Chapter 01: A story always starts somewhere

Konohagakure, the village hidden in the leaves. More often than not simply called ‘Konoha’ if not always. 

Konoha. The very first shinobi village created in the whole continent of the Element Nations. Born out of the blue or to be more specific out of a miracle. Enemy shinobi clans stopping their blood feud to make peace and break the cycle of war? During a time where war was all around and considered the most bloody times of recorded history? So bloody that they called it the ‘Era of the Warring States’?

Miracle. Yes, the word was fitting.

In a time where the life expectancy was around fifteen, where children below ten were sent on the front to murder and be murdered, two men said: ‘No, no more”.

Senju Hashirama and Uchiha Madara, leader of their own respective clans, agreed to peace despite incommensurable loss due to the other’s clan. From clansmen and women to direct family. They simply got tired of seeing their young ones die for nothing. They got tired of the pain, of the hatred and of the grief.

Fortunately for them they were, perhaps, the two strongest shinobi in a world where strength meant everything. That helped in the birth of Konoha. A haven for allied shinobi that wanted peace. That wanted their children to live and reach adulthood and have happy lives. Of course it wasn’t so simple. The alliance of the two most powerful clans put fear in other clans all across the globe. Some joined them, some, geographically too far or simply not interested in what the two men were selling, made their own villages.

Over time, many things happened. Among them? Three Shinobi World War. And everytime Konoha came out on top. Sometimes easily, sometimes not so much and sometimes barely to the point that it couldn’t really be said they won the war. Not when they send children to fight in them and betraying the very fundamental, the very philosophy on which Konohagakure had been built on.

The Will of Fire.

The compulsion to fight, to defend your home, to protect the younger generations so they could know peace. It was what pushed the Shinobi of the leaf, as they were called by their enemies when they were ‘nice’, to go past their limits and vanquish their opponents.

Regardless, the Will of Fire had been betrayed but everyone understood why and conveniently ignored it. The last war had been so bad that they had to enlist children into the shinobi corps after a grueling but short training. No one would deny that. Ninja were pragmatics first and dreamers or idealists second. If they were not, they would die pretty quickly.

Still, a shinobi village needed shinobi. That was why Senju Tobirama, little brother of Senju Hashirama, had created the Ninja School or more commonly called the ‘Academy’. It had been more of a necessity than anything else but it has proven very useful and the right thing to do. Children, from clans or civilian backgrounds, were all taught the same ninja arts. That created a cohesion among the shinobi forces that triumphed over any hidden village willing to pick a fight with Konoha. So much that those same hidden villages had created their own academy too in the end.

Located at the very base of the Hokage mountain, where the face of every leader, every Hokage, had been carved into the very stone, the academy was currently hosting multiple classes of children from eight to twelve years old. One particular class, looked at with scrutiny by most of the higher ups of the village because of the number of clan heirs in it, was outside in the training yard practicing the shinobi arts of hand to hand combat. Taijutsu.

“Winner: Riku!”

The voice of the academy instructor, Umino Iruka, had been loud, clear and firm in presenting the result of the taijutsu spar that had happened under his eyes and every one of his students’, watching from outside the sparring ring. Multiple girlish cries of outrage and insults were heard at the results and sent towards the young boy that had just won.

From the above average height of his twelve years old body, Warudo Riku looked down on his sprawled on his back opponent. With his gray blue eyes and through the bangs of his dirty blond hair, Riku observed Uchiha Sasuke, holding his bloody broken nose with one hand. The hatred and murder in the loser’s eyes couldn’t be missed by any one who was paying attention, meaning everyone but the fan girls.

As Riku released his tiger stance, he made the sign of reconciliation with his hands. A sign indicating that, despite the spar, they were still comrades. Regardless of what one truly thought of their opponent, it was a tradition and would be seen disapprovingly if not respected. Especially in Riku’s case. He couldn’t afford to not be the perfect model student in front of a military superior even though he loathed the Uchiha with every fiber of his being and never considered him a comrade.

Anyone that knew of Riku’s life up until now would simply say ‘that was expected of him to think like that.’ After all, Uchiha Sasuke had almost everything going for him. He was the heir of one of the founding and strongest clans of the village, rather handsome, smarter than average and had a lot of potential in the Shinobi arts.  The mass slaughter of his whole clan four years prior by his older brother, leaving only him alive, had attracted the sympathy and support of the most influential people that sucked up to him in the hope of gaining favor.

In simple terms, Uchiha Sasuke was the ‘tragic prince’ of Konoha and everyone kissed his ass. Especially the fan girls in the academy who were more interested in being the next Matriarch of the Uchiha clan than being a proper Kunoichi. Many of them were there because their parents subtly pushed them to be, in the hope they would catch the eye of the heir of one of the most wealthy and influential families since the founding of Konohagakure.

Riku on the other hand?

Riku had nothing. Nothing but a bad reputation for something that wasn’t even his doing but of his mother. Chunin Warudo Sora was caught as a spy for Orochimaru, one of the most infamous traitors of the Leaf village, when Riku was five. Orochimaru, former beloved student of the current Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen, had been caught nearly a decade prior doing illegal and monstrous experiments on kidnapped children and escaped the village. To say that anything or anyone related to him was treated harshly was an understatement.

When Sora was executed for treason, her husband, Kaito, had taken his own life without a spare thought for their son since he hung himself right in front of him.

As a result Riku became an orphan at five, dealing with the fallout of his parents’ passing and actions by his lonesome. With people constantly looking at him with scorn or loathing as if he was the one responsible, growing up had not been easy. The caretakers at the orphanage he ended up at, had not been nice to him and turned the other children away making him some kind of a pariah. They had not been verbally or physically abusive in any way but that did plenty of damage to the traumatized young boy.

The consequences were drastic. If any semblance of childhood could have been salvaged had Riku received proper support, it was now gone. He understood very quickly that the world was against him and he could  either fight it or follow in his asshole of a father’s footsteps.

That had been an easy choice for the young boy. He would fight and he would make all the villagers look down in shame once he was at the top. The only way for him to do that was to become the Hokage. The most respected and revered person in the whole village. That meant he needed to become a shinobi and become the best. The first step happened when he turned six. He had unlocked his chakra which allowed him to start ‘training’.

Training.

A big word for what he actually did. He didn’t learn any jutsu at all from any of the three main schools of the shinobi arts. How could he when  every book about them was under key in the village library? Simple, he could not. What he could do however was observe. He watched with a laser focus attention some of the academy students’ practice sessions as he passed near the academy from time to time. He didn’t bother with anything practical, like taijutsu or shuriken jutsu. There was no point, they were beginners practitioners and trying to imitate them when they were learning themselves would have been the height of foolishness. Any mistakes they made, he would have made, believing he did right. He could have watched the instructors but that would have meant spending more time in his spying and that was unsafe.

No, what Riku trained in was chakra control. At first he practiced the basic and first exercise: sticking a leaf on his forehead for a minute. Once the exercise was completed and above all mastered, he gave himself another challenge that was a bit harder. Two leaves, then three. Then more leaves but on other parts of his body, then making them spin in one way then the other, then both ways with different leaves. So on and so on. He never stopped training how to manipulate his chakra.

That wasn’t technically the only thing he did though. Chakra was the combination of spiritual and physical energy so he had to fill his head with knowledge and keep his body in shape. He didn’t do anything too strenuous; again, he was six. It was more than enough to be ready for the academy when he turned eight. Far more than students from a civilian background. More than students from a regular shinobi background. Slightly more than all the clan heir that was in his class.

The moment he began his school days, he gave it his all. Physically, mentally, he trained and studied at the limit of exhaustion. More and he would have simply hurt himself. Such dedication to his goal to become Hokage left very little time to make friends. Not like he could have. Parents had been clear with their children about staying away from him. He had expected that after the two years spent at the orphanage and walking down the streets of the village. That was nothing new.

What was new however was the clear favoritism he had been confronted with. Riku had aced all his written tests. Came first in all the practical ones. Yet, for three consecutive years he had come second. Second behind none other than Uchiha Sasuke. He had caught on pretty quickly the bias of the instructors against him when the results of the mid-term exam came in. His score had been lower than what he actually was. He had protested to his sensei at the time but was rebuffed and threatened with expulsion from the shinobi program if he insisted. The rage he had felt at that moment had been immeasurable but he didn’t let it out, instead he channeled it to train, not harder but smarter.  As an academy student he was allowed to visit and read books on the shinobi arts of his level at the Library. There wasn’t much, he learned everything he could. After all it was the basics and strong asics were the fundamentals of a good ninja. Without them he would be just like the dead last of the class: a failure.

Fortunately for Riku in this last year of the academy, his new instructor had proven himself to be a fair man. He wasn’t interested in wealth or in favors. Only in making sure that his students were trained properly to become outstanding leaf-nin. There was no favoritism. There was no discreetly kissing Konoha’s tragic prince’s ass. As such, Riku was not second but first. On his way to be the Rookie of the year next week at the final exam.

And that pissed the emo prince more than anything in the world.

Because he had everything, either from his clans or from the sycophants that wanted to use him, Sasuke had started to have a huge ego. Thinking that he was the best and everyone was beneath him. That a clanless orphan loser kept on beating him enraged him to no end. In his eyes, Riku should be just like the other clanless orphan loser of the class: Uzumaki Naruto. It should be someone that no one cared about and that wouldn’t amount to anything above mediocrity. That if he died, nobody would shed a tear or even have a thought about him.

That was why the Uchiha looked with pure hatred at his opponent.

Forgoing the sign of reconciliation and leaving the ring, Sasuke went to the infirmary to have his nose fixed. Not caring one bit about Iruka’s reprimand for breaking tradition. It took Riku all he had to not smile smugly at the retreating back of the defeated heir.

“Alright, that’s it for today. Remember to study for the final exam this Friday.”

Iruka’s words indicated the end of the day and most students went back to the classroom to take their school bags in a rush to get out of there as fast as possible. Riku ignored the murderous stare of Sasuke’s fangirls, especially Yamanaka Ino, and made his way back leisurely.

“Riku.”

Stopping in his tracks on the spot. The dirty blond turned around to look at his sensei.

“Yes, Sensei? Do you need anything?”

“Was it really necessary to break his nose?” the chunin instructor inquired with his eyebrows furrowed.

“Was it necessary for him to look down on me because of my situation?” Riku asked back and went on before Iruka could say a single word. “ For the first three years he’s been sabotaged by unprofessional instructors, giving him an ego too big for his own good. This year, despite your fairness, he learned nothing about it. Sensei, there comes a time when you need to punch someone in the face to wake them up to reality. It’s better for him to be put in his place right now than in the field where he could get killed or worse get his teammates killed.”

“... That’s true.” the man agreed. “But you won’t convince me that you didn’t take pleasure in doing the punching yourself.”

“I won’t even try, sensei. You’re right and I’m not going to lie about it.” he replied with a shrug. “There is also nothing wrong with that.”

“Some would say you are vindictive.”

“Some would say I’m retaliatory and Sasuke is the vindictive one. I never went after him, nor cared what he did as long as he left me alone. You can’t say the same about him. I worked hard to prove that I’m the best by improving myself and not by putting down others to feel better about myself. Can you really blame me for taking satisfaction in clocking the face of the one that bullied me for the past year because his fragile ego couldn’t take the fact that I was better? Can you say that you never did the same thing?”

Letting a tired sigh escape his mouth, Iruka shook his head which made Riku smile. “No. I unfortunately can’t.”

“Besides, it’s just a broken nose, sensei. If he can’t deal with that when he’s three days away to become a shinobi then maybe despite all his talent he shouldn’t become one.”

“...You’re way too mature for your age, Riku.”

“I know. Not really my fault. It was either maturing fast or being a second Naruto. That was an easy choice.”

“Naruto is not a bad kid.” Iruka defended his favorite student with a bit of steel in his voice.

“Never said he was. He’s quite the good guy in my opinion. He’s just an idiot.” Riku replied and quickly added up some more words. “Not in the sense that his IQ is low. Quite the contrary, his pranks are very clever after all. I meant in the sense that… he’s ignorant, knows about it and does nothing to correct it. In my opinion, Naruto has the greatest potential by far of everyone in class and he wastes it because to him the lectures are either boring, not flashy enough or ‘lame’. The worst is that he’s too bullheaded and prideful to admit he’s wrong and change, persevering in… whatever it is he’s doing. Yes, he never gives up and that is an admirable trait, I commend him for that but never giving up on crippling yourself is just idiotic.”

With that said, Riku entered the classroom and fetched his bag. Coming out, he thanked Iruka for the lessons of the day, wished him a good evening and left. All the while the chunin looked at the back of the best of his students in contemplation, thinking about his words concerning Naruto. They were not wrong. His favorite student would be rookie of the year instead of dead last had he applied himself on the right things. In his opinion, Naruto wasn’t ready to become a shinobi. He was too immature. Too much of a child still. Yet He hoped that this Friday he would finally pass the academy exam and become a genin. A jounin-sensei would do the sun kissed blond a lot of good and give him the almost undivided attention that he needed. Something that Iruka couldn’t do with twenty eight students.

He did wonder how two young kids, treated the same by the village, could become so different. Sure they didn’t share the same burden but the similarities between the two were uncanny. How they didn’t become the best of friends, bonding over their unfortunate lives was beyond him.