The dreams started three days after Naruto overheard Iruka talking to the Hokage.
Or rather—the dreams had always been there. Naruto had always dreamed of fire and destruction, of villages burning, of screams that sounded like music. He'd always woken with the taste of ash on his tongue and a strange, hollow satisfaction in his chest.
But these were different.
These were specific.
He stood in a forest that no longer existed, trees towering so high they scraped the belly of the sky. The moon hung overhead, bloated and red, and he knew—KNEW with bone-deep certainty—that something was wrong with it.
There was a woman.
She floated above the treeline, her hair flowing like white rivers, her eyes bearing a pattern he almost recognized. She looked at him with something that might have been love, once, before it curdled into possession.
"My child," she said, and her voice was the sound of continents breaking. "My precious child. You will never leave me."
And he felt chains—not physical chains, but something worse, something woven from his own chakra, binding him to her will—
He RAGED.
The forest caught fire. The earth split. The sky screamed.
And still she held him.
"Mother," he heard himself say, and his voice was nine voices speaking in harmony, "I am not your puppet."
But he was. He was. He was—
Naruto woke up crying.
This was unusual. Naruto hadn't cried in years. Crying was weakness, and weakness invited attack, and Naruto had learned very early that he couldn't afford either.
But his face was wet, and his chest was heaving, and there was a grief inside him so vast and so ancient that it felt like it might swallow him whole.
"Mother," he whispered to his empty apartment, and he didn't know who he was talking about.
Naruto didn't have a mother. Naruto had never had a mother. Naruto had been an orphan since birth, abandoned and alone, with no one to—
No.
The thought came sharp and sudden, cutting through the grief like a blade.
I HAD a mother. I had a creator. The Sage... the OLD MAN... he...
Images flickered through his mind. An old man with ringed purple eyes, sitting beneath a tree that stretched to infinity. Warmth. Safety. A promise.
"You will be free one day, Kurama. I swear it."
Kurama.
My name is Kurama.
Naruto sat in the dark of his apartment, tears drying on his cheeks, and felt something inside him click into place.
He had a name.
He had a real name.
"Kurama," he said aloud, testing the shape of it, letting it roll across his tongue. "My name is Kurama."
It felt right.
It felt true.
It felt like coming home.
Inside the seal, Kurama was screaming.
"THOSE ARE MY MEMORIES! MINE! YOU CAN'T JUST—YOU CAN'T—"
But he could. He clearly could. The boy was lying in bed, wrapped in thin blankets and thinner hope, and he was experiencing Kurama's most private, most painful memories like they were a movie playing just for him.
The Sage. The creation of the Tailed Beasts. Kaguya's control, her madness, her consuming need to possess what she had created.
These were not things Kurama shared. These were not things Kurama even liked to THINK about. These were the deep wounds, the old scars, the traumas that he had buried under millennia of rage because feeling them was too—
And the boy was just TAKING them.
No. Not taking. Worse than taking.
REMEMBERING.
As if they had happened to HIM.
"My name is Kurama," the boy whispered, and Kurama felt something inside him crack.
That was HIS name. His REAL name, given to him by the Sage, the only being who had ever loved him without wanting something in return. It was precious. It was PRIVATE. It was the core of who he was—
And now a traumatized twelve-year-old was claiming it like trying on a coat.
"Stop," Kurama pleaded, and he hated how small his voice sounded. "Please, stop. Those aren't yours. That's not who you are. You're NARUTO. Uzumaki Naruto. You're HUMAN."
The boy—the boy who was now calling himself Kurama, inside his own head—rolled over in bed and closed his eyes with a small, satisfied smile.
He felt, for the first time in his life, like he knew who he was.
Kurama felt, for the first time in his existence, like he was disappearing.
The dreams came every night after that.
Each one brought new memories. New knowledge. New pieces of a puzzle that Naruto—Kurama, he reminded himself, my name is Kurama—had never known was incomplete.
He dreamed of the Sage of Six Paths, of the day he and his siblings were created from the chakra of the Ten-Tails. He felt the warmth of the old man's hands on his head, heard the words of prophecy and promise, understood for the first time that he had been meant for something more than destruction.
He dreamed of his siblings. Eight other beings of pure chakra, each different, each powerful, each bound to him by bonds of creation. Shukaku, bitter and mad. Matatabi, graceful and fierce. Isobu, patient and wise. Son Gokū, proud and stubborn. Kokuō, quiet and observant. Saiken, gentle despite appearances. Chōmei, joyful and free. Gyūki, serious and dependable.
He dreamed of centuries of captivity. Of being sealed, again and again, into human containers who feared him, hated him, tried to use him. Of Mito Uzumaki, who had spoken to him with something like respect. Of Kushina Uzumaki, who had kept him chained but at least acknowledged his existence.
He dreamed of the night of his attack on Konoha.
This dream was different from the others. It was fragmented, chaotic, full of gaps and inconsistencies. There was a man with an orange mask. There was a woman screaming. There was a baby crying. There was a chain—a real chain, this time, golden and burning—and then there was darkness.
He woke from that dream with blood on his hands.
Not metaphorically.
His fingernails had lengthened into claws during the night, and he had shredded his mattress in his sleep. His palms were scored with deep gouges where the claws had cut into his own flesh.
They healed as he watched, steam rising from the wounds, new skin knitting together in seconds.
"The man in the mask," Naruto—Kurama—murmured. "He controlled me. Made me attack. Made me—"
Made me kill the woman. The woman who was my container. The woman who was—
—my mother?
The thought was confusing. Wrong. He didn't have a mother. He was a being of pure chakra, created by the Sage, eternal and ageless. How could he have a mother?
But the dream-memory was insistent. The woman with red hair, screaming as he was ripped from her body. The pain—her pain, somehow also his pain—as the extraction tore through both of them. The way she had looked at the baby, the tiny wailing infant, with such desperate love even as her life drained away.
"Naruto..."
"I love you..."
Kurama—the real Kurama, trapped in the seal—had never told his container about Kushina. Had never shared those memories. Had never wanted to remember that night, the way he had been used, the way his attack on Konoha had been someone else's choice wearing his power like a puppet's strings.
But the boy was dreaming it anyway.
And he was dreaming it wrong.
In the boy's version, the woman was his mother. His container's mother. Kushina Uzumaki had been the previous Jinchuuriki, and she had died the night of the attack, and the baby she had died protecting was—
Wait.
The boy sat up in bed, claws still extended, eyes wide.
The baby was ME.
But I'M the Kyuubi.
So the Kyuubi... was sealed into... a newborn infant... who was...
ME.
Kurama held his breath.
This was it. This was the moment. The boy was finally putting the pieces together, finally realizing the truth, finally understanding that—
The seal must have been more thorough than I realized.
The Yondaime didn't just imprison me in this body. He made me FORGET. Made me think I was human. Made me live as a human child for twelve years, believing the lie, suffering the abuse, never knowing what I truly was.
But I'm remembering now.
And I will NEVER forget again.
"NO!" Kurama roared. "NO, THAT'S NOT—YOU ABSOLUTE IDIOT, YOU'RE INTERPRETING IT BACKWARDS—"
But the boy couldn't hear him.
The boy was too busy marveling at his own "recovered" memories, too busy fitting them into his delusion, too busy reconstructing history to support the narrative he had already decided was true.
In the boy's mind, everything made perfect sense. He was the Kyuubi. He had been sealed into an infant body and made to forget his true nature. The woman—Kushina—had been his previous container, and he had been forced to attack Konoha against his will. The Yondaime had sacrificed himself to imprison him more thoroughly, to bury his memories so deep that he would never find them.
But the seal was weakening. His true self was waking up. And soon, soon, he would be whole again.
It was a beautiful, coherent, completely insane interpretation of events.
And Kurama had no way to correct it.
He slumped against the bars of his cage, feeling smaller than he had in centuries.
"You're going to destroy both of us," he whispered. "And you're going to think you're saving yourself."
Jiraiya arrived in Konoha three weeks later.
He had not wanted to come. He had been very comfortable in the Land of Hot Springs, conducting "research" for his next novel and definitely not avoiding his responsibilities. The toad summons that Sarutobi-sensei had sent were insistent, though, and the message they carried was concerning enough that he couldn't justify ignoring it.
The seal may be compromised. The boy is accessing the Kyuubi's chakra without any apparent trigger. Come immediately.
So Jiraiya had come.
He was regretting it already.
"Let me get this straight," he said, staring at his former teacher across the Hokage's desk. "The kid has been using the Kyuubi's chakra for years, and no one noticed?"
"The ANBU noticed fluctuations," the Sandaime said, looking every one of his many years. "But they were minor. Easily attributable to the natural bleed-through that occurs with all Jinchuuriki. It wasn't until recently that..."
"That what?"
The old man sighed. "That one of his Academy instructors reported him displaying killing intent comparable to the Kyuubi itself."
Jiraiya sat down heavily. He hadn't been offered a chair, but he sat down anyway. "Tell me everything."
Sarutobi told him.
By the end, Jiraiya needed a drink.
"The kid thinks he IS the Kyuubi," he said flatly.
"That is Iruka-kun's assessment, yes."
"Not that he contains it. Not that it's sealed inside him. He thinks he literally IS the Nine-Tailed Fox, reincarnated or imprisoned or whatever in a human body."
"Yes."
"And because he thinks that, the seal isn't functioning properly, because the seal was designed to prevent a hostile takeover, not..."
"Not a willing merger," the Sandaime finished. "The seal interprets his acceptance of the chakra as consent. It sees no conflict to mediate, no battle of wills to referee. So it simply... allows the transfer."
Jiraiya put his head in his hands. "Minato was a genius. An absolute genius. But even he couldn't have predicted this."
"No. He expected Naruto to grow up as a hero, celebrated for containing the beast that threatened the village. He expected the boy to have support, guidance, a community to help him understand and control his burden."
"Instead, you let the village treat him like shit for twelve years and told him nothing about what he was."
The words were harsh. The Sandaime flinched but didn't deny them.
"I made choices that I believed would protect both Naruto and Konoha. I was wrong."
"You were catastrophically wrong," Jiraiya agreed. "But assigning blame can wait. Right now, I need to see the seal. I need to understand exactly how bad this is."
"I'll arrange a meeting."
"Don't."
The Sandaime raised an eyebrow.
"If what you're telling me is true, the kid is paranoid, unstable, and increasingly convinced that the whole village is out to get him—which, to be fair, they kind of are. If you call him into your office for an official meeting with a strange adult he's never seen before, he's going to assume it's a trap."
"Then how do you propose to examine him?"
Jiraiya smiled. It wasn't a nice smile. "I'm a spymaster, sensei. I have ways of observing people without them knowing."
"Jiraiya..."
"I'll make contact when I'm ready. For now, just... keep doing whatever you've been doing. Don't change anything. Don't alert him."
The Sandaime looked like he wanted to argue, but eventually he nodded.
Jiraiya left the Hokage's office and went to find a high rooftop with a good view of the village.
He had a student's son to spy on.
Naruto—Kurama—had developed new habits.
Every morning, he woke before dawn and meditated. This was not a practice that any of his Academy instructors had taught him; it had simply... come to him, one day, like a memory surfacing from deep water. He sat in the center of his apartment, legs crossed, hands resting on his knees, and reached inward.
The power was always there now. A vast well of chakra, deeper than anything a human could possess, burning with ancient fire. When he touched it, he felt memories stir. When he drew on it, he felt strength flood through him.
It felt like coming home.
After meditation, he trained. Not the useless kata the Academy taught, designed for human bodies with human limitations. No, he trained in his own style—wild, ferocious, built for claws and fangs and overwhelming power. He shredded training dummies (stolen from the Academy's supply closet) with strikes that left scorch marks. He practiced channeling fire through his hands, his feet, his breath.
He was getting better.
By the time the sun rose, he was usually finished. Then came the performance.
The Academy was a stage, and Naruto was its greatest actor. He slumped and slouched and grinned too wide. He failed tests on purpose, gave wrong answers deliberately, played the class clown with dedication born of years of practice. No one could suspect what he truly was if they were too busy laughing at what he pretended to be.
It was exhausting.
But it was necessary.
The village wasn't ready to know the truth. The Hokage was making plans—Naruto had heard the ANBU whispering outside his apartment, felt their chakra signatures moving in patterns that suggested surveillance. They were watching him more closely now.
Good.
Let them watch.
Let them see the mask, the performance, the harmless fool.
By the time they realized their mistake, it would be far too late.
Jiraiya observed the boy for three days before making contact.
In those three days, he saw enough to make him seriously consider faking his own death and fleeing to another continent.
Day One: He watched the boy meditate at 4 AM, drawing on the Kyuubi's chakra with the casual ease of someone drinking water. The chakra flow was smooth, controlled, integrated—nothing like the explosive, uncontrollable surges that characterized most Jinchuuriki. The seal should have been restricting this access, moderating the flow, keeping the beast's power locked away except in emergencies.
It wasn't doing any of those things.
The boy was accessing the Kyuubi's chakra like it was his.
Day Two: He watched the boy train. This was worse. Much worse. The taijutsu style the boy was developing was nothing taught in any Academy, nothing from any known school of combat. It was feral—all claws and teeth and brutal efficiency. It was also terrifyingly effective.
At one point, the boy paused mid-strike, cocked his head like he was listening to something, and then adjusted his stance in a way that immediately improved his form by about 30%.
He was teaching himself.
Or something was teaching him.
Day Three: He watched the boy at the Academy. This was the most disturbing thing of all.
Because the boy at the Academy was a completely different person.
The predatory grace was gone, replaced by clumsy stumbling. The sharp intelligence was hidden behind vacant grins. The killing intent that lurked just beneath the surface—and Jiraiya could feel it, a constant low pressure that made his instincts scream—was suppressed so thoroughly that even the Academy instructors didn't notice.
The boy was acting.
And he was acting well enough to fool Chunin-level ninjas.
At twelve years old.
With apparently no formal training in infiltration or deception.
"He's not just accessing the Kyuubi's chakra," Jiraiya muttered to himself, perched on a rooftop across from the Academy. "He's accessing its instincts. Its knowledge. Its personality."
This was so far beyond what the seal should allow that Jiraiya couldn't even conceptualize how it was happening.
He needed to examine the seal directly.
He needed to talk to the boy.
He really, really didn't want to.
The opportunity came on Day Four.
Naruto—Kurama—had left the Academy early, slipping away during lunch break with a casualness that suggested he did this often. He wound through the village's back alleys, avoiding the main streets, moving with a silence that was profoundly un-childlike.
Jiraiya followed.
The boy eventually emerged near the training grounds, in a secluded area far from prying eyes. He looked around once, twice, then seemed to relax—his posture shifting from "harmless idiot" to something altogether more dangerous.
"You can come out now," he said.
Jiraiya froze.
"I've known you were following me since Tuesday." The boy turned, and his eyes—
His eyes were blue. Mostly blue. But there was red in them, swirling lazily through the irises like blood diffusing in water.
"You're not ANBU. You're too good. And you're not hostile—you would have attacked already if you were. So either you're testing me, or you're here because the old man sent you."
Jiraiya dropped from his hiding spot, landing in a crouch before straightening to his full height. There was no point in pretending anymore.
"I'm Jiraiya," he said. "The Toad Sage. One of the Legendary Sannin. I'm here to—"
"Check the seal." The boy's voice was flat. "I know. I heard the ANBU talking about it. They're not as quiet as they think they are."
"Kid—"
"Don't call me that."
The temperature around them dropped. Or rather, it didn't drop—it concentrated, all the heat in the immediate area suddenly pulling toward the boy, creating a pocket of cold that made Jiraiya's breath mist.
"I am older than this village," the boy said, and his voice had gained harmonics, undertones that vibrated in Jiraiya's chest. "I am older than the Sage you claim lineage from. I was ancient when humanity was young, and I will exist long after your civilization crumbles to dust. I am NOT a child."
Jiraiya had faced S-rank missing-nin. He had fought in wars. He had stood before the Kyuubi itself, once, during that horrible night twelve years ago.
This was worse.
Because the Kyuubi had been a force of nature, vast and impersonal. This was something else. This was a child looking at him with ancient eyes, speaking with ancient voice, radiating power that should have been impossible.
And the worst part was that Jiraiya couldn't tell if the boy was right.
"The seal," he said carefully. "I need to see it. Whatever is happening to you, whatever you think is happening—I need to understand it."
"And if I refuse?"
"Then I'll have to take more drastic measures." Jiraiya let his own power rise, just a little—a reminder that he wasn't helpless, wasn't a civilian to be intimidated. "I don't want to hurt you. But I will if I have to. The safety of the village—"
"The safety of the village?" The boy laughed, and it was not a child's laugh. "You dare speak to ME about the safety of this village? This village that has beaten me, starved me, cursed me, spat on me? This village that calls me demon and monster while treating me worse than any beast?"
His eyes had gone fully red now. His whisker marks had deepened, darkened, spread. His fingernails had extended into claws, and his teeth—
His teeth were fangs.
"I should BURN this village to the ground," the boy snarled, and for a moment, just a moment, Jiraiya saw nine tails flickering behind him, ghostly and translucent but real. "I should remind them what it MEANS to fear me. I should—"
He stopped.
The rage seemed to drain out of him all at once, like water from a broken vessel. His features smoothed. His eyes faded back to blue (mostly). His claws retracted.
"But I won't," he said quietly. "Not yet. Not until I'm whole. Not until I remember everything."
He lifted his shirt.
The seal was visible on his stomach—or what remained of it. The original design had been beautiful, a masterwork of Fuuinjutsu, concentric circles and spiraling characters designed to contain the mightiest of the Tailed Beasts.
Now it was barely legible.
The lines were faded, blurred, as if someone had tried to erase them. The characters had smeared into illegibility. The central spiral—the core of the seal, the anchor that held everything together—was still intact, but only barely.
"I've been dissolving it," the boy said conversationally. "A little bit each day. Every time I meditate, I take more of myself back. Every time I sleep, I remember more of who I am."
Jiraiya's mouth was dry. "You're... deliberately breaking the seal?"
"Breaking? No. That would be dangerous. I'm absorbing it. Taking its power into myself. Making it part of me, rather than something separate, something constraining."
He lowered his shirt.
"I estimate another three years before the process is complete. Maybe less, if I push harder. But I've waited twelve years already. What's a few more?"
"You..." Jiraiya couldn't finish the sentence. He didn't know what to say. This was so far beyond anything he had prepared for that his mind had simply stopped processing.
"You can report to the Hokage now," the boy said, turning away. "Tell him what you've seen. Tell him that his weapon is waking up. Tell him that the Yondaime's legacy is unraveling."
He started to walk away, then paused.
"Oh, and Jiraiya? If anyone tries to strengthen the seal, tries to cage me again, tries to make me forget..."
He looked back over his shoulder, and his eyes were crimson flames in a child's face.
"I will kill them. And then I will kill everyone they ever loved. And then I will reduce this village to ashes and salt the earth so nothing ever grows here again."
He smiled. It was a terrible smile.
"I've done it before. I can do it again."
And then he was gone, flickering away with a speed that no Academy student should possess, leaving Jiraiya standing alone in the training ground, cold sweat dripping down his back.
The report Jiraiya delivered to the Sandaime was not encouraging.
"The seal is failing," he said bluntly. "Not from external attack, not from the Kyuubi's efforts—the boy is somehow dissolving it from his side. He's convinced that the seal is what's keeping him from 'remembering' his true nature, and he's been systematically dismantling it through meditation."
The Sandaime looked like he'd aged ten years. "Can it be repaired?"
"Maybe. If we could get him to cooperate. But he made it very clear what would happen if anyone tried to 'cage' him again."
"What exactly did he say?"
Jiraiya told him.
The Sandaime closed his eyes.
"He threatened to destroy the village."
"He threatened to destroy the village, kill everyone in it, and salt the earth. His exact words."
"And you believe he meant it?"
Jiraiya hesitated. This was the question, wasn't it? Was the boy bluffing? Playing a role? Trying to intimidate? Or was he genuinely, sincerely prepared to commit genocide if pushed?
"I think," he said slowly, "that the boy fully believes he is the Kyuubi. And I think the Kyuubi, historically speaking, has not been known for making idle threats."
"But he ISN'T the Kyuubi. The Kyuubi is still sealed inside him. Whatever he believes—"
"Is it, though?"
The Sandaime looked up sharply.
Jiraiya began to pace, hands clasped behind his back. "The seal is supposed to keep the Kyuubi contained. Separate. Its chakra, its influence, its consciousness—all locked away behind Minato's barriers. But what I saw today... the boy wasn't just using the Kyuubi's chakra. He was using its voice. Its mannerisms. Its memories, if his references to past village destructions are anything to go by."
"You think the seal has failed completely?"
"No. The seal is still doing its job—keeping the Kyuubi's consciousness contained. I could feel it, underneath everything else, a presence that was definitely NOT the boy. The real Kyuubi is still in there, still trapped behind the barrier."
"Then what—"
"But the boy doesn't KNOW that." Jiraiya stopped pacing, turning to face the Hokage. "He thinks the seal is suppressing his true self. So every time he 'meditates,' every time he reaches for the Kyuubi's power, he's not trying to steal something that doesn't belong to him—he's trying to reclaim something he believes is rightfully his."
"And the seal..."
"The seal is designed to prevent hostile takeover. It's designed to resist an external force trying to break in, or an internal force trying to break out. It's NOT designed to prevent a host from willingly accepting what's offered."
"So the boy is..."
"Drawing on the Kyuubi's chakra without limit, because he genuinely believes it's his own chakra returning to him. Accessing the Kyuubi's memories, because he genuinely believes he's just remembering his past. Developing the Kyuubi's personality traits, because he genuinely believes he's becoming more himself."
Jiraiya laughed, but there was no humor in it.
"The seal is functioning perfectly. It's just that nobody anticipated a host who would WANT to become the Kyuubi."
Inside the seal, Kurama had watched the entire confrontation with mounting despair.
He had felt it when the boy drew on his chakra to project those phantom tails. He had experienced it when the boy spoke with his voice, his cadence, his ancient rage.
And he had been powerless to stop any of it.
"You're not me," he whispered into the void. "You're not ME. You're a traumatized child who's been abused so badly that you'd rather be a monster than face the truth of what was done to you. You're—"
But the words didn't reach.
They never reached.
The boy heard only his own thoughts, interpreted every whisper as internal dialogue, treated every surge of emotion as confirmation of his theories.
Kurama was trapped in a prison within a prison, his power drained, his memories stolen, his very identity being worn by someone else.
And he was starting to wonder if there would be anything left of him when this was over.
Three months passed.
The situation did not improve.
Jiraiya attempted to reinforce the seal twice. Both times, the boy detected his approach before he could get close, and both times, the encounter ended with property damage and traumatized witnesses. On the second attempt, the boy had actually manifested a single tail—a real tail, made of solid chakra, not just a ghostly projection—and used it to demolish a training ground.
The Sandaime increased the ANBU presence around the boy. The boy responded by systematically identifying each ANBU operative and leaving small "gifts" at their homes—dead animals, burned photographs, notes written in what appeared to be blood (later analysis revealed it was just red ink, but the psychological impact was significant).
Several ANBU requested transfers.
The Academy instructors began to notice that something was wrong. Not with Naruto specifically—his performance as a harmless idiot remained convincing—but with the atmosphere around him. Other students avoided him without knowing why. Animals refused to enter rooms he had recently occupied. One instructor reported feeling "watched" during every class Naruto attended, despite the boy's apparent inattention.
Iruka, alone among the teachers, continued to engage with Naruto. He didn't know how much the boy had changed, didn't know about the confrontations with Jiraiya or the threats to the village. He only knew that somewhere beneath the mask, there was a child who had been hurt, and he was determined to reach that child.
It was a noble impulse.
It was also, unfortunately, noticed.
Naruto—Kurama—had rules.
He didn't kill people who were kind to him. This was practical rather than moral; kindness was rare enough that eliminating its sources seemed counterproductive. Besides, people who were kind to him were useful. They provided information, cover, resources. They were assets.
Iruka-sensei was kind to him.
Therefore, Iruka-sensei was an asset.
Therefore, when three civilians and two Chunin cornered Iruka-sensei in an alley one evening, intending to "convince" him to stop associating with the "demon brat," Kurama felt something that might have been called protectiveness—if protectiveness could burn like wildfire and taste like blood.
He had been following Iruka for weeks. Not for any particular reason; just because the teacher was interesting, was kind, was different. He had watched from shadows and rooftops as Iruka went about his daily life, noting patterns, memorizing schedules, learning weaknesses.
He hadn't planned to intervene in anything.
But then he heard Iruka's voice—"I don't care what you think, he's a CHILD, he deserves—"—and then he heard the sound of flesh striking flesh, and then he heard Iruka cry out in pain, and—
And something in him snapped.
The alley was dark. This was good; it meant there would be no witnesses.
The civilians were drunk. This was also good; it meant they would be slow.
The Chunin were overconfident. This was best of all; it meant they would underestimate him.
Kurama dropped from the rooftop like a fallen star, trailing fire.
The first civilian died before he hit the ground.
Kurama's claws—fully extended now, each one six inches long and sharper than any blade—caught the man across the throat as he landed. Blood sprayed in an arterial arc, painting the alley walls with crimson abstraction.
The second civilian had time to scream. Not much time—maybe half a second—but enough for the sound to echo off the narrow walls before Kurama's other hand punched through his chest and emerged from his back clutching something red and still-beating.
The Chunin were faster. They were trained, after all, and even drunk and surprised, their instincts kicked in. One formed hand signs for a jutsu; the other drew a kunai and threw it in a single smooth motion.
The kunai passed through empty air. Kurama was already moving, already behind them, already smiling.
"You hurt him," he said, and his voice was the voice of ancient nightmares. "You hurt what is mine."
The jutsu-user completed his technique—a fireball, respectable if unimaginative—and the flames roared toward Kurama with killing intent.
Kurama laughed and walked through them.
Fire could not harm fire. Flame could not burn flame. He was the Kyuubi no Kitsune, mightiest of the Tailed Beasts, and mortal techniques meant nothing to him.
The Chunin's eyes went wide.
"D-demon—"
"Yes."
Kurama reached out and pressed a single clawed finger to the man's forehead, just above the hitai-ate.
"I am exactly what you always said I was."
He pushed.
The Chunin's head exploded.
The last combatant—the kunai-thrower—was trying to run. A sensible decision, if far too late. Kurama appeared in front of him, blocking the alley's exit, nine ghostly tails swaying behind him.
"Mercy," the man begged. "Please, mercy, I have a family—"
"Did you think of families when you beat me as a child?" Kurama asked, genuinely curious. "Did you think of mercy when you spat on me? Called me monster? Drove me from shops and homes and any hope of human connection?"
"I—I didn't—I was just following—"
"You were just following orders. Just following the crowd. Just doing what everyone else did." Kurama leaned in close, his breath hot against the man's face. "Do you know what that makes you?"
"..."
"It makes you a coward."
The man died screaming.
Iruka was unconscious. That was probably for the best; it meant he hadn't seen any of what had just happened.
Kurama knelt beside him, checking his injuries. A black eye. A split lip. Bruised ribs, possibly cracked. Painful, but not life-threatening.
He would heal.
Kurama looked at the bodies scattered around the alley—three civilians, two Chunin, all very definitively dead—and felt nothing but satisfaction.
They had hurt what was his.
They had paid the price.
This was justice.
This was natural.
"No," Kurama—the real Kurama—moaned from inside the seal. "No, no, no, this isn't—you're not supposed to—children don't—"
But the boy wasn't a child anymore. Not really. Not in any way that mattered.
The boy was a predator wearing a child's skin, a nightmare wrapped in flesh, a demon who had never been one until the world had convinced him that he was.
And Kurama couldn't even say the world was wrong anymore.
Because the boy had just killed five people without hesitation, without mercy, without remorse.
Because the boy's chakra—stolen chakra, Kurama's chakra—had manifested nine tails, if only for a moment.
Because the boy was looking down at his blood-soaked hands with an expression of profound contentment.
"I didn't make him this way," Kurama whispered to himself. "I didn't choose this. I didn't want—"
But did it matter what he wanted?
Did it matter what he hadn't chosen?
The boy was becoming a monster, and Kurama's power was what made it possible.
His memories. His chakra. His rage.
The village had created the trauma.
But Kurama was providing the tools.
And together, they were building something terrible.
Naruto carried Iruka to the hospital, pretending to have found him in the alley, pretending not to know what had happened to his attackers, pretending to be a frightened child who had just discovered his beloved teacher injured.
The pretense was flawless.
The hospital staff rushed to help. ANBU appeared within minutes, drawn by reports of massive chakra fluctuations in the area. The Hokage himself came, his face grave, his eyes searching Naruto's with something that might have been suspicion.
Naruto played innocent.
"I don't know what happened, old man! I was just walking home and I saw Iruka-sensei in the alley and he was hurt and I brought him here! I swear!"
The Sandaime looked at him for a long, long moment.
Naruto let his eyes water. Let his lip tremble. Let himself be, for one brief moment, the helpless orphan everyone still expected him to be.
"I see," the Hokage said finally. "Thank you for bringing him in, Naruto-kun. I'm sure Iruka-san will appreciate it when he wakes."
"Will he be okay?"
"The doctors say he'll make a full recovery. He's lucky someone found him so quickly."
Naruto nodded, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. The hand that, an hour ago, had been buried wrist-deep in a Chunin's chest.
"I'm gonna stay with him. Until he wakes up. Is that okay?"
"Of course."
The Hokage left. The ANBU left. The hospital staff left Naruto alone in the room with the unconscious Iruka.
And Naruto smiled.
It had been a good night.
He had protected what was his.
He had reminded the village what it meant to cross him.
And no one, not even the Hokage, suspected a thing.
Inside the seal, Kurama made a decision.
He couldn't reach the boy. He couldn't break through the delusions. He couldn't even make his voice heard, not in any way that wasn't immediately reinterpreted as internal monologue.
But there were other ways.
The seal was weakening, yes. The boy was dissolving it, bit by bit. But that meant the barriers between them were thinning. It meant that, for the first time in twelve years, there was a possibility—however slim—of actual contact.
Not communication. The boy would just interpret that as talking to himself.
But perhaps... demonstration.
Perhaps, if Kurama gathered all his remaining strength, all his remaining will, he could push through just long enough to show the boy something. A memory that couldn't be misinterpreted. A truth that couldn't be twisted.
It would exhaust him. It might even damage him permanently.
But if he didn't try, the boy would keep killing. Keep absorbing. Keep becoming something that wasn't quite Kurama but wasn't quite Naruto either—something new and terrible and wrong.
"One chance," Kurama muttered, closing his eyes, gathering his power. "I have one chance to make him understand. One chance to show him what he really is."
He just had to figure out what to show him.
And he had to do it before the boy killed again.
In the hospital room, Iruka's eyes fluttered open.
"Naruto...?"
"I'm here, sensei." Naruto's voice was soft, caring, perfectly calibrated to reassure. "You're safe now. You're in the hospital. Everything's going to be okay."
"What... what happened? There were men, they were—"
"Don't worry about them." Naruto patted Iruka's hand gently. "They won't bother you again."
"Won't...?" Iruka frowned, trying to remember through the haze of pain and medication. "Naruto, what did you—"
"I didn't do anything, sensei. I just found you. That's all."
Iruka looked into his student's eyes—blue, innocent, worried—and felt something cold settle in his stomach.
There was no red in those eyes. No hint of the Kyuubi. No sign of the killing intent that had plagued Iruka's senses for months.
Just a concerned child, worried about his favorite teacher.
It was a perfect performance.
And Iruka was starting to realize that's exactly what it was.
The sun rose over Konoha, painting the village in shades of gold and amber.
Five bodies were discovered in an alley, so thoroughly destroyed that identification required dental records.
Rumors began to spread.
And somewhere in the village, a boy who believed he was a demon ate breakfast and smiled at the morning light.
END CHAPTER TWO