clone had a look on his face that conveyed all his happiness and joy in the next three words, “Oh my god.” taking a deep, shaking breath he looked at Team Undine and said, “I’d like the four of you to officially meet Minato and Kushina… my parents. They’re the real deal.”

To say the four of them were surprised was the understatement of the century.

“Your parents…?” Undine muttered in bewilderment.

“I thought they were dead,” Glissa added awkwardly.

“We are,” Kushina replied with a sheepish chuckle. “I can’t say I blame you for being shocked, but I was just too eager to meet my grandbabies.”

Clearly, Naruto wasn’t the only one in his bloodline with a tendency to think before he acts...

“I was around longer, actually.” Minato told them. “I was there when you fought the giant puppet, Mukade. I never got the chance to talk to my son, though… and don’t ask me how my wife got here… or how I’m apparently back from the dead and not just a simulation. I’m still trying to piece that together, myself.”

He has a theory on that actually; with his son having the power of all nine Bijuu and the Rikudō Sennin, plus fuinjutsu still being a vastly unknown branch of jutsu, his son may have inadvertently found a way to bring the souls in the Pure Land back to the realm of the living. This creation of his isn’t really part of the physical world, since it in a sense, generates its own pocket dimension. It is entirely possible that Naruto has found a way to bring the deceased out of the Pure Lands.

He’s wrong of course, since this was Shinigami’s work, but that’s why it’s a theory, not fact.

“Duly noted,” Deneve replied with a nod.

Zelda eagerly scampered on up to her hubby’s parents. “So… my name is Zelda… Zelda Uzumaki,” she said with a blush and respectful bow. “I am one of your son’s wives.” She showed them her wedding band. “I must say, he turned out well. The young man is nothing short of a miracle worker.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Kushina said with a respectful bow of her own. When the two women straightened up, the redhead looked to the others, “And who are the rest of you?”

“I’m Glissa, your son’s mate.” The dark-haired pointed-eared Awakened One introduced herself with a polite smile. Her terminology raised a couple eyebrows, but Minato and Kushina kept that to themselves for now.

“I’m Deneve Uzumaki, another of your son’s wives.” The pixie-haired blonde said with a respectful nod.

Seeing as it was her time to introduce herself, Undine gave her hubby’s parents a polite, respectful smile - since the blond is the former leader of Konoha - and introduced herself. “I’m Undine Uzumaki, another of your son’s wives.”

“Pleased to meet you all.” then Kushina gave the clone a teasing look, “I hope he’s been treating you all well.”

“Immaculately,” Glissa said almost seductively. “I never thought I’d say this before meeting him, but I have truly fallen in love~!”

“I think we all have, Glissa.” Zelda said with a girlish giggle.

The Naruto clone covered his mouth as he cleared his throat, now thoroughly beet red. “We were actually, uh, having a training exercise to get Glissa settled in with her new team. They’re doing pretty well too! I certainly wouldn’t mind fetching their kids so you can meet a few of your grandchildren, though.”

Kushina brightened considerably at that. “Oh! Please do!” The redhead was clapping her hands together with excitement and eagerness to finally meet some of her grandkids.

Amused at her antics, a grinning Naruto shook his head and looked at his girls. “Keep my mum and dad company, will you?”

“Gladly,” Undine replied with a nod. Satisfied with her answer the blond vanished in a yellow flash, thoroughly surprising Minato and Kushina as it was something they were not expecting in the slightest.

“Sooooo…” Zelda started, looking at her mother and father-in-law. “...does this mean we can ask for advice?”

“Well... it depends on the type of advice you’re looking for.” Kushina told her.

“Hmm…” Zelda closed her eye in thought. “I would ask for advice on what Naruto’s likes and dislikes are, but, seeing as the two of you were dead through no fault of your own, I suppose that’s moot. Maybe…some advice on chakra?” she asked, opening her eye again to look at them.

“I’m actually well suited for that,” Minato said with a grin. “I had a few students of my own, back in the Third Great War, so it fell upon me to train them as quickly and effectively as possible.”

“I got knocked up with Naruto almost immediately after becoming a Jounin, so I never got the chance to teach professionally,” Kushina added sheepishly. “After doing my homework on the matter, I quickly realized that I simply couldn’t juggle both responsibilities, so I retired to focus on raising a family… then, that masked dickbag happened when I came to term and the rest is history, I guess.” Her tome became significantly more grim at the end.

“Well, on the bright side, you now have a chance to make up for lost time,” Glissa chirped. “Words cannot describe how glad I am to have met that young man!”

Kushina blushed and smiled at that.

Minato smiled as well, before addressing Zelda. “So, what kind of advice would you like?”

“I’ve heard from Naruto that you managed to defeat an entire army of ninja by yourself, in a matter of seconds. If I were to go against an enemy of that caliber, what is the best way to survive?”

Undine perked up, eager to learn what Minato had to say.

“Isn’t Naruto capable of doing the exact same thing?” Deneve pointed out remindingly to Zelda.

The woman in question glowered, as she crossed her arms against her bosom with a childish huff. “Yeah. He’s the person I want to beat! We never managed to beat him in our spars! Ever! Even in training he manages to kick our asses!”

“It depends on a number of factors,” Minato said, crossing his arms inquisitively. “When I did that, I had the element of surprise on my side, even when I became rather infamous for it. Also, while the Hiraishin was invented literal decades before I was even born, it wasn’t very well known a technique and no one who did know about it had expected some no-name schmuck from a family of merchants to master it.”

“Wooooah… Naruto’s dad is a badass…” Glissa said with wide, doe-like eyes.

“Mine,” Kushina growled teasingly.

“We know,” Team Undine all said at the exact same time, though they shared a good laugh.

“Naruto can use the Hiraishin himself. He put the sealing formula on us so we can call him when we need him.” Undine revealed, before pouting, “He can use it to bring himself to the person it’s on without them knowing until it’s too late.”

“Oh yeah, I forgot he could do that.” Zelda said with a thoughtful frown. “Thankfully he never uses that in our sparring sessions, otherwise we’d get our asses handed to us the second it starts. The kunais on the other hand...”

“That’s bullshit...not only can he appear directly beside the person he’s tagged, he can even appear a mile away from them!” Glissa raged, though it was all in good nature. “It’s certainly useful to get out of a tight pinch though.”

Deneve cleared her throat, “Can we not diverge from the subject?” she asked with a look of exasperation. “We pretty much established Naruto can teleport beside us or a mile away from us. And from the looks of it, the seals themselves are unremovable… unless we were to cut it off.”

“The seals are unremovable yes. Even when the ink fades away, it’s still there. It’s permanent.” Minato confirmed. “As for cutting it off, I don’t think anyone’s ever tried.” Then he rubbed his chin as he thought back on Zelda’s original question. “Though the best way to survive, would be to get as far away from the thrown kunai as possible. If you’re far enough away from the kunai, then it’s hard for the person that threw it, to try and kill you.”

“But if there’s more than one kunai, then you’re shit outta luck.” Zelda sighed.

“I wouldn’t say it like that, but yes.” Minato gave her an apologetic look.

“Soooo… out of curiosity, are the three of you family?” Kushina asked Undine, Zelda and Deneve.

Kushina and Minato were very surprised when the latter of the three shook her head. “No, we’re not… well, at least not by blood,” Deneve stated. “I’ll bet you thought that because the three of us share similar features: silver eyes, unnatural pale blonde hair?”

“Admittedly,” Kushina replied with a nod. “The Yamanaka Clan’s known to have pretty strong genes in those departments.”

“That would explain why Inonon has such similar features to Ino, despite insisting that they’re distantly related, at best,” Glissa muttered.

“Oh?” Kushina looked at her curiously. “I take it you know some members?” She didn’t want to assume, but secretly hoped this was an indication that her son had snagged a woman of nobility.

“Only in passing,” the brunette replied. “Ino’s an old classmate an childhood ‘friend’ of his, though I feel he’s using that term a bit too loosely.” She shrugged. “Cultural differences, I’m guessing. Inonon, however, is a girl he’d commissioned to help him with some women in dire need of psychiatric help.” Her expression became a bit more impish as she added, “rumor has it that Tsunade’s been working her like a dog to keep the poor thing from acting on the crush she has for your son.”

“I can’t say I blame her if that’s true,” Deneve pointed out with a sigh. “I’m guessing Tsunade’s just trying to look out for her godson.”

“Too true.” Zelda sighed. “Anyway, the reason why we have the same coloured eyes and similar coloured hair is because we were made like this. We are Half-Human Half-Demon hybrids, we were cut open and had the flesh and blood of youma, the demons of this continent, grafted into our body. The transformation into becoming a half-demon is painful, and we lose the original colours of our eyes and hair, with one exception as far as I know. My hair was originally dark brown and my eyes were green before the transformation.”

Minato looked at Glissa as he thought back to when he last saw them. “The last time I saw your team, you had a… green-skinned humanoid with you. Where is she?”

“You’re looking at her.” Glissa replied with a nervous look. “I’m what is called an ‘Awakened Being’. I’m what hybrids become when they go over their limit and in the process, lose their humanity entirely. Youmas eat humans, and because I became a demon myself, I have to eat humans too. Naruto has found a way around that, though… with Tsunade’s help, of course. Before she came along, we were eating bandits and the like.”

“Interesting…” Minato muttered. “How many are there of these ‘Awakened Beings’ in the family?”

“Myself, Evianna, Pyrrha, Megan, Priscilla, Riful, Luciela…” Glissa began to count the rest in her head, she ticked off the amount of people with her hands, going well into the double digits. “...21 of us, I believe. Not counting the four males who are really just helping out with security and the like; if they were then that would make 25 of us in the family.”

Minato didn’t know if he should be concerned there’s over twenty demons around his son… then again, the one in front of him said his son had found a way around it. So he’ll give her the benefit of the doubt.

His wife on the other hand...

“I’ll give you a friendly warning, honey,” Kushina began, looking all friendly like, despite the downright frightening tone she had in her voice. “If you hurt my son in. Any. Way. I’ll find a way to hurt you. Understand?”

“Several of his wives would undoubtedly get to me first, Some of them are even among those demons I’d mentioned earlier… and more powerful than some of the Nine Bijuu.” Glissa pointed out awkwardly. “You have nothing to worry about, I assure you.”

“Good to know,” Kushina chirped. “So… who’s this girl with a crush on Naruto? You know anything about her?”

“Not much,” Undine grunted with a shrug. “Pretty much all we collectively know about her to my understanding has already been said. I’m sure a meeting can be arranged if you asked, though.”

“I would like that,” the redhead replied.

“I’ll get to it, then,” a familiar, masculine voice assured. They all turned their attention to Naruto who had five kids in tow… two of which looked way too old to be his. “My kids age twice as fast than normal. Tsunade thinks it’s because of the genes between the parents, that’s making them mature faster. The hybrids all stop aging once they reach full maturity, and Tsunade thinks its the same thing with the kids though none of them have gotten old enough to confirm that suspicion, just yet. We’ll see in a few years.”

“Very interesting,” Minato muttered inquisitively.

“Give me a sec,” Naruto said, placing his hand on the barrier. Soon after, the room black faded away and his parents found themselves standing inside the room of a local-style inn. “There, now the kids can walk in and interact with the two of you,” he said, before turning to the kids and gesturing for them to enter. “Go on, now, meet your grandparents.”

Lyesse giggled and scurried forth, not needing to be asked a second time. Kushina and Minato couldn’t help but notice her and Damia’s odd attire, but opted to ask about it later. Damia followed, soon after, her little sister, Altea on her heels. Then, Gideon and Isabella trailed behind - Deneve’s little girl being the last to enter.

Naruto chuckled and turned to his four present wives. “You wanna go in and play with your kids or continue the exercises?”

I’d prefer to go in,” Gnissa chirped.

Zelda nodded in agreement, as did Deneve.

“I guess that settles it then,” Undine chuckled, before stepping forth.

----

A few hours later, the sun rose in Sunagakure as a one-armed man with black hair covering one eye stepped out of the apartment he’d stayed in and took in the crisp morning air. By his side, a pink-haired woman with green eyes and a blue, diamond-shaped in the middle of her forehead gave him an expectant look. In her arms was their baby girl who’d just recently had her first birthday.

“Ready?” Sasuke asked.

“As I’ll ever be…” Sakura sighed. When last she saw Naruto, they were not on the best of terms to say the least. As rumor had it, these women Naruto was reputedly staying with had very low opinions of her. This was going to be one hell of an awkward reunion, wasn’t it?