Marvel: Raising — Chapter 136 - Naruto, the Third Hokage, Sasuke

After I Fire, You Regret.

Sarutobi Hiruzen came to the Ninja Academy and found Naruto in a corner, the normal-person Naruto.

"Shinobi are merely tools."

"But I possess ninjutsu and chakra. Why should I become anyone else's tool?"

"Uncle Guan is right! In a world of superpowers, the strong should rule. When disaster strikes, can those fat, profit-gorging daimyo actually hold the line?"

"Compared to Brother Azu, who owns entire planets and star systems, the Land of Fire is tiny. And chakra is just one branch among countless cosmic energies."

"But with Brother Azu and Uncle Guan behind me, taking the Land of Fire's daimyo seat is entirely within the bounds of propriety and law."

Naruto was thinking.

He usually looked dumb as a melon. He was actually shrewd as hell.

He'd just been held back by Asura's chakra all this time.

At this moment.

Meeting the Third Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen, again.

Naruto gave a small nod. "You've come."

If this were before, he'd still have felt something for this old fart who looked after him all those years.

But now.

Naruto got straight to the point. A question, more of a confirmation. "Lord Third Hokage. Is the Fourth Hokage my father?"

"Uh—!"

Sarutobi Hiruzen choked. He shifted subjects, his smile warm and grandfatherly. "I heard you hit someone today? Naruto, why? Are you unhappy?"

?

Does that even matter?

Naruto frowned. "They started it."

"Yes, but why? One hand alone can't clap, Naruto."

Sarutobi Hiruzen kept smiling that same kind smile.

Naruto went still.

Two images surfaced, overlapping, cycling through his mind.

One: Brother Azu tore open space. Uncle Guan made a dashing entrance, waved a hand, and dealt with the Nine-Tails and the impurities, just like that. Then he brought Naruto to experience a normal person's life. Gave him gifts. Showed him what it meant to actually be alive.

One: him as a small child. Every time he was bullied, the Third Hokage old fart would show up and sit with him. Keep him company.

But why had he been bullied from the start?

He wasn't a troublemaker. Not from the beginning.

He was obedient.

And the ones who bullied him? Never punished. Every day, full of energy, hurling insults without consequence.

Now, thinking back on all those times the Third Hokage sat with him, comforted him, spoke those gentle words...

Isn't that just PUA?

Shing!

A kunai flew. A flash of Flying Thunder God.

Naruto appeared in front of Sarutobi Hiruzen. He crouched on a classroom desk, raised his hand, and slapped the old fart clean across the face.

SMACK!

"You see." Naruto's voice was perfectly calm, his reasoning clean and deliberate. "If someone sticks their face out, one hand can clap just fine."

"Fourth Hokage. Third Hokage. Whatever."

"Nine-Tailed Demon Fox?"

"The Night of Disaster?"

"Those are the village's problems. Not mine."

"I'm not your living ancestor. I don't see anyone offering me tribute. So why am I supposed to carry the Nine-Tails' hatred on one side and get screamed at and beaten on the other? Do I owe you people something?"

The words came in a torrent, emotion breaking through every sentence.

Sharper, even, than the Flying Thunder God.

Sarutobi Hiruzen felt as if he'd been struck by lightning. His head buzzed. He murmured, "Naruto, the prejudice in the villagers' hearts is a great mountain. But the village is one whole. Where the leaves of Konoha dance..."

Here it comes.

He was piling on values now. Pulling out the Will of Fire rhetoric. Gearing up for another round of moral hostage-taking.

Naruto didn't want to hear a word of it.

He cut him off. "Shinobi are born as combat tools. That is a wrong way to exist. The scenery along the shinobi path is too cruel, too insane."

"In this life, I am going to cast off the identity of a shinobi. Attain freedom. Live under the sunlight."

"And you, Third Hokage."

"You could clearly live under the sunlight. Instead, you willingly degrade yourself into a tool, and keep manufacturing more."

"I'm very disappointed in you."

The words landed.

"Naruto, how dare you speak to the Hokage like that?"

"You ill-bred thing!"

"Despicable!"

Contemptuous jeers, erupting from every corner.

Shing!

Naruto flashed with Flying Thunder God, drove his kunai through their filthy mouths and guts.

A floor full of wailing.

He left, trailing intestines behind him.

"..."

Sarutobi Hiruzen watched the whole thing.

Regret filled him.

If he had died in the Second Great Ninja War, he, Sarutobi Hiruzen, would have been a hero of Konoha. If he had died on the night of the Nine-Tails' rampage, he would have been a venerable elder of high esteem.

But he just had to live until now.

No grand conspiracy. No tragic fate.

The current him was purely, simply a senile old fool who wanted to manage everything, succeeded at nothing, and gave everyone around him high blood pressure.

"What beautiful Flying Thunder God. What beautiful Body Flicker."

"If the Fourth... if Kushina could see this... they'd probably feel gratified, wouldn't they?"

Sarutobi Hiruzen murmured to himself.

Naruto had grown.

That was all he had ever wanted to see.

So why did he feel so uneasy right now? So jittery, his heart pounding with dread?

"A jinchuriki must not act recklessly — must not stray down the wrong path!"

Sarutobi Hiruzen was being foolish again, already itching to interfere.

...

Naruto had changed. Dramatically.

The little bastards at the Ninja Academy, who spent every day with him, felt it most.

First: the face.

Sasuke, the juvenile poser, the Uchiha normal-person plus pressure-enduring king, Second Pillar, Sakura's dream, universally acknowledged as handsome from childhood onward.

But Naruto had removed his whisker marks. Tossed out the filthy, shit-yellow high-collared tracksuit. Ditched the goggles. Swapped it all for a clean tied-back hairstyle, like something straight out of Rurouni Kenshin, then put on a Marvel-brand T-shirt, cropped pants, and a full set of tech accessories.

Sasuke fell far short.

"N-n-nani?!"

At first glance, it nearly jolted Sakura's inner second personality awake. "This is Naruto?"

She couldn't believe it.

"Hmph!"

Black hair, deep attachment to his brother, a dojutsu, a branch of the Otsutsuki bloodline, Sasuke's whole configuration was identical to Hinata's. He let out a soft snort.

The meaning was roughly: Heh. Naruto. You've caught my attention again.

The two of them had been watching each other since they were kids.

So Sasuke could tell. Today's Naruto was different, striking in a way that was hard to ignore, as if every old ailment had been swept clean, everything renewed.

"..."

At the same time, Naruto was looking at Sasuke.

He remembered what Uncle Guan had said. One of the rare near-equivalent normal people in the Land of Fire.

That was very high praise.

The two stood in the classroom, eyes locked. The air between them crackled, like lightning meeting lightning.

"Meet me in the arena!"

Sasuke stood up, hands shoved in his pockets, voice cold. "I can sense it, you've gotten stronger, Naruto."

"But you will never defeat me."

"The visions we carry, the caliber of our resolve — they are completely different."

"Dead last."

The girls started cheering before the words were even finished.

Shing!

Chakra greased the soles of his feet. A streak of golden light. Naruto threw one simple Body Flicker straight punch.

Sasuke was beaten to tears.

And as he cried, his eyes turned red. Both of them redder than a rabbit's, pupils blown wide, something like an extra tadpole swimming in each one.

"Is this... an eye disease?"

Having beaten a normal person into developing some kind of condition, Naruto felt a bit bad about it. He didn't have reading glasses or prescription lenses on him, so he could only pull out the telescope he'd gotten from the farm and hand it over.

➤ Next: Naruto: I’ve Got Someone Backing Me Up