The Zero Tails Jinchuriki #7

Disclaimer - I don’t own anything. As the corporations say these days, you will own nothing & be happy. I don't, and have never claimed

Disclaimer - I don’t own anything. As the corporations say these days, you will own nothing & be happy. I don't, and have never claimed to, own Naruto or any of its characters. With that out of the way, let’s goooo!

Konoha, Land of Fire

–Kenta Akimichi–

He fidgeted in the clothing he was given and had to constantly stop himself from reaching out and fixing his hair. Out there in his exile, he had a single haircut.

Short.

Using chakra, he was able to easily cut off all his bodily hair, maintain general hygiene without much issue but what he most definitely did not care about, was looks. Aesthetic. The lady at the salon was very adamant that he do things her way and not even touch her look, not until the meeting was done.

If not for the fact that it was an important meeting and the Kage himself had ordered him to attend it, he would have outright refused to go, all because of how uncomfortable he was feeling at the moment, to be exposed to hundreds of people all at once.

He felt…exposed, to be precise. For the past decade and a half, he had spent every waking moment, working on himself, his chakra, his overall prowess, and most important of all, he had focused on keeping himself hidden, from everyone.

From the rival villages, from the Samurai, from the Daimyo’s people, from the black market and even from shinobi from his own village, and to think that in the span of a couple of days, he was going to be exposed to the world as a Senju. His face will be in every single important room in days.

The change was a little jarring but nothing he could not bear for the village. After all, while he had never expected for things to come to this and had almost resigned himself to having to live and die alone, outside the village he was born in and had only hoped to get a burial in Konoha, he was a little bit excited to finally be back in the village he barely remembered from his memories anymore.

He grew up without his parents, both of them being targeted heavily due to their Senju lineage, with him only surviving because he was much more powerful than his targets, as he was only ever allowed outside the village under an Elite Jounin, even when he had become a Chunin. 

Only when he became an official Jounin was the supervision removed and he could finally start going on missions all by his lonesome. During the raid on the Land of the Sky, he was an Elite Jounin, one of the strongest shinobi under the Hokage, but he did not become one without hard training.

Every day of his waking life was spent on training, on becoming a better shinobi, all in order to break the cage that he was in, a cage that was supposedly imposed on him for his own safety but that was not something his past self understood.

His past self understood his lack of freedom, and how he would go about obtaining that. So, as he walked through the village, there were legitimate things that were new to him, even if they were just as old as he was, simply because he had never had the time or the inclination to roam around and explore the village.

Relatives who did not care about him beyond getting the appropriate resources for becoming an exemplary shinobi, and the lack of friends, made sure that becoming the strongest version of himself was all that he could see.

He stopped for a second as an absolutely heavenly aroma assaulted his senses, so much so that in that moment of stillness, he took in Nature Energy and allowed his senses to expand, and the heavenly aroma became even more tantalising. 

He closed his eyes, took a deep whiff, and turned around, heading in the direction of the Food of the Gods. Mindful of the fact that he could not run on the rooftops, because it might mess up his looks, he began walking towards the smell, and within 10 minutes, he was in front of a stand that was clearly temporary, with signs of rubble all around it.

Sighing at the reminder of the destruction that the village had to undergo, he entered the stand, and to his surprise, found people. Not just people but people happily slurping down ramen, talking to each other.

With his Sage Mode still active, the avalanche of positive emotions hit him, almost physically, as he took a step back and let the Sage Mode bleed away from him, the emotional sensory ability he had muting itself in the background.

For all the time he had been in the village, he had not sensed a single place full of so much happiness. It was…refreshing, to know, that while the signs of rubble around this place signified the hardship the village had gone through, the sheer amount of lively cheer in this place signified Konoha’s ability to bounce back from any hardship suffered.

Unconsciously, a smile found its way on his face as he sat down on one of the stools, waiting for someone to come take his order. His eyes roved to the side as the ANBU tailing him carefully dropped a stack of Ryo that he quickly pocketed. He did have money, but he forgot to bring it with him when coming to Konoha.

He didn’t have as much need for money because of regular supply drops from Konoha, which included any necessities and as for food, he hunted and foraged through the forests, and cooked with the supplies he got from the village.

With the amount of clandestine operations that Konoha had, hiding a small cache of supplies in regular missions was very easy, so that there was no risk of exposing his existence to the shinobi population of Konoha, not that it would have mattered because the ones making the delivery for him were ANBU who were trained to only see and never speak, unless their Kage demanded it.

“Hello, I am Teuchi, owner of this place. I am so sorry but due to material constraints, we only have Miso ramen available right now. Will that be alright?” He looked up to see the man slightly bowing at him in apology. 

“Alright,” he replied as the man scrambled back into the kitchen, presumably to prepare his food. He sensed another chakra signature inside the kitchen of similar quality and age, along with a tiny one, which meant it was a baby.

He looked around and saw that the Teuchi fellow was the only staff in this place, along with being the sole cook as well. It made sense, since most businesses were probably still rebuilding to their normal levels since the attack.

Honestly, he was unsure if he could have done anything to stop the series of events from happening, even if he was in or near the village at the time of the attack. Sure, the civilian casualties could have been lowered by either pushing the Nine Tails out of the village sooner, which seemed unlikely, even with his considerable power or helped, or rather convincing the Yondaime to not kill himself while sealing the Nine Tails.

It was all a mess that he would rather not think about. He had spent years solving his inner mental demons, and he was now beyond the reach of the Zero Tails, a malevolent mass of negative emotions that always sought to attack his mental state.

The dream of Hashirama-sama, the existence of Konoha, was the one thing that he focused on, something that helped him a lot while solving some of his mental demons, events that made him all the stronger for it.

Clearing his mental demons honestly helped him a lot in creating a rudimentary Sage Mode for himself. That was five years ago. Shortly after that, Yondaime visited him and during their talks, he correctly deduced that Kenta was dabbling with Nature Energy.

Beyond a warning, he was not given any constraints whatsoever, and with his clear mental state, he had been able to improve on his Senjutsu in leaps and bounds. He knew, without a shadow of doubt, that his version of Senjutsu was not perfect, it was flawed in a fundamental way.

But then, not everyone could be Hashirama Senju, could they?

Some of them had to make do with whatever mental, spiritual and physical gifts they had.

“Here you go, one Miso Ramen.” He saw a steaming hot dish of ramen in front of him and as he took the first bite, all the worries dulled a bit. Not faded, not vanished but the burden of those worries seemed as if they were becoming lighter with every single slurp of the noodles.

Setting down the plate, he said, “One more,” with a cheer that was absent before.

For he had forgotten that Konoha was not just shinobi, not just clan and clan lineages, not just chakra and politics. It was people like Teuchi, running places like these, serving their fellow men, and not falling into despair.

He was starting to remember the Will of Fire once more.