It was our fifth year in ninja school, and like last year nothing much happened. We didn't learn anything new other than some politics, culture, and warfare. I'd had enough of politics as an adventurer who had saved the world a couple times, so I ended up not paying attention to most of that. Similar enough with warfare; I had fought in many, many wars so nothing to learn there. The one I actually had to pay attention to was culture; after all, a new world meant a new culture. We learned about the known culture from the great ninja villages in the world. It would be important for when we had to interact with ninja from different villages, assuming we weren't killing them of course.

I had mastered all the jutsu taught to us in the academy: Clone jutsu, transformation jutsu, substitution jutsu, and the rope escape jutsu. That last one was pretty easy, and I knew how to do it within a day. My Taijutsu had improved a lot as well. I still couldn't beat Naruto, Hinata, or Duck Butt, but everyone else was fair game. My Chakra control had also improved by a fair amount. I could now keep 4 leaves on my forehead for 2 hours continuously. I was trying to up my concentration the most, since it would benefit my summoning of my demons.

As a warlock who specialized in demons, I could summon quite a few. I had one demon who I could summon permanently. This was usually my main combat demon. I then had a multitude of other demons I could summon temporarily, and they would vanish after a certain amount of time, or when combat ended. Because of what I discovered with maintaining a spell, I had hopes that I could summon my various demons more long term. Well, this was all assuming I could even summon them in the first place. I still had yet to even get my shadowbolt up and running. I was working on it, but with all the other academy stuff I was learning, I hadn't really had the time to sit down and work out how to replicate it.

Other than that, the rest of the year was just us continuously going over and practicing what we had learned.

The 6th, and final year of the academy was the year I turned 12 years old. My features had changed as I got older. I had long black hair that I kept in a ponytail, with a lock of hair coming down to frame both sides of my face. My violet eyes had gotten deeper in color over the years. I had no idea why I had violet eyes and Shikamaru didn't. I suspected it had something to do with my vocation back in Azeroth.

It was common for the magic one used to influence the user's body in some way. For example, an Ice mage would have some feature denoting they had dedicated their lives to frost magic. Same with a fire mage, their hair might be red. Demon hunters took in Fel Magic to get their powers, and it corrupted them. It gave them horns, and made them blind. In my case as demonology warlock, my pupils had been vertical, however they hadn't been violet. I had a feeling that as I started using my warlock spells, my hair would change in color somehow. I had seen it happen before, but had no way to know if it would happen to me.

For the rest of my features, I had high cheekbones, an oval face, a small nose, and a light sprinkling of freckles from my time out in the sun. My eyes glinted with mischief occasionally; something I had gained from Naruto. Over the last couple years Naruto had convinced me to take part in some of his pranks. I had to admit they were fun. I liked the harmless pranks where no one got hurt, or mortified. I hadn't been a prankster in my past life; too much to do, save the world, fight in some wars, that kind of thing. Didn't leave much time for such things.

This was the year we'd do a survival exercise in the forest. We'd be left alone for two days to fend for ourselves. We were allowed to form teams, but it would be a bit of a challenge since we would all be dropped off at different parts of the forest. This challenge would be both easy and a pain in my ass. As an adventurer I'd had plenty of experience surviving in the wilds of some out of the way jungle, but I'd had magic to help me then. So this would be an experience.

"I expected at least a good chunk of you to drop out, but I see almost everyone here. Well done. Today will be one of the final tests to see if you will be good Shinobi or not." Iruka said with a proud smile on his face.

"Today we will do a survival exercise in the nearby forest. Don't worry, some jounin have already gone through and killed all the dangerous animals so you'll be mostly safe. That doesn't mean that the forest is without dangers though. There are still some wolves here and there so watch out." he explained.

The expressions of the kids faces ranged from excitement on some, and terror on others. It was understandable I suppose, up until now we've had the structure and safety of the academy to protect us. But now we'd be left to our own devices. I noticed a pattern though, the kids who looked excited or disinterested were the clan kids. Almost all the kids who looked terrified were kids who didn't come from a famous clan.

"You all will be dropped off at different spots within the forest. You aren't prohibited from grouping up, but it will be hard considering how spread out you will be." he continued.

All of a sudden, many ninja surrounded the group of kids.

"These ninja here will escort groups of you around the forest and ensure you don't know where your friends are." Iruka told us before dismissing us.

I went to the nearest ninja and waited for us to go. Shikamaru, Hinata, Naruto, and Choji all went to different ninjas, so there was no hope in finding them. With me were several kids i'd seen but never talked to much.

"H-How do you guys think you'll do?" one of them nervously asked.

"I don't know, I think I'll be pretty lost." another responded.

"How about you Kari? You're one of the strongest in the class" a third piped up.

I suddenly felt bad that I didn't know any of their names, but they knew mine.

"I don't think I'll have too much trouble, I've done similar stuff before" I told them.

"Wow, I-I wish I could group up with you, but I d-doubt we'd find each other." the first kid said.

"You never know what might happen, just keep your eyes peeled and you should be fine" I said, trying to reassure the nervous kid.

As we finished talking we reached our destination and I volunteered to go first. After all, the faster I could get myself set up, the easier the rest of the two days would be.

Entering the forest, I took a look around. The trees were massive, as it seemed all the forests in this world were. They were close enough together to form a nearly endless canopy that one could use to traverse above without needing to touch the ground. It made it easy to not leave tracks.

Activating my Chakra Reinforcement, I took to the trees. I had gotten much better at using the skill I had created over the years. I still wasn't sure if other people could use this skill, but I wasn't willing to expose it to find out. I could now cover my entire body, and with my outrageous chakra, I could keep it going almost indefinitely. I had learned that as my body got stronger, I could reinforce it with more chakra without hurting myself.

Sprinting through the treetops, I was looking for a good place to make camp for the next few days. Once I made camp, I planned to do some experimenting to try and finally replicate my shadow bolt. After about an hour I found a decent enough spot. It was a clump of tree branches that had formed a particularly sturdy criss crossing platform in the air. It wasn't large, but it was enough for me to fit and maybe a bedroll. I hadn't used much stamina to get here, with my reinforcement, but channeling that much chakra for an hour still took a small toll on my mental exhaustion. So even though I could still keep going, I decided to not risk anything if I was going to be experimenting.

First thing I did was to mark out where my natural tree house was on the ground below. It was really hard to see from the ground unless you knew where to look. Next I set out to find something to eat. I had learned a decent amount about the edible plants found around the forest near the village. It didn't take long to find some berries and whatnot that were edible. I was even lucky enough to find a small rabbit. I was a pretty good cook in Azeroth, and while this wasn't a magical rabbit, like one I'd use to make food that gave buffs, it would do.

After getting back to my treehouse, and dressing the rabbit, I got to work trying to create my first Jutsu in this world. I started by remembering how the spell worked in Azeroth. Normally the warlock's mana was influenced by the shadow magic that we typically used, so I had no idea if the same would hold true for my Chakra. When I cast Shadow Bolt, I used my mana to form a connection with the shadow realm, next I would create a void inside the shadows, then used a barrier to contain everything. The result was a swirling mass of purple and black negative energy. When I send the ball at the enemy, propelling it with a burst of mana, there was a trail of shadowy energy following it. When it hit the enemy it would explode, dealing shadowy necrotic damage. To replicate it here would take some work. The way my clan used shadows is vastly more limited than what I was used to. I wonder if i could fix that?

I thought about how my clan used shadows. We used the Yin Release to control any shadows that already existed. If we wanted to extend our range, we'd have to either get better at using the Jutsu, or make a new shadow with something that would create its own shadow. For example a fireball, or something as simple as a Kunai stuck into the ground on a sunny day. I had been taught our clan's Shadow Possession Jutsu, and after about a month I had finally mastered it. It was another 3 before I showed how good I was with it. I was currently unmatched in our clan with its use; well maybe everyone except my father. I hadn't tested myself against him yet so it was impossible to know. The main limitation was that once the shadow disconnected from you, you lost control of it.

So what if I were to combine this world's shadow usage, with Azeroth shadow usage? It would be utterly alien to them, as far as i could tell they hadn't come up with a new way to use shadows in quite some time. If I were to use just Nara clan shadows to recreate the spell, i'd be limited however, since the person would need to be able to cast a shadow in the first place. Meaning i couldn't use this new jutsu, or any other clan jutsu in utter darkness. A limitation my shadow bolt from Azeroth did not share.

Quickly performing the shadow possession jutsu, I started messing around with my shadow. I experimented with how far away I could make it move in the first place. It turned out to be about 120 feet(36.5 meters) without extending my shadow with an external force. I found I could keep my shadow extended that far without doing anything for about an hour. I had enough chakra to keep it going almost indefinitely, however my mind couldn't keep up with the strain of channeling chakra for that long without rest.

The length of time I could keep it up went down quite a lot when I actually started moving it and doing things with it. I hoped that as I got better with the jutsu, the mental toll would be a lot less. After all, I was still only 12 years old and my mind would be still developing for another decade at least. Knowing at least part of my limits, I tried to see what I could do with the shadow other than just moving it and preventing others movement. After another hour of practice just moving it around, I found that using visualization from Azeroth, I could lift the shadow off the ground. I wasn't sure if it was possible normally, but that was how I pulled it off.

I thought about how else I could manipulate it. The most obvious one was a lance of shadow. It would be a nerfed version of my normal shadow bolt. More time passed and I had moderate success making my shadow turn into a spear. Well it was a spear in name only since it just tapered off to a sharp point and gradually got larger as it led back to the base of the shadow. I found I could make the shadow easily pierce a tree, however the speed was so slow it would be no use in actual combat yet. I was disappointed but progress was progress. After all, by all accounts you couldn't make a functional jutsu in a day.

It was pretty late by this point and I was starting to get ravenous. Even with breaks to let my mind rest, using that much chakra all day was still enough to work up quite the appetite. After restarting my fire, hunting a couple rabbits, and gathering some berries, I passed out as soon as my head hit the bedroll.

I woke up with the sun hitting my face. I was sore as hell, I still wasn't able to use Shadow Possession without hand signs, so I had to stand in that awful position all day while I used the Jutsu. I was curious how the other students were doing; after all this was fairly easy for me, despite my lack of magic. The non-clan kids weren't so lucky however. I was curious as to how they were doing, but not enough to go find them. After all, if I had people around me, I couldn't experiment with my jutsus in ways that were considered impossible.

My main takeaway from last night was that I could recreate my shadow bolt, but it would take some time. Second was that I would need to practice a hell of a lot more with my jutsu than I had been so far if I wanted to make that happen. I had decided to name my new jutsu "Shadow Style: Shadow Lance". At the time I didn't know that basically the same jutsu was already in existence, "Shadow Stitching". Right now it was just a ripoff shadow bolt, and it was way too slow to use in combat. The only way I could kill anything with it was if I snuck up on them; sure I could possess their shadow first, but right now any damage they took, I took.

I decided to spend the rest of the time in this forest training my shadow lance. I needed it to be combat ready, and fast. My Taijutsu was still crap; the only thing I had going for me was my insane chakra levels, and my control over it. Graduation was in a few months and I needed something to fight with by then to make use of my advantages.

At the end of the second day, the same shinobi as before came and found me. I had heard him coming from a mile away; I guess since he was on his home turf he didn't feel the need to be quiet. That was good for me though, since it meant that he didn't see me practicing shadow lance. As we made it back to the academy, I was able to get a look at the other students. They looked to be in rough shape; it seemed that only Sasuke and I were untouched coming back from our two day excursion into the forest.

"Well well, looks like none of you had a good time in that forest" Iruka said to us as the last few students trickled in.

"Well, most of you anyway" he said with a chuckle looking at Sasuke and I.

"Everyone get back inside and clean yourselves up, head home and get some rest. We'll see you tomorrow and discuss how you all did" he continued.

Uh oh. I didn't like the sound of that. It seemed I had been careless and forgot that some Jounin would probably check in on us periodically. I found out later that I had been right. I hate being right.

-    -

"What did you say?" the Hokage asked.

The hokage was currently sitting at his desk in his office.

"Kira Nara has been experimenting and has apparently created her own jutsu during the academy survival exercise" Iruka reported.

"Very interesting… Very interesting indeed. Fox, please send a message to Shikaku Nara, I would like to speak with him" the Hokage said, addressing one of the Anbu in the room.

Some time later, Shikaku entered the room as requested.

"Lord Hokage, how can I help?" he asked.

"Tell me about your daughter, Kira." he said.

Shikaku was understandably surprised. He hadn't expected his daughter to catch the eye of the Hokage so soon.

"To describe her in a few words; She's scary intelligent" Shikaku said honestly, no point in hiding it when he would find out anyway.

"In what way?" the Hokage asked, curious.

"Ever since a few months after she was born, she always seemed more aware of the world around her. As she grew up it got even more pronounced. To the point that she would only talk with her brother, Shikamaru, who is also very intelligent. I overheard them talking one time that Shikamaru was the only one besides us that she could have an actual conversion with, as everyone else seemed dull. She'd never tell that to anyone to their face of course, she's much too kind for that" Shikaku said.

"Hmmm… Iruka, tell him what you told me" the Hokage suggested.

"Well Shikaku, are you aware of your daughter's learning speed? How fast she learns Jutsus?" Iruka asked.

"I am aware she is a fast learner, but judging from your question, it must be more than i thought" Shikaku said, now curious himself.

"Well let me put it this way, she learned every jutsu at the academy in less than a week. Every other student took almost twice as long as she did to learn them. She tried to hide it from me, by acting as though she was still having trouble, but I've taught a lot of students and know when one is excelling" he said

"Seriously? I knew she was smart, but that's insane.. Our clan jutsu took even her some time to learn." Shikaku said, he was surprised, but not as much as he let on. He needed to see where this was going.

"That jutsu is why I called you here, Shikaku" Hiruzen said.

"Oh?"

"Iruka said that during the recent survival excursion into the forest, he saw your daughter experimenting with her jutsu in ways he hadn't heard of before." The Hokage continued.

"Yes, she was creating spikes from her shadow and attacking things, though they weren't very fast." Iruka explained.

Shikaku's eyes went wide at that.

"What is it?" they asked Shikaku.

"She has discovered another secret jutsu of our clan on her own. That jutsu should be well beyond her years. Normally we start with the most basic, and work our way up, but she went from the first level, and jumped right to near the end." Shikaku told them.

"What could she do with this jutsu, Shikaku? Is it dangerous to herself or others?" Iruka said with some concern.

"No, everything is mostly fine. If it's as you said then she's still learning and wouldn't be able to fight with it, but that won't last long. At full power however she could easily kill anyone in the village she wants with it bar experienced shinobi." Shikaku explained.

"Is she likely to do that?" The hokage asked with some concern. He had heard of the girls large chakra reserves, but he knew nothing about who she was as a person.

Suddenly, Shikaku burst into laughter. It took a minute for him to calm down, despite the looks the others were giving him.

"Sorry, it's just that she would never do that unless the entire Nara clan were to fall under attack by the village." Shikaku explained.

"Is she that loyal to the village?" Hiruzen asked.

"No, she's not loyal to the village in the slightest. The way the villagers treat Naruto made sure of that. However she is almost fanatically loyal to her friends and family. So as long as they are loyal to the village, by proxy, so too shall she." Shikaku told them.

"That is concerning that she has almost no loyalty to the village. I also wasn't aware she had become such good friends with Naruto, and I had hoped the villagers would have treated him like a hero" the Hokage said with some sadness.

"Oh yes, she is very good friends with Naruto, in fact she has been a very good influence on him. Because of her, Naruto keeps his grades up and gets into less trouble despite the fact that Naruto has roped her into some of his pranks." Iruka said with a smile. He used to hate Naruto because of what was inside him, but the boy had grown on him over the years.

"Well, is there anything to be done about this situation?" Hiruzen asked.

"I don't see any reason to interfere, as of right now she is just discovering her abilities, and is not hurting anyone. If we make a big deal of this, she will make more of an effort to hide. It would also mean that if she runs into trouble she can't handle, she won't come to me for help" Shikaku said to them both.

"I agree, for now let's just watch." Iruka said.

"Very well, I will leave it to your judgment for now. But if anything happens, I want to know. We can not let Danzo get his hands on her." the Hokage said, ending the conversion.

-  -

It's been a few months since the forest event, and I'd gotten quite good with my shadow lance. I'd say it was almost combat ready. A few more days of practice should do it. Dad had come to talk to me not long after the excursion, asking how my training was going. Despite my love for him, old habits die hard. Years of mistrusting other people besides my demons had made it hard to open up to my parents, despite their clear good intentions. I think I saw some hurt in dad's eyes when I told him everything was doing fine and nothing was new. Did he know?

It was now the day before graduation; Naruto and I had just finished vandalizing the Hokage stone faces. We had thought we had gotten away with it, but turns out our Sensei is quicker than us.

"What the hell do you think you two are doing?!" Iruka Sensei shouted at us from behind. His face was comically red.

"Oh uhh, Iruka Sensei, nothing. We were just going for a walk." Naruto tried to defend.

"Really? Then explain to me why there's paint all over your hands? And why people saw two academy students running away from the scene of the crime? And what are you two doing outside of class?" Iruka interrogated.

"It must have been another couple of students?" Naruto said weakly

"And you Kira, you should know better, what do you have to say for yourself?" he asked me.

"Hey, I plead innocent. I just went along to see what would happen" I said.

"You liar! You painted those faces almost as much as me!" Naruto said, objecting to my throwing him under the carriage.

"Shhh." I said, kicking his shin.

Man all these years as a child really has made me less mature. If my old adventuring party could see me now they'd be appalled. What happened to the regal elf who always had an answer?

"Get back to class, both of you." Iruka sighed.

Back at the classroom, we were both tied up on the floor in front of the whole class.

"I'm about at the end of my rope here. You two both have good grades, but this little stunt could have cost you both your graduation! What would you have done if you couldn't have been a ninja?" Iruka asked us.

I was horrified at the thought of having to take this bullshit again. I had long ago learned everything the academy had to teach me.

As for Naruto, he just harrumphed.

"Fine, because you two missed it, everyone will have to go over the 4 jutsu's you all have learned so far" Iruka said, gesturing to the whole class.

There was a chorus of groans and jeers, mainly directed at naruto. This hadn't been the first time they'd had to do this because of him. Everyone lined up at the front of the class and waited for Iruka to tell them to start.

"First up, Sakura. Transformation Jutsu, Rope escape jutsu, substitution jutsu, and Clone Jutsu. In that order." she groaned, but complied. She ended up transforming into him, got out of some rope tied to her hands, made 2 clones and substituted with sasuke; who was mildly surprised.

Iruka went down the list until finally he got to Naruto. Instead of waiting to be called like everyone else did, he immediately went to his "sexy jutsu" that he had made. That fucking thing was vile. Needless to say it got the Sensei and he passed out with a slightly bleeding nose. Unable to continue, the review was over.

Naruto and I spent the remainder of the day cleaning all the paint off the faces. Naruto grumbled the whole time. When night fell we went our separate ways. Naruto went to go get food, and I went home.

"Thanks a lot sis for the extra work" I heard when I got home.

"Yeah yeah, shove it. If you weren't so lazy it wouldn't be so bad" I told the bed troll I called a brother. If he had it his way he would sleep his life away, never leaving his bed.

"I hear today was interesting," mom said with a dangerous smile on her face.

"Uhhhh, yeah, Naruto and I did an art project together." I said, with a mildly terrified smile.

"'Art project,' she says. You hear that dear? That's what she calls painting all over the Hokage Faces!" Yoshino yelled to her husband.

I knew I was in deep shit now. I wasn't too upset though, I knew what I was getting into when I had done it. I hadn't had a family in centuries, getting in shit just to get a rise out of them felt good sometimes.

The next morning we were in class with Iruka standing at the front.

"Today's exam will be based on.. The clone jutsu." he said.

Everyone could hear a loud groan come from the back corner of the room. It was Nartuo. Everyone knew that the clone jutsu was his worst one. I had faith he could do it though.

When my name was called, I headed into the exam room.

"Please perform the Clone jutsu with at least one clone." the examiner said.

Not to be a show off, but I ended up doing six. I had accidentally miscalculated how much chakra was needed for the jutsu. I must be nervous, after all I could finally leave this academy and get on to learning from a veteran. There was only so much I could learn in a school meant to teach children.

"Well done Kari, come up to the front and take your Leaf Headband" the man said.

Taking the headband with a shit eating grin, I thanked him and left. The headband had what looked like a steel plate in the middle stylized with the leaf village symbol. The fabric was a silky cobalt blue, long enough to tie on any part of the body one wished. I'd think about where to put it later. Exiting the building, I had expected to see Naruto, but all I saw was an orange blur jumping off a swing and running away. Fuck.

Naruto didn't pass.