Descending the Hokage Mountain felt more dangerous than scaling it.
Every time I engaged the chakra vacuum on the soles of my feet, my focus threatened to waver under the weight of the migraine pulsing in my head.
I didn't climb down so much as I managed a slide against the stone, scraping the skin from my palms and knees.
When I landed on the floor, my legs buckled. I fell to my hands and knees in the dirt, gasping for air.
I forced myself to stand. I had to merge with the surviving crowd.
Konoha was a landscape of devastation. The central commercial districts and the administrative sectors had been flattened.
I navigated the ruined streets, stepping over debris. The silence was scary. The screams of the beast were gone, replaced only by the weeping of the survivors.
The emergency protocols of the village kicked in. Jonin and Chunin, many of them were nursing severe injuries from civilians and shinobi alike.
Witnessing the Tailed Beast, and seeing the power of the Hokage who had fought it, had shattered my illusion of superiority.
I had been treating my training like a side project squeezed between the hours of an orphanage routine.
I could no longer rely on fragmented theories or trial-and-error in the forest. I needed access to institutional records. I needed to study high-level taijutsu. I needed scrolls on chakra theory and elemental transformation.
I needed the Academy.
"Hey. You."
A shadow fell over me. I looked up.
A Chunin, his flak jacket torn. He held a makeshift clipboard.
"Name?" he croaked, his voice hoarse.
"Raijin" I said, my voice steady. "Orphanage Sector Four."
The Chunin didn't blink. He simply checked a box on his clipboard. "Sector Four's building collapsed. The survivors are being gathered in the tents, across the compound. You can find them there".
I stood up and made my way through the tents.
The tent was packed. Dozens of children sat on thin mats, many of them crying. There, I found the head matron of my orphanage.
She spotted me as I entered. For a second, her eyes widened in surprise, perhaps already having mentally counted me among the dead.
"Sit down and stay quiet" she ordered, pointing to an empty mat.
I walked over and sat. I did not speak to the other orphans. I closed my eyes, regulating my breathing, and turned my focus inward, resuming the expansion of my chakra coils.
I had no time to waste.
The refugee camp became my home for the next few months.
The infrastructure of Konoha had to be entirely rebuilt from the ground up, something that demanded the labor of every civilian and low-ranking shinobi.
I quickly learned that my goal of enrolling in the Academy was impossible.
The complex where generations of shinobi had been taught was destroyed by the Nine-Tails. Education was a secondary concern to a village that needed to restore supply chains. The admission of students was indefinitely postponed.
I was locked out of the system for at least another year.
I did not let this frustrating fact break my rhythm, though. If the village could not provide me with resources, I would forge them on my own. But while my training resumed, amidst the aftermath of the disaster, the village's political scene occupied my thoughts.
The camp was a hub of information. Exhausted shinobi and officers moved through the tents, bringing rumors with them.
The Fourth is dead. That was the first fact. The Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi, had come out of his brief retirement to reclaim the hat and stabilize the traumatized village.
But as the winter settled over the village, the grief began to grow into something darker.
It started as a whisper among the older people.
The beast didn't attack on its own. It was controlled. By a Sharingan.
Before the attack, the Uchiha Military Police had patrolled the main streets with pride, respected by the people. Now, when an Uchiha officer walked through, the civilians averted their eyes. The silence that followed them was heavy with resentment.
I knew the truth. Obito Uchiha was responsible, but the clan as a whole was innocent. Yet, the village administration, guided by Danzo, was capitalizing on the tragedy.
By the time spring arrived and we were moved into housing sectors, the redrawing of the village had begun.
I overheard a conversation. "The zoning maps are a nightmare" the officer muttered. "The council is moving the Uchiha compound to the edge of the village, right against the walls. They say it's for 'reconstruction efficiency' but we all know what it really means."
I stared at the dirt. The canon was intact. The board was being set. The seeds of the coup had just been planted in the aftermath of the Nine-Tails attack.
While the village fractured politically, I escalated my training regimen.
Walking on the surface of the slow-moving stream in the forest was no longer a challenge. Still water was predictable. Combat was not.
I abandoned the quiet stream and ventured deeper into the forest, following the water until I found a sharp drop in the terrain. The streams narrowed, funneling into a place where the water rushed violently.
This was way more complex. On still water, the force required was just vertical. But on rushing water, the fluid actively tries to sweep your feet out from under you. To stand on a moving current, I had to angle the chakra expulsion. I had to continuously adjust the intensity and direction of the output in a fraction of a second to stand still.
My first attempt ended before I even took a full step.
The moment my weight transferred, the current slammed into my ankle. My downward chakra output was useless against the lateral force. My legs were swept out from under me, and I plunged into the water.
I tumbled before I managed to grab a root to get myself out of the stream.
I stripped off my soaked shirt. My mind raced.
Slowly, I came to a conclusion. For every pound of force the water applies, I must match it with an angled emission of chakra to anchor my center of mass.
I stepped back to the edge of the rocks. I engaged the chakra in my core, stepping onto the rushing water. The current hit my foot. I immediately adjusted the angle of my chakra.
I held the position for two seconds before the current shifted over a submerged rock. My calculation lagged by a fraction of a second. I fell in again.
I spent the entirety of the winter and spring fighting against the river.
By the time summer returned, I had adapted.
I stood in the center of the roaring stream. My eyes were closed. I didn't need to look at the water anymore. The chakra flowing from the soles of my feet acted as an extension of my mind. I could sense the changes before they hit me, adjusting the angle and intensity of my output.
I was as stable as if I were standing on solid concrete.
I opened my eyes, the sound of the water filling my ears, and slowly walked upstream.
I was roughly six years old now.
I stepped onto the edge of the stream, my thoughts turned back to the center of the village.
The Ninja Academy had finally been rebuilt. The admissions boards were accepting applications for the new semester. The village was desperate to replenish its military force.
I dried my feet and slipped my shirt back over my body.
The years hiding in the forest, scavenging for rusted kunai, and fighting the river were over. It was time to step into the light. It was time to access the theoretical archives, and finally weaponize my chakra.
I walked out of the treeline.
It was time to go to school.