After I saw Naruto run off, I saw a silver haired dude standing where he had been. If I remembered right, that was Mizuki Sensei. What was he doing with Naruto? Unless I’d missed something, they hadn’t really been close, not like Iruka Sensei. Over the years Iruka had gotten pretty close with Naruto. Neither of them had grown up without parents, or so I had been told by my dad. I’d asked to know more about Iruka Sensei; after all the guy would be teaching me for 6 years. I suppose Iruka saw some kinship with Naruto, and that’s why they’d been close. I’d never seen the same warmth in Mizuki’s eyes that I did Iruka Sensei.

I had an uneasy feeling, seeing the way Misuki looked at Naruto’s retreating back. However, right now there was nothing I could do about it, so for now I decided to head home with Shikamaru and celebrate officially becoming a ninja. I couldn’t believe it had been 12 years since I'd come to this world. As an elf I didn’t notice the flow of time much, pretty hard when you were 600 years old. Up until I had entered the Academy, time seemed to crawl. Maybe because I had been impatient to start learning new things? I didn’t know; so far this new life hadn’t been that bad, but over the last few years I had started to miss my demon’s more and more. 

I had formed soul contracts with them, and over time I considered them to be both my friends, and family. I personally thought that was why I had been so powerful; I didn’t treat my summoned demons like slaves like many other warlocks did. When you treated them with respect, they gave much more to you than the bare minimum. After all, why would a sentient creature give their all for someone they hated?

I was totally lost in my thoughts on the way home and didn’t even notice until we got to the front door. 

“What’s got you in such a mood, Sis?” Shikamaru asked.

“Thinking about how fast time flies. It feels like only yesterday that we entered the Academy” I told him.

“Yeah, that’s because we slept through most of it” he said with a snicker.

“I acknowledge your statement and have nothing to refute it” I said, also smiling at him.

“Maybe if you two hadn’t been so lazy, your grades would be better” our mother chided us.

“Hey, I was near the top of the class the whole time I was there. Shikamaru was the one who let his grades slip after the first year.” I said, totally abandoning Shikamaru.

“Traitor” he said.

“Anyway, go wash up for dinner. We have a good reason to celebrate tonight. It’s not every day that one's family gains two new shinobi” She continued.

“Kay!” we said, doing as we were told.

It was halfway through dinner when the commotion that I had been oblivious to building up had finally hit our door.

“Shikaku! It’s an emergency; Naruto has stolen the sacred scroll! The Hokage has given the order to assemble to discuss how to deal with this” a voice I recognized as Mizuki said. 

“You two, stay here. I need to deal with this” dad said, pointing to Shikamaru and I.

There was no way in hell I was staying here. Naruto had gotten himself into some deep shit now. Though I had no proof, I had some suspicions it wasn’t entirely his fault. It was a little too convenient Mizuki had chosen to get close to Naruto the day he failed his Graduation exam. I had to find Naruto. Dammit if I didn't wish I could summon my Eye of the Inquisitor. It was a flying eye that was magically invisible, while it couldn’t do anything besides scout, since it could move much faster than me it would be perfect. However I couldn't even cast a basic shadow bolt yet, so the Inquisitor’s Eye was out of my reach for now.

I would have to do things the old fashioned way. Where would Naruto go after doing something this big? Somewhere secluded was the obvious answer, but there were many places that would fit. After faking that I was tired I headed upstairs and snuck out my window. After running around for a bit I concluded that I was just wasting my time, I had to find a different way. I thought about how to find Naruto, and the only answer I could come up with was by trying to find his massive chakra. There was a method in Azeroth the various classes used to resurrect somebody. They would scan their target with their mana to get an impression of what their soul looked like, then drag it back to its body through the twisting nether. I didn’t need to do any of that, I just needed to find the person. It wasn’t perfect, but it would have to do.

Closing my eyes and finding a secluded alleyway, I thought about how I was going to do this. The healers would have a physical body to use to track where the soul was and bring it back. I didn’t have Naruto's body, but I had spent enough time with him that I knew what his chakra felt like, and also no one else had two chakra sources inside them. Gathering up my chakra in my chest, I sent it all out in one big burst. I didn’t know where to look, so I decided to aim at the forest first. At first nothing happened but When I was about to give up and try a different spot, I felt a brief spark of something familiar. I tried it again and the spark got bigger. A third time I was able to tell a direction. Bingo.

This method wouldn’t have worked if I didn't know Naruo’s chakra so well; it also wasted a ton of chakra, so I'd only be able to use it during an emergency. Sprinting to the source of dual chakra, as it could only be Naruto, I tried my best to stay out of sight. I was supposed to be at home right now, and if one of the Jounin caught me, I'd be dragged back home unable to help. It didn’t take long to find Naruto after a few more chakra pulses. I had arrived just in time to see Mizuki fling some kunai at Iruka. That’s it. He was a dead man. I had grown to like Iruka over the years, despite his initial hatred towards Naruto, he was able to see past it. Not many people were able to do that. 

“Naruto! Give me the scroll, now. Don’t let Iruka lie to you. He just wants to use you!” Mizuki said, trying to bait Naruto.

“Bullshit, you just want the forbidden Jutsu that could destroy our village. Don’t give it to him, Naruto.” Iruka pleaded.

“What the hell is going on?” Naruto said, totally confused.

“Bullshit you say? I’ll tell you what's really bullshit. Naruto, your entire life the village has been lying to you. Even the Hokage which you look up to so much was in on it. In fact he was the one responsible.” Mizuki said with a smile.

“Shut up Mizuki!” Iruka said.

“See? Even now your precious Sensei doesn’t want you to know the truth that the whole village knows” taunted Mizuki.

I had a feeling I knew what was coming. After all, I'd known about it ever since I'd spent any time with Naruto.

“What is this secret? Why was I the only one not told?” Naruto asked.

“The truth is the Demon who attacked the village all those years ago, and killed the parents of so many people, is sealed inside your body. It has taken over your body; you ARE the nine tailed fox” Mizuki said with a sadistic smile, relishing in the pain he was causing Naruto. Yep he was going to die tonight. 

I also knew what he was saying was bullshit. I knew demons. When they took over your body, they left nothing behind of who you were. They ate your soul and took your body. If the Nine Tailed Fox had really taken over Naruto’s body, there would be very obvious proof. He wouldn’t act like a child for one. He’d also have traits from the demon, like the red fur, or the bloodthirsty eyes. 

“That is why the whole village hates you and treats you the way they do. Even Iruka Sensei despises you.” Mizuki continued. 

“Time to die Naruto.” he said as he spun up his giant shuriken and threw it at Naruto.

It was way too fast for me to stop it from here, but what i could do was at least kill the shit head who threw it. By now I had figured out how to cast my shadow possession without the seals. So I used my shadow to snake over to Mizuki in the trees. He didn’t seem to notice as I grabbed his shadow, and made him fall out of the tree. It didn’t work though, as right before he hit the ground, he used substitution. Dammit, I hate that Jutsu. Looking over to Naruto, I saw that instead of an impaled Naruto, I saw the giant Shuriken sticking out of Iruka's back. Naruto was nowhere to be seen. I couldn’t quite hear what was being said, but Mizuki and Iruka were talking when suddenly he threw the shuriken back at him. Mizuki dodged and they both ran off. Shit, I had no idea how to help. All of my skills were useless right now. After this was over I was going to figure out how to use shadow bolt as soon as possible.

I wasn’t used to this kind of thing in this body, the adrenaline was affecting me differently than I was used to and everything was moving so fast. Throwing out a couple more pulses, I could only feel Naruto’s chakra, even though I knew of at least two other people here. However it was enough to find him. Once again I arrived too late to do anything, for all my tough talk I was certainly useless. I got there in time to see Naruto create a metric shit load of clones. All of them started wailing on Mizuki. 

He didn’t stand a chance and when all was said and done, he was lying there in a bloody mess, but still alive. At the very least I would fix that. After Naruto passed out, Iruka moved him to a tree some distance away and let the adrenaline wear off. Thankfully he still didn’t know I was there. While he was distracted I snuck up on Mizuki. He was still conscious.

“Kari? What are you doing here?” he asked, confused.

“You shouldn’t have opened your big mouth Mizuki, because of you, Naurto felt the worst pain he’d ever felt tonight.” I told him.

“Heh, so what? That little demon deserves it. And what are you gonna do? Kill me? There’s no way a mere child can do that, even in my weakened state.” he said, and as if to punctuate that, he coughed up some blood.

“Yes, that’s exactly what I'm going to do.” I whispered into Mizuki's ear, making his eyes go wide.

It was trivially easy; I called up my shadow lance and pointed it at him. My violet eyes glowing eerily. I was close enough to his face that I could see them casting a very faint light on him. The same thing often happened when I used my warlock magic back on Azeroth. This meant that I still had the magic in me, I just had to find a way to access it. But what triggered it? I had no idea; I would have to think about it later.

“Say goodbye, you waste of space” I said.

“No! Wait!” He tried, but I didn't let him continue.

Before he could go on another rant or some such, I stabbed him through the heart with my shadow lance. For good measure, I also stabbed him through the eye, punching into his brain. Always double tap your enemy, you never knew if they’d get up again. Realizing the sun was coming up, I knew I had to get out of there. I was glad none of his blood had gotten on me. Naruto was passed out, and Iruka was too distracted to notice me this far away; I was lucky.

“No one fucks with my friends” I whispered to myself as I walked away from the corpse.

 Unbeknownst to me, the Hokage, who was watching this whole thing with his crystal ball, shivered a little at my words. ‘Now i know what Shikaku meant during our meeting. She could be a valuable ally to the village, or the one who destroys it. Only time would tell.’ the Hokage thought to himself.

The next day I woke up with some anticipation. It would be the first day in a long while that I wouldn't have to go to school. I’d still be learning, but I'd be actively learning instead of being stuck inside a classroom. It was nice to know that all my friends had graduated as well. I was also dying to know what team I'd be put on. If tradition stands I'd be put on a team with Ino, Choji, and maybe Shikamaru. However with two Nara kids thrown into the mix it was hard to tell where I’d end up.

Getting dressed, I recalled last night's events. Overall I'd been pretty useless. The only thing I managed to do was develop a new way of finding Naruto. Maybe one day I could develop it further to find other people than just him. I was able to kill Mizuki at least, that was something. That waste of oxygen didn’t deserve to merely rot in a prison. He might escape one day and then where would we be? Better to just get rid of him now. I needed to improve my Jutsu, or find a way to otherwise gain a better edge.

I thought about how I could do that. Since I wasn’t having much luck getting my shadow bolt up and running, maybe I could try summoning one of my demons? But how would that work? In theory that was even harder to pull off; however maybe not as much as I thought. My demons were connected to my soul after all, so I suppose I'd just have to use that connection to bring them here. I knew I still had my warlock powers, otherwise my eyes wouldn’t have shone like they did last night, so it wasn’t impossible. I needed to find a summoning jutsu somewhere, so I could see how this world did things. I could modify how the chakra acted to summon a creature, to instead summon one of my demons.

I decided to ask my parents where I might find a summoning scroll. 

“Mom, dad, anyone home?” I called out as I walked downstairs. 

“Over here kiddo.” I heard dad say. I went to where he was in the living room. I found him reading a book.

“Dad, do you know where I might find a summoning scroll?” I asked

“Hmm, why would you want one of those?” he responded, obviously curious.

“I feel like I'm not quite strong enough to be a ninja, so I thought having a creature I could summon would help with that. Cover my weaknesses.” I told him.

“Kari, you’re only a Genin, you aren’t supposed to worry about stuff like that right now. But I suppose knowing you, I shouldn't be surprised. Check the Nara clan’s library, you might find something there.” Dad told me with a small smile.

“Thanks dad.” I said, before heading in that direction. 

Entering the library I went to the previously off limits jutsu section. I was looking for a few things. First, I needed a summoning jutsu to replicate its chakra flow. Second, I need anything related to space-time jutsus. There were several warlock spells that involved teleporting, so in order to replicate them I needed to understand how that worked in this world. Third, I needed more information on the Yin release; I had a theory that I could use the Yin release to use my shadowbolt, instead of a jutsu that used it.

After looking for about an hour, I only found two of my objectives. I found a simple summoning jutsu for rats; why rats? I have no idea, maybe it was supposed to get the user used to using a summoning jutsu before calling much bigger creatures. I also found more information on the Yin release, but that could wait until later. I was on this train of thought with summoning and I didn't want to get sidetracked now. 

Since I still had a few hours before I had to be at the Academy, I decided to try out the summoning jutsu right now. It would give me time to mentally analyze how the chakra moved, and I could think about how to change it while I was doing other things. In the Academy I had mastered all the different hand signs, so it was no big deal to perform the required seals for the summoning. Offering up a small amount of blood, I did what was required.

I did the seals, put my hand on the ground, my chakra moved and the black script appeared; but nothing happened. It felt like there was a block; I had made the connection with the rat summons, but it felt like it was… scared? It didn’t want to come. That was odd. I’d never heard of a summons being able to reject a summons before. After giving it some thought, I came to only one conclusion. My demons were either blocking the summons from happening, or the rat was terrified of said demons and/or me.

Honestly I wasn't all that disappointed. Rats weren’t really my thing anyway, and the summoning jutsu had done it’s thing enough for me to get an idea how it affected my chakra. One of the reasons I think sealless jutsu is considered so rare is because people don’t question how anything works. They just use the seals and let them guide their chakra, they didn’t bother trying to replicate how their chakra flows without the seals. In my opinion, seals were a crutch designed to learn how the jutsu worked. Granted this is probably a lot harder than I made it sound, after all I have loads of experience with mana, which is harder to control than chakra.

I didn’t have time to work out how to move my chakra right now, but at the very least, I could think about it until I did have time.

I was about to leave the house when dad called out.

“Hey, how did it go?” he asked

“Good and bad, I found a summoning scroll, but nothing happened.” I told him.

“That’s too bad, keep working on it and you’ll get it eventually” he encouraged.

“What animal did you find anyway?” he continued.

“The rat.” I said.

“That’s strange, I didn’t even know that was in the library, I've also never heard of the rat scroll.” he said confused.

“Neither have I. Anyway I have to go to the academy, they’re assigning Sensei’s today.” I told him with some excitement.

“Good luck, just hope you don’t get Kakashi” he said gravely.

It wasn’t a long trek to the school. By this point I had found the best route to get there. Upon arriving, I saw students trickling in. I didn’t see anyone from my class so I just walked in alone, and went to the classroom we’d been using for this year. I saw mostly familiar faces; Choji, Duck Butt, Hinata, Shikamaru had beaten me here, the Inuzuka kid I had learned was named Kiba, and the quiet kid from the Aburame clan, Shino. In the years since we started at the academy, I hadn't really hung out with any of them much. Only real exceptions being Choji, Hinata and Naruto. I’m kind of stuck with Shikamaru so he doesn’t count.

I took a seat near the middle of the class when Naruto came in. No one but me really noticed him come in, after all I was the only one who knew he passed. He took a seat right behind me, and beside Duck Butt, who didn’t notice him sit down in his brooding. Some time later and everything was pretty slow until those two loud mouths came bursting in the room yelling at each other about some race they’d had.

“No, I won the race! You were eating my dust and I could barely see you.” Pinkie had said.

“In your dreams Forehead, I was clearly the winner.” Ino shouted.

Then suddenly Pinkie had gotten distracted. I could guess the reason. The one guy she’d been obsessed with for years was sitting right behind me. As they were standing next to Naruto and Duck Butt, they were making a huge fuss and I was starting to get a headache. All of a sudden, Naruto hops up on the desk and crouches centimeters from his face. 

“I don’t get it, what’s the big deal with you Sasuke. Why do all the girls go crazy for you?” Naruto sneered. 

“Because I'm not a loser like you” he retorted.

“Hey Naruto, stop glaring at Sasuke!” Pinkie yelled.

Naruto got a hurt look on his face. Sorry kid, you fell for the wrong girl.  

Ignoring her Naruto glared harder at Sasuke and you could practically see sparks between them. It was then that I got a horrifically terrible idea. I couldn’t resist. I “accidentally” bumped Naruto from behind.

“Oh sorry Naruto, my bad, I wasn’t paying attention.” I said, batting my eyes at him in an attempt to be convincing. However he was occupied and didn’t see me. The effect from my “accidental” shove was that Naruto and Sasuke ended up lip locked with each other. Was that some tongue?

The room fell deadly silent for a few seconds before pandemonium ensued. All the girls were losing their shit, all pissed off that Sasuke had his first kiss stolen. As for me, I was on the floor dying of laughter. 

  -    -

In another room in the Academy, the Hokage and several jounin were watching everything that was happening.

“Is that him? The only survivor from the Uchiha clan?” the one with red eyes asked.

“Yes, his name is Sasuke Uchiha. One of the most promising new students along with Kira Nara” the Hokage told the group.

“Naruto Uzumaki huh?” one of them said.

Upon seeing what Kari had done to Naruto the hokage spoke

“As usual, those two are causing trouble”

“I dunno, what that girl did to Naruto was kind of funny” the red eyed woman said.

“You know what? I kind of agree.” another one of the jounin said.

“So do any of you want to volunteer on who to take? Or do I have to assign them?” the Hokage asked the group.

“I think it’s only fair that the best Jounin here takes the two best students.” one of the male Jounin said.

“Ugh, do you have any idea how much work that’s going to be?! I won’t be able to read my Icha Icha novels.” the person in question asked the room.

“Yes exactly, why do you think I don't want them? Plus that whole traumatized kid is out of my wheelhouse on how to deal with.” the same one as before said.

“You and Shikaku would get along great.” second one said.

“Why do you think I'm taking his son?” first said.

“Hey, if you’re taking one sibling, take both of them” the second begged.

“No way, besides two Naras on one team would be unbalanced.” first argued.

“Sorry, but I have to agree, two naras on one team would be unbalanced. Also, the best should train the best.” the red eyed shinobi from before piped up. 

“Then it’s settled. The one taking the Uchiha boy and the Nara girl is…” the Hokage began.

   -   -

“Alright everyone, settle down. I’ll now assign the teams for which you will be together for quite a few years.” Iruka said after getting everyone’s attention.

“You are now all ninjas, for better or for worse. All your challenges until now have been nothing compared to what you will face in the future. As fledgling ninja you will all be given the rank of Genin. All Genin are grouped up into three’s. Here are the following groups” Iruka sensei went on. 

I had zoned out for most of his assignments for the teams. I only paid attention again when I heard Naruto’s name. 

“And lastly, for team 7, Naruto Uzumaki, Sakura Haruno, Sasuke Uchiha, and Kari Nara.” the Sensei finished.

Naruto sulked, Sakura cheered, and I was just confused.

“Sensei, you said everyone would get 3 group members, but why do they get 4?” someone asked.

“Ah, that’s why I said their name last. The simplest answer is that there were an odd number of students. It wouldn’t be either kind, nor fair to put a fresh Genin on their own.” Iruka explained.

“Why does a good group like ours gotta be with a slug like sasuke anyway?” Naruto yelled.

“Simple. We put the two best students, with one of the worst students.” Iruka told him.

Worst? WORST?! Naruto had told me he had kept his grades up. I leveled my glare at Naruto. I could see him shiver without looking at me. I had seen one of his report cards, and the grades were if not the best, at least good. So it must have been a recent development of his grades slipping. 

“Naruto, I will stab you. Repeatedly.” I whispered under my breath. I saw him shrink back even more, so he must have heard me.

“Anyway, you will all report to your assigned classroom to meet your new Sensei.” Iruka said as he dismissed us.

   -   - 

Several hours later found us still sitting in our classroom waiting for whichever Sensei had been assigned to us. Personally I wouldn't want to teach a goofball like naruto.

“Where the hell is this guy? Why is our Sensei the only one that’s late?” Naruto shouted, pacing the room.

I was only half paying attention as I was trying to nap.

There was a cluttering sound, followed by Pinkie shrieking.

“What the hell are you doing Naruto?!”

“This is what the jerk gets for being so damn late” he said.

Oh boy, this was going to go well.

I could tell Sasuke didn’t think it would work, and I tended to agree. No way a veteran Shinobi would fall for such a thing; unless….

I decided to help Naruto with his little prank. Despite the good nap I was getting, I was also annoyed for having to wait this long. So to add a little insurance to his prank, I silently made a shadow span the width of the door on the floor. Just enough to trip over. I had made the shadow just in time as almost as soon as Naruto jumped off the stool the Sensei entered the room.

As I expected, he didn’t fall for the eraser; he ended up catching it, then looking between it and Naruto. Said knucklehead had preemptively started laughing at his would-be victim, Sensei pelted him in the head with the eraser. What he didn’t see was my shadow on the floor, and to my surprise he fell for that. I honestly didn’t expect him to fall for mine either, I just wanted to see what would happen. 

Sure enough, he ended up tripping, landing face first on the floor with his arms comically splayed out. Quickly retracting my shadow, I decided to let Naruto take the fall for this one. Everyone was quiet for a few seconds before Naruto started laughing all over again. Sensei didn’t say anything as he stood up and dusted himself off. Eventually though, he spoke.

“Hmmm, my name is Kakashi, and my first impression of this group… you’re a bunch of morons.”