Hidetada scratched his cheek with his finger faux nervously before replying, "Uh.. I sort of forgot about it?"
A deadpan look appeared on Mito's face at his answer before she sighed exasperatedly. Still, she did not have it in her heart to scold him for interacting and finding new friends, especially when he hadn't been able to for his whole life. The study felt cozy in the quiet evening, with the soft scent of aged paper and the gentle, rhythmic flickering of candle flames casting long shadows across the rows of ancient scrolls.
"I see, you look tired anyways, we will continue our lessons tomorrow instead." With a sheepish nod, Hidetada stood up and replied, "Don't worry about it grandmother, I'll easily be able to combine Mokuton and Fuinjutsu by tomorrow. So, goodnight?"
She wished him good night as he departed, staring at his back as he opened the door and stepped outside of the room, closing the door behind him with a final, solid clack.
Whistling down the hallway, Hidetada made his way towards his room. Today had been a pretty productive day, though he did not particularly yearn for friendships, it had still been very fun talking with Duy and interacting with Mikoto, he couldn't help but think as his eyes glinted. The moonlight poured through the tall empty spaces on the left of the corridor, painting silver rectangles on the dark wood of the floorboards.
His movements paused as he furrowed his brows. 'Where was Kushina?' The thought made him realize that he hadn't thought about her at all. Where the hell was Kushina actually? If he was not wrong, then she was supposed to arrive in Konoha around the Second Shinobi World War, but she still wasn't here. Has his presence affected the world in ways he had not expected? The butterfly effect came to his mind.
What exactly had caused the arrival of Kushina to the Village Hidden in the Leaf to be delayed? As far as he knew, Uzushiogakure was still standing strong and was not destroyed, so she couldn't possibly have been killed. Maybe it had something to do with Mito? That sort of made sense he supposed. According to the original timeline, she was supposed to be quite old by now, but that was not the case here, since she clearly looked like she was in her twenties instead of being a mumbling and rambling old grandmother. Hidetada had to suppress a laugh at that mental image.
To be honest, he had never really questioned why she looked so young. He had never really thought about it, and even if he did, he had chalked it up to the normal Uzumaki longevity. And most of all, why should he not be happy about Mito living a few more years? The pink Byakugou seal on the center of her forehead flashed through his mind. It allowed the user to store an immense amount of chakra throughout the years and use it at the time of need to heal the user's injuries almost instantly. His mind drifted off to wonder if the seal was inspired by Hashirama's and his own healing factors before he focused again.
Didn't Tsunade in the original series have something similar that allowed her to look young? Was it because of the Strength of a Hundred Seal or was it simply a Genjutsu? Hidetada again cursed himself for not writing down all his meta knowledge.
But that couldn't be the reason for Mito to look young. He had touched her all over and her skin still felt soft and supple below his fingertips. No, it could definitely not be a Genjutsu.
Realizing that he had been standing in one spot for a very long time and how suspicious it would look from an outsider's perspective, he hurried his footsteps towards his room.
The first thing that he needed to do was write down all his meta knowledge in English. Hidetada hadn't done that originally because the possibility of someone finding it and discovering his secret was too high.
'Though, if they somehow actually managed to find it and translate everything inside, they deserve to keep it at that point,' he thought with an amused smile as he took a turn towards the corridor.
Why was this place so god damned big? It was almost like a maze.
Shaking his head, he turned his focus back to the reason for Mito's young appearance. It could possibly be related to some sort of Fuinjutsu. Had she discovered something that made it possible to be young forever?As far as he knew, something like that was not possible, or just hadn't been discovered. The thought of Orochimaru rushed through his mind as he thought about longevity. That man would sacrifice everything to learn the secret behind his grandmother's look.
The sharp clack of his feet stopping drew him out of his thoughts. Hidetada had finally reached his room. Sliding the door out of the way, he stepped inside. The wide space greeted him as he slid the door back towards its original place.
Avoiding his unnecessarily large bed, he stepped around it to reach the drawer placed beside it. Bending low, he rummaged through its several rows before finding what he was looking for, a pen and an empty notebook. It was another weird thing that things such as pens and pencils existed here. The technological timeline of this place was in a mess.
Picking up both pieces of equipment, he moved towards his desk and pulled the chair back to sit down. Turning on the lamp that was resting on the mahogany desk, Hidetada pulled back the cap of the pen and set it aside before flipping the notebook open.
Leaving a gap of pages for indexes, he set his hand down to write. While the knowledge of English had deteriorated, he still remembered enough to write everything down properly. Actually, if the language was crooked, wouldn't it be harder for someone to decipher what exactly he was writing down? Shrugging, he wrote the number one at the bottom of the page in the black ink before moving towards the top.
'Where to begin?' Hidetada thought and resisted the urge to bite the pen in his hand. Would it be better to write everything down in chronological order or in the order of the episodes?
After a few seconds of contemplation, he decided to write from the event where it all began.
His handwriting was awful after years of not being used, yet he made do. The words Kaguya Otsutsuki landed on Earth spread themselves through the page in light-absorbing black ink. More and more pages were filled and flipped as his hand gained its memory of the language back. Hidetada wrote until his wrist and fingers hurt and went even beyond that.
After hours had passed, he finally paused and rubbed his eyes tiredly. Turning his gaze towards the grandfather clock, he realized that it was already one o'clock at midnight. With a yawn, Hidetada raised his arms above himself for a stretch before setting them back down on the table. It would be for the best if he stopped writing for now. There were still a lot more things to cover, but it wouldn't be good if he forgot something just because he was sleepy.
Closing the notebook with a sharp crack, he picked it up and put the cap on the pen back on. Sliding the chair back, Hidetada stood up and picked up the notebook and his writing equipment while shutting the lamp off. Moving towards his drawer, he set the book on top of it and placed his palm on it. With a precise application of his chakra, the Fuin for 'Ignore' and another for 'Detect' appeared on its surface with its loopy and jagged handwriting.
The Fuinjutsu was a simple one. It would simply cause the person's gaze to slide past the book if they looked at it while also alerting him just in case someone still managed to touch it. While Hidetada could have placed something that was more dangerous and life threatening on it, the only thing that it would succeed in would be making the searcher even more suspicious. He would have to put more seals on it in the morning, as these were simply not enough, but for now it would do.
Too tired to change out of his robes, Hidetada placed the notebook and the pen back in the drawer before falling onto the bed with his arms spread out.
He fell asleep the moment his head hit the soft material of the pillow.
...
Hidetada woke up groggily and rubbed his eyes with a mumble. Blinking a few times to clear his vision, he stared at the clock to realize that it was nine in the morning. Stepping off the bed with a grimace, he looked at the drawer where he had kept his book. His brown eyes darted to the clock again before focusing on the drawer. Mito wouldn't come to check up on him for at least another hour. That gave him just enough time to finish writing down everything that was left.
Opening the compartment of the drawer where he had kept his book and pen, he picked it up and brought it close to his eye to stare at it. Going by the looks of it, no one had touched the book while he had been asleep. Even the arrangement of the things had been exactly the same as he had left it last night.
Writing down the important plot points had reminded him of a very dangerous black man.
Was Black Zetsu even a man? Eh, probably not.
But the thought of a big black man chasing him was terrifying.
How many people had Zetsu even killed by directly and indirectly plotting for what, a thousand years? And Hidetada was probably a sexy slice of meat waiting to be chopped into pieces and taken out before he grew strong. That actually made him wonder why the black creature hadn't attempted anything against him yet?
While the barriers placed around the walls of Konoha might be able to detect the presence of any unwanted cretin, Black Zetsu was another thing entirely.
Only Hashirama had the feat of sensing him, and as a result, the only other person who could sense Zetsu was Hidetada Senju of course.
Sitting down on the chair with a smirk, he flipped open the book to the page he had left it on during the night. Ignoring the jokes, Black Zetsu accompanied by Madara was a serious issue that he could not ignore.
Hidetada tapped the back of the pen repeatedly on the page of the book as he thought deeply. Was the location of the cave Madara resided in ever disclosed in the original anime? He didn't think so, or maybe it was just another thing that he had forgotten about.
Even if he knew where exactly it was located, it wouldn't be the best idea to go after the infamous Ghost of the Uchiha.
Hidetada was stupid, not retarded.
It seemed that Madara would get a few more years to live before Hidetada killed him with his own two hands. 'Hmm, I'll have to burn his body to ash just in case.'
No more Deus ex Machina to save you anymore, you old geyser.
Killing Black Zetsu was another thing entirely, however. Could he even be killed? Hidetada did not think so. So he would need countermeasures upon countermeasures to seal that creature and make sure it never escaped.
Maybe launching him towards space would be effective?
Shaking his head at the thought, Hidetada uncapped the pen and started his work again. Almost half an hour passed before he was finally done with writing down all the major plot points of the Naruto series from where he had left it off last night. Everything from the landing of the Rabbit Goddess to her eventual re-sealing through the hands of Naruto and Sasuke was written down by him.
He had gone even past that and wrote down everything from the last Naruto movie, though he couldn't remember whether it was canon or not. There was nothing major that he remembered from the other movies, as he had never truly paid attention to them.
That only left the Boruto anime.
Hidetada had avoided that anime like a plague in his past life.
'If I had the opportunity to go back in time, I still wouldn't watch that fuck ass series.'
Perfectly reasonable in his opinion.
Though the thought of Boruto reminded him of something very, very important.
Launching Black Zetsu into space was probably not the best idea.
Hidetada yawned before blinking to clear the tears away. Setting his pen down, he started to crack his fingers one by one. While he did not exactly remember what the purpose of the Otsutsukis were, it was still probably not the best idea to hand them a creature created by one of their own.
The thoughts related to Boruto were spiking his cortisol.
It was best to pretend that it was just a fanfiction and move on.
Truly one of the wisest pieces of advice, it was.
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Word Count: 2277.