The night was quiet, save for the occasional rustle of leaves outside his window. Naruto sat cross-legged on the floor, a brush in hand, the scent of drying ink thick in the air. His latest work was spread out in front of him—an old memory, something from a life long past. A crocodile, large and ancient, basking in the murky waters of a river during the Clan Warring Era.
He had been that crocodile once.
Back then, the rivers ran red with blood, human corpses floating aimlessly as shinobi waged war on each other. He had lurked beneath the surface, patient and undisturbed, watching with cold reptilian eyes as bodies fell, their struggles ending in an instant. It hadn't mattered to him who they were or what their reasons had been. He was just another predator in a world that did not care.
But humans… humans were always so complicated. They never just killed for food. They killed for ideals, for grudges, for revenge. And sometimes, they killed for stupid reasons—like believing that crocodile skin would make for good shields.
That was how he had died in that life. Some wandering shinobi had mistaken his armored hide for something valuable, something that could stop kunai and arrows. They had hunted him, thrown jutsu at him, and eventually, one of them had managed to pin him down long enough to slit his throat.
It had been such a waste. Not even a week later, they had discarded his hide when they realized it wasn't as durable as they had hoped.
Naruto dipped his brush in ink, adding more depth to the scales in his painting. The eyes—he focused on the eyes, making them deep and old, the kind that had seen far too much and cared too little. He had lived so many lives, but humans… humans never changed.
They fought, they killed, they justified it all with words that meant nothing.
And now, here he was, a human again. A shinobi, no less.
The irony of it all didn't escape him.
He sat back, looking at his work with a critical eye. The crocodile was nearly complete, its thick body half-submerged in the inky water, ripples surrounding it like whispers of old battles. The brush strokes captured the stillness of a predator waiting, but also the weight of something ancient and tired.
He sighed, setting the brush aside.
It was late. He should sleep.
His body still remembered the habits of nocturnal creatures—owls, panthers, bats—lifetimes spent awake under the cover of darkness. But right now, in this life, he was human, and humans needed sleep. He wasn't going to let himself develop bad habits just because his soul had been restless for thousands of years.
Stretching, he stood up, wincing as his legs tingled from sitting too long. He cracked his neck, yawning as he moved to his bed. His mattress was thin, his pillow lumpy, but he had long since stopped caring about comfort. Compared to some of his past lives—being a rat, for example—this was luxury.
He lay down, staring at the ceiling. Tomorrow would be another day of pretending to be a normal human, a normal shinobi. Missions, training, teammates who didn't know who or what he truly was.
His eyelids grew heavy, and he let himself drift, the echoes of his past fading into the quiet hum of the present.
—ToT—
The mission was simple: capture Tora, the Fire Daimyo's wife's runaway cat.
Simple, right?
Wrong.
Team 7 stood in the Hokage's office, staring at the mission scroll in Kakashi's hand. Sakura groaned. Sasuke scowled. Naruto just blinked, glancing at the mission details like it was another pointless assignment.
"A D-rank mission?" Sasuke muttered, crossing his arms. "This is a waste of time."
Kakashi, as always, was unfazed. "You have to start somewhere. Consider it teamwork training."
Sakura perked up, brushing her hair back. "If we're working together, Sasuke-kun, then I'm fine with it!"
Naruto said nothing, just watching them with the same quiet expression he always wore. He had done nothing but D-ranks all week—picking up trash, walking dogs, pulling weeds. At least he didn't have to be a weasel again. Weasels were always blamed for stealing food, even if they didn't do it.
"Alright," Kakashi said, rolling the scroll shut. "Let's go find Tora."
Thirty minutes in, the mission had already gone downhill.
Sakura had scratches on her face. Sasuke was perched in a tree, glaring down at the bundle of leaves where Tora had just been a second ago. Kakashi was, as usual, reading his book. Naruto was standing in the middle of the training field, watching the chaos unfold with mild interest.
"That cat is a menace," Sakura growled, rubbing her cheek. "How does one animal cause so much trouble?"
"It's just a cat," Sasuke muttered, eyes scanning the area. "It can't hide forever."
"It's a ninja cat," Kakashi corrected absentmindedly, flipping a page. "It has more survival instincts than most Genin."
Sakura groaned, brushing her dirtied skirt. "Ugh, Naruto, help us already! You're just standing there!"
Naruto blinked at her. "You're chasing it wrong."
Sasuke scoffed. "Oh? And you know the right way?"
Naruto thought for a moment. "Yes."
Sakura huffed. "Then why haven't you caught it yet?"
Naruto tilted his head. "You didn't ask. Dattebane"
Silence.
Sasuke pinched the bridge of his nose. "Just—just go catch the cat, Naruto."
Naruto shrugged. "Okay."
Then he sat down.
Not in a combat stance, not in a ready position. Just cross-legged on the ground, hands resting on his knees. Sasuke and Sakura stared at him, and even Kakashi glanced up from his book.
"What are you doing?" Sakura demanded.
Naruto didn't answer. He just sat. He closed his eyes. Breathed in. Breathed out.
Then—
A rustling sound.
Sasuke turned, Sharingan flaring slightly. Sakura tensed. Kakashi's single visible eye widened just a fraction.
From the bushes, the small, furry head of a cat peeked out.
Tora.
The infamous demon feline of Konoha, the scratcher of a thousand Shinobi, the beast that had reduced seasoned Jounin to whimpering messes, the terror of D-rank missions—
It walked right up to Naruto.
Not cautiously. Not with suspicion. No hissing, no defensive stance.
Tora sniffed once, then sat in Naruto's lap.
Naruto's hand came up, scratched behind its ear, and the cat let out a pleased purr.
Sasuke's mouth opened slightly in disbelief. Sakura looked like she had just been hit by a Genjutsu. Kakashi lowered his book.
Naruto just kept petting the cat, running his fingers over its fur like it was the most natural thing in the world. Tora's eyes drooped, completely relaxed, tail flicking lazily.
Sakura's eye twitched. "HOW—?!"
"You're chasing it wrong," Naruto repeated simply, still stroking Tora's fur.
Sasuke's fingers twitched. "That's it? You just sit down and it comes to you?"
Naruto nodded. "It's a cat."
Sakura threw her hands up. "That doesn't explain anything!"
Naruto tilted his head slightly, expression blank. "If you chase something, it runs. If you don't chase it, it comes to you."
Sasuke looked personally offended by the logic. "That—That's ridiculous."
Naruto scratched under Tora's chin. "Okay."
Kakashi chuckled, putting his book away. "Well, mission accomplished. Good work, Naruto."
Naruto stood, cradling Tora in his arms, the cat still perfectly content. "Are we done?"
Kakashi nodded. "We're done."
Sakura dragged her hands down her face. "This isn't fair. That cat clawed me."
Sasuke scowled. "I refuse to believe that actually worked."
Naruto just blinked at them. "Maybe it likes me."
Tora nuzzled against his arm, purring loudly.
Kakashi hummed. "Or maybe you're secretly a cat whisperer."
Naruto thought about it. "I was a cat once. Dattebane."
Sakura squinted at him. "What?"
Naruto blinked. "Nothing."
The problem with D-rank missions was that they were all pointless busywork. Naruto figured the only reason they existed was to keep Genin too distracted to question why they weren't doing anything important. But even pointless tasks could be made tolerable with the right mindset.
Sasuke and Sakura didn't seem to share that sentiment.
"Are all our missions just going to be chores?" Sasuke muttered, standing stiffly with his arms crossed as an elderly farmer explained his missing herb situation.
"Well, we are new," Sakura said, trying to be reasonable. "They're not going to send us on anything big yet. Besides, how hard can it be to find some plants?"
The farmer was an old man with hunched shoulders, a wrinkled face, and a mouth that seemed permanently twisted in either irritation or exhaustion. "Ain't hard, just annoyin'. Kids these days don't know their weeds from their cabbages. Every time I send my grandson out, he comes back with garbage. If you lot can find the right herbs, I'll pay the village well for it."
Kakashi gave them all an eye-smile. "Well, you heard the man. Get to work."
Sakura sighed and rolled up her sleeves. Sasuke just walked toward the fields with his usual brooding expression. Naruto stood there, looking over the land, sniffing the air once before walking in the opposite direction.
"Where are you going?" Sakura called.
"To get the herbs."
"How do you even know where they are?"
Naruto pointed at his nose. "I can smell them."
The farmer squinted. "Boy, are you telling me you can sniff out plants?"
Naruto just nodded.
The old man grunted. "Well, I ain't gonna stop ya. If you find 'em first, you find 'em first."
Sasuke and Sakura took the logical approach—checking plant beds, carefully comparing the leaves to the pictures in their mission scroll. Naruto, on the other hand, crouched low, inhaled deeply, and just walked straight to a small patch near a fence. He plucked the right herbs with zero hesitation, placed them in a basket, and walked back to the old man before the other two even found one.
Sasuke and Sakura turned to see Naruto standing there, arms full of perfectly gathered herbs.
Sakura's eye twitched. "No way."
Naruto blinked at her. "What?"
"You just—you didn't even look!"
Naruto tilted his head. "I smelled them."
The old man took one look at the basket and nodded. "Well, I'll be damned. That's the exact batch I needed. Good work, kid."
Sasuke scowled. "That's not possible."
Naruto shrugged. "Okay."
Kakashi hummed, tapping his chin. "You know, if the whole Hokage thing doesn't work out, Naruto, you could always be a professional truffle hunter."
Naruto frowned. "I don't like mushrooms. Dattebane."
The next mission involved finding a missing dog.
Naruto had already proven his affinity for dealing with animals, so Kakashi didn't even bother pretending this was going to be difficult. The client—a woman in her mid-thirties—was already red-eyed and sniffling when they arrived.
"My little Maru-chan has been gone for two days! He's such a delicate thing, he won't last in the streets!"
Sasuke stared at her blankly. "It's a dog."
She gasped. "Not just any dog! He's my sweet baby!"
Naruto sniffed the air.
Sakura crossed her arms. "Don't worry, ma'am, we'll find him."
Naruto started walking.
"Where are you going?" Sasuke asked.
"To get the dog."
"You don't even know where it is!"
Naruto pointed at his nose again. "I can smell it. Dattebane"
The woman blinked. "Wait, are you saying you can track him just by scent?"
Naruto nodded.
Sasuke scoffed. "You're not an Inuzuka."
Naruto blinked at him. "Okay."
Ignoring them, he followed the scent down an alley, through a fence, over a rooftop, and finally to the marketplace, where a tiny, pampered Pomeranian was stuffing its face with free samples from a kind old food vendor.
Naruto crouched down. "Maru-chan?"
The dog looked up, mouth full of rice ball, then jumped into Naruto's arms like it had been expecting him.
Naruto returned to the client within five minutes.
She gasped, scooping up her pet. "Maru-chan! Oh, my baby, I was so worried!"
Naruto dusted off his pants. "He was eating."
Sasuke and Sakura arrived moments later, panting slightly from trying to keep up.
Sakura groaned. "Again?!"
Sasuke gritted his teeth. "This is ridiculous."
The client hugged Naruto tightly. "Oh, thank you so much, young man! You must be so gifted!"
Naruto, still trapped in her grip, blinked at Kakashi for help.
Kakashi only eye-smiled. "Looks like you're popular with animals and their owners, Naruto."
Naruto sighed.
The third mission of the week was retrieving a missing necklace.
Sakura was relieved. "Finally! Something that doesn't involve chasing animals!"
Sasuke nodded. "We should check for any pawnshops first. If it was stolen, that's the most likely place it would end up."
Naruto sniffed the air once, then started walking.
Sasuke pinched the bridge of his nose. "Let me guess. You can smell it."
Naruto didn't answer, just kept walking.
Kakashi hummed. "Well, no harm in following him."
Naruto led them behind a bakery, where a crow was currently trying to peck at a glimmering pendant caught between the cobblestones.
He reached down, plucked it up, and held it out. "Found it."
Sakura groaned. "Of course you did."
Sasuke looked personally offended. "How?!"
Naruto blinked. "It smelled like metal and perfume. Plus I know where a crow might hide a stolen necklace."
Kakashi chuckled. "Well, that's another one done."
Sakura flopped against a nearby wall. "Why are we even here?"
Naruto tilted his head. "Teamwork."
"That's not teamwork! That's you doing everything in five minutes while the rest of us run around like idiots!"
Sasuke glared at Naruto. "This isn't normal."
Naruto shrugged. "Okay."
Kakashi patted Sasuke on the back. "Don't take it too personally. Sometimes, people are just built different."
Naruto nodded. "I was a crow once. Dattebane."
Sakura squinted at him. "What?"
Naruto blinked. "Nothing."
—ToT—
D-ranks were getting on everyone's nerves. Not because the missions were hard—far from it. They were just chores. Pointless, mind-numbing chores. Babysitting loud kids, pulling weeds, scrubbing graffiti, catching cats—always catching that cat. It wasn't work for ninjas. It was work for civilians too lazy to do things themselves.
Sasuke had enough.
"This is a waste of time," he declared as they trudged back to the Hokage's office after another humiliating morning of doing a farmer's yard work.
Sakura, brushing dirt off her gloves, nodded. "I have to agree. Sensei, we've been doing D-ranks for weeks now. Shouldn't we get something more serious?"
Kakashi barely looked up from his book. "Mmm, that's up to the Hokage."
That was all the encouragement Sasuke needed. The moment they entered the office, he didn't even wait for formalities. "I want a C-rank mission."
Hiruzen raised a brow. "Is that so?"
Sakura chimed in. "Hokage-sama, we've done so many D-ranks already. We're ready for something harder."
Naruto blinked. A C-rank. A real mission. The kind where things could go wrong. The kind where people could die.
What if they had to kill? What if he was hunted?
Hiruzen's gaze settled on him. For a moment, Naruto just stared back, then shifted his eyes away. He wasn't sure if he was ready.
Hiruzen looked to Kakashi. "And what does their sensei think?"
Kakashi hummed, snapping his book shut. "I think D-ranks are... not exactly suited to their abilities."
The Hokage exhaled through his nose, mulling it over. "Very well." He picked up a scroll from his desk and unrolled it, skimming its contents. "Send in Tazuna."
Naruto froze.
Uh-oh.
A minute later, an old man stumbled into the room, the smell of alcohol clinging to him like cheap cologne. His skin was tanned from years of hard labor, his graying beard unkempt. He took one glance at Team 7 and made his disgust very clear.
"These brats are supposed to guard me?" He snorted, taking a swig from his liquor bottle. "That pipsqueak of a malnourished pinkie? That boy who looks like he's having a bad stomach? And that brat with tomato hair and glowing eyes?"
Sasuke twitched. His fingers curled into fists. Sakura's eye twitched even harder.
Naruto, ever blank-faced, just stared at him.
Kakashi, unfazed, chuckled. "Don't worry, Tazuna-san. I'm more than capable of watching over both them and you."
Tazuna huffed. "You better be."
Hiruzen ignored the exchange. "Your mission is simple—escort Tazuna to the Land of Waves and ensure his safety until his bridge is complete."
Kakashi turned to his students. "You have until tomorrow morning to gather everything you need. Meet me at the northern gate by sunrise."
Naruto walked away with the rest of them, hands in his pockets, deep in thought.
Another step to becoming a real shinobi.
—
The next morning, Naruto arrived early. Not because he was eager, but because he had always preferred getting to places ahead of time. Less noise. Less people.
The northern gate was quiet, the village just barely beginning to wake. He leaned against the wall, staring at the sky as the last traces of dawn faded.
Sasuke arrived next, looking as serious as ever. Sakura followed shortly, dressed in practical travel gear instead of her usual attire.
Kakashi, naturally, arrived late.
"Sorry, sorry," he said, scratching the back of his head. "I got lost on the road of life."
Sasuke rolled his eyes. Sakura sighed. Naruto just stared at him.
Tazuna was already there, grumbling about brats and irresponsibility and how he should have asked for a better team.
Kakashi ignored him. "Alright, everyone ready?"
They all nodded.
"Good. Let's go."
And with that, they set off.
—
The first few hours of travel were uneventful.
Naruto listened to the birds, the rustling leaves, the sound of their footsteps crunching against dirt. He liked nature. It was predictable, unlike humans.
Tazuna, meanwhile, wouldn't shut up.
"Man, you brats don't look like much, but I guess you'll have to do."
Sakura smiled, trying to be polite. "Don't worry, Tazuna-san. We won't let anything happen to you."
"Hmph. You better not. I have a bridge to build, and I'm not dying before it's finished."
Sasuke, walking beside Naruto, whispered, "Is it too late to request a different client?"
Naruto shrugged. "Probably."
They walked for a few more hours, the forest growing denser.
Then, Naruto saw it.
A puddle.
A completely out-of-place puddle in the middle of the road, despite the dry weather.
He didn't say anything. Just watched as they passed it.
Then, suddenly—
Chain whip!
Two masked figures burst from the puddle, chains flying toward Kakashi.
Naruto didn't even flinch as the chains ripped through their teacher, cutting him to shreds.
Sakura screamed.
Sasuke's eyes widened, but he reacted instantly, jumping back.
Naruto just sighed. "That's a clone."
Sure enough, Kakashi appeared behind them, completely unharmed, while the shredded "corpse" disappeared in a puff of smoke.
The two attackers barely had time to react before Sasuke moved.
Kunai flashed. One enemy staggered back, barely dodging.
Naruto, unfazed, stepped forward. He didn't bother drawing a weapon. He just... moved.
And suddenly, one of the masked men found himself slammed into the ground.
Sasuke stopped mid-strike, staring. "What the—"
Naruto had flipped the man effortlessly, his movements precise, almost animalistic.
The other attacker tried to run. Kakashi appeared behind him in an instant, slamming him down as well.
And just like that, it was over.
Tazuna was shaking. "What—what the hell was that?!"
Kakashi turned to him. "That's what I'd like to know. Tazuna-san, care to explain why two Chūnin-level assassins were waiting for us?"
Tazuna paled.
Naruto just sighed.
Yeah. This wasn't going to be a simple mission.
TBC