With Kurama
(and the Uzumaki-Namikaze Twins)

Naruto winced where he lay on the sealing altar, feeling the ridiculously heavy chakra of the Kyūbi no Kitsune weigh on his tiny stomach. The fox considerately did not struggle, making the process much less uncomfortable, but it was still painful for a foreign chakra to enter his body with or without a seal as an intermediary. The blond child valiantly fought against the urge to fall into unconsciousness but allowed his eyes seem to slide shut when he had really left them a crack open to be able to see his surroundings while hiding the fact that he was still awake.

Kushina, on the other hand, was not so lucky. As the adrenaline wore off, she collapsed to the ground limply. Minato, on the other hand, just rushed to his wife's side, picking up the woman bridal-style and scooping up the blond baby.

He took his wife and son to the safe-house where his two biological children had slept through the whole fiasco. Minato made two shadow clones to carry Kushina and Naruto, picking up his children, one in each arm. He had known from the start, thanks to Tsunade's checkup, that he was to have one son and one daughter, but he had not known which was which. Minato picked up the two children and made a quick check (he had the right to, after all, he was their father), finding out that the red-haired child with fairer skin like Kushina's was female while the red-blond haired child that had his natural tan was the male child. Minato wondered briefly about the colour of the eyes of his children, musing that it would definitely be adorable to see a mini Kushina running around the village pulling pranks on people. While Natsume had a facial structure that vaguely resembled Kushina's rounded face, Naomi's facial structure was more defined, resembling her father more.

Minato compared his twin children to their adopted older brother, finding himself smiling at the sight. Naruto fit right in with his two dear children. A redhead, a blond and a blond with natural red highlights when put together was not strange at all. Naruto looked like one of his own children, just a little older. Minato sighed as he realised that the blond child was going to be in a different graduating class from the two younger children if he decided to attend the shinobi academy, which was very likely seeing as both he and his wife were very high ranking shinobi.

Minato flashed back to the village using his hiraishin and ordered his clone to drop Kushina off at the hospital before bringing his three children along to address the village.

"People of Konoha. I am saddened to announce that our shinobi forces have been reduced to seventy-five per cent of its original population due to the unprecedented strike by the Kyūbi no Kitsune. I would like to inform all of you that this was neither an accident nor an occurrence caused by a malfunction of the seal that kept the fox sealed in its jinchūriki. It was pure foul play, a ploy carried out by a strange man with an orange swirled mask who possesses the Sharingan of the Uchiha clan. Though the unknown intruder bore their kekkei-genkai, I can safely say that this attack was not the doing of the Uchiha clan that resides within Konoha. It was either an Uchiha that had never been accounted for or one that was presumed to be dead, which I deduced because of the lack of similarity of the chakra signature of the man and any Uchiha in the village. May we all remain vigilant and remain prepared for another attack, however unlikely it is!" Minato declared, the crowd receiving his speech with loud cheering and smattering applause.

"The Kyūbi no Kitsune has been safely defeated and sealed into a new jinchūriki. Though the identity of the jinchūriki is not to be revealed, I would like to inform all of you here that the jinchūriki is merely the only line of defence between our village and the mighty bijū. This is why I am here to tell all of you that the jinchūriki of the fox is the real hero of the day. Not me, who did the sealing. Not Kushina, who held the fox down as it was sealed. No, your hero is the one whose life has been sacrificed for our village. The sealing scroll that contains the kunai is harmless. However, the kunai in the scroll is the one that can truly harm. As long as no one does anything to remove said kunai from its scroll, it is harmless. A scroll cannot kill, it is the kunai that can cut. For protecting the village from the demon fox, let us all applaud the one who had made a huge sacrifice to save our village from its destruction!" Minato finished soulfully.

Although the shinobi below as well as the civilians that had been released from the safe-houses were silent for a full minute as they seemed to contemplate and process their Hokage's words, all got over their shock and clapped and cheered once Kakashi had boldly disrupted the awkward silence with loud applause. Though many were scowling and scanning the distance for the possible jinchūriki at the start of the second part of Minato's speech, all had stopped doing so near the end of it, favouring listening to their beloved Hokage talk about the sacrifice made by the jinchūriki. Many then commended the strength of the previous jinchūriki for having held the bijū back from destroying the village while even more admired the sacrifice made by the unknown jinchūriki to save the village.

Naruto was surprised by how well the citizens of Konoha, shinobi and civilian alike, took to Minato's words. He had expected them to shun the existence of the jinchūriki as the general populace had seemed to regardless of what Minato told them. He could not help but respect the man for his ability to change the perceptions of others with his undeniable charisma. Though he could see how a man who knew when to push, when to give in and when and how to go about conveying certain things to do what is best for his village became Hokage, he still saw the man as the murderer of his parents. This could not be helped, seeing as Minato did assassinate his beloved parents and take him away from his precious older brother, but Naruto could at least let his guard down enough to allow himself to drift off into unconsciousness as he had stopped himself from doing before.

Naruto felt himself in something wet but warm and opened his eyes to find himself in a blue river (with a bit of gold that trailed through it without mixing with the blue) of what he deduced was his chakra when he noticed a larger red river beside it that leaked some red chakra into the larger blue river where smaller blue channels converged constantly. Naruto followed the red river upstream, ignoring the forests that looked rather similar to the forests of Hi no Kuni as he trekked towards the source of the red chakra. He guessed that it was the chakra of the Kyūbi, considering that it had just been sealed within him only moments before.

Naruto saw that the chakra flowed from the side of an enormous tree that had the strangest glowing leaves of all colours and shapes. A large hollow could be seen at the bottom of the tree, the insides seeming dark and foreboding. Naruto ignored that and approached the hollow, entering the space without a second thought. His suspicions were proven right when the enormous fox came into view behind a translucent bluish barrier looking miserable about being stuck in such an enclosed space.

The Kyūbi perked up when he saw Naruto enter, stretching as he uncurled his body from how he had been curled up like a cat. The fox padded to the barrier and stared at his new jailor, nodding approvingly after scrutinising him as though searching for something. The fox seated himself on the ground and motioned for Naruto to join him, stretching out a tail for the tiny blond.

Naruto complied and walked through the barrier without hesitation and sat on the tail offered to him by this nine-tailed fox. Naruto stroked the fur, surprised by how soft and fluffy it was. The fox only laughed at the child's antics and brought his tail upwards such that Naruto could look him in the eye.

"Hello, young Kagami," the fox greeted, Naruto recognising the form of address from how his mother had been addressed by other shinobi.

"Hello, kitsune," Naruto greeted simply, noticing that it was easier for him to talk in this place.

"Welcome to your mindscape, though I do not know what it looks like..." the fox said grandly before mumbling the second part of his sentence under his breath.

Naruto ignored the welcome that he had been given by the fox, bouncing to his feet as he balanced carefully on the fluffy tail.

"I'm Kagami Naruto! What's your name?" Naruto asked cheerfully.

"Do you not believe the other humans when they say that my name is Kyūbi?" the fox asked, genuinely curious about Naruto's reply.

"Of course not! The Ichibi has a name, Shukaku. The Ichibi part is just his title, One Tail. You are the Kyūbi, the Nine-Tails. That is just your title! What is your name?" Naruto repeated with a pout.

The fox chuckled before replying kindly, "I'm Kurama. Only you Kagami would bother to ask for my name. Any other human just labelled me as the nine tails and left it at that."

Naruto's eyes began to sparkle as he leaned forward to get closer to the fox, falling off before he was deftly caught by a second tail, "Tell me more! What do you know about my clan and kekkei-genkai?"

Kurama shook his head, already fond of the adorable blond, chiding lightly, "Careful there. You almost fell."

Naruto frowned, "If I fell, you would catch me as you did before, no?"

"Of course, but it is dangerous nonetheless," Kurama replied with a sigh.

Naruto sat down on the tail with a huff, snuggling up to the fur as he got comfortable in preparation for what he knew would be a long story. Kurama told Naruto all about his clan, even explaining the abilities of his kekkei-genkai and how they worked. Kurama had hesitated before telling the blond that he was immortal, having checked the boy for the particular trait that the immortal Kagami had shared while they still existed. It was what seemed to be another colour swirling in the depths of the eyes that remained regardless of whether the dōjutsu had been activated. That was what he had been scrutinising the blond for, along with the presence of the small birthmark that the immortals were born with at the nape of their necks. It looked like the Kagami clan symbol had been branded into his skin, though it was completely natural as seen in the obvious lack of scar tissue on the tender skin there.

Kurama even bothered to explain what happened if Naruto's opponent were to land a killing blow. The truth was, each and every one of the immortal Kagami had been from the main branch. When they receive a killing blow or lose a body part, they could either choose for any dismantled body parts to quickly pass through a mirror where they would be reconnected (if the body had been thoroughly destroyed, only the consciousness would be transported and another body would be constructed) by the bloodline that had given them immortality. Alternatively, they would leave a reflection-turned-real replica of their dead body. This meant that they were able to perfectly fake their deaths to anyone who did not know of their immortal status. The "transporting to another location after losing body parts" option looked a lot like the Izanagi of the Uchiha's Sharingan. They were really unaffected by immense blood loss and could actually stop the blood flow if they wanted to. In other words, the blood flowing through their bodies is only for show as the bodies of immortal Kagami clan members did not need their blood to survive.

There was also the choice for him to remain conscious even if a major body part (for example his head) were to be detached, but Kurama did not want to tell Naruto about it as actually found it quite disgusting.

Naruto listened attentively as Kurama ended the story of his clan and began to tell him about Hagoromo, who Kurama had referred to as his father, and his children. Naruto found out about the rivalry between the Uchiha and Senju and about how Uchiha Madara had controlled Kurama to fight against Hashirama, which had led to Kurama being sealed for the first time. Kurama told Naruto about how Madara was actually still alive after his supposed death after his battle with Hashirama that had been named the Valley of the End in honour of their battle. Madara had been, for some reason, wielding a sword that was capable of storing a whole pint of blood.

Kurama began to talk about how his previous two jinchūriki had either held him down with torii or chained him down with chakra, at some point shifting to his vendetta against Uchiha Madara and the masked Uchiha. Kurama told Naruto that the man had claimed to be Uchiha Madara when he clearly was not the powerful man and did not possess the same ocular abilities and chakra as Madara. Kurama began ranting about how Uchiha were arrogant, snobbish pricks with sticks stuck up their asses after he mentioned Madara.

Naruto had listened quietly despite not being particularly interested in how the Uchiha thought that they were god almighty with their oh-so-amazing Sharingan, knowing that Kurama just needed to vent his annoyance at practically everything as he had been pinned down without his freedom for far too long. He waited patiently for the fox to finish, calmly watching as Kurama finally stopped talking when he had run out of things to complain about.

"At least I will never have to watch you die," Kurama said with a sigh, vowing to never tell Naruto about the sacrificial jutsu that he found largely pointless and not worth sacrificing his life for.

Naruto shrugged, unable to help but flinch as his mother's death seemed to flash before his eyes, making Kurama's eyes soften as the fox asked, "How old are you, kit? You're awfully tiny."

"I'm... uh..." Naruto counted off the months on his fingers, holding out seven fingers in front of his face.

"Seven," Kurama supplied.

"I'm seven months and a week old," Naruto told Kurama, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly.

Kurama was shocked. A baby, not even one year old, was able to speak so well. Of course, the boy stumbled a little when he spoke and paused very long to think about how he should say it to convey his thoughts. However, he still had quite a range of vocabulary to be able to understand so much of what Kurama had said. Moreover, Naruto was able to walk unaided. This was evident in how Naruto had managed to avoid Kushina's notice as he followed her to the clearing where Kurama had been. The boy had managed to coordinate his limbs well enough that his two adoptive parents did not notice him until he had chosen to reveal himself. They were shinobi. Among the most powerful ones of their time, even. Though the child's status as an immortal might have increased his rate of mental and physical development, it still should not be possible for an infant to catch two trained shinobi off-guard.

Naruto tilted his head to the side before he hopped off the tail, winds catching him and helping him land gently.

"Would you like to have this barrier removed, Kurama?" Naruto asked, a sly smile creeping over his slightly chubby features.

"Why not?" Kurama asked rhetorically, feeling uncomfortable with how the boy looked at him so expectantly.

Naruto smiled cheekily, "Well that's because I'm going to do this!"

All at once, the barrier came down and the kanji for seal shimmered out of existence, a weight appeared on the fox's neck and multiple beams of coloured light began to shine into the large hollow, leaving Kurama blinking for ten seconds as he processed what had happened. The fox looked down to see what was on his neck, only to see something that annoyed him (only slightly, though).

"Why did you make me wear a collar?" Kurama asked Naruto while frowning with displeasure.

Kurama hated dogs. It had something to do with his foxy nature.

"It is better than stopping you from your freedom, no? The seal cannot be removed by an.... an... amateur like me, anyway," Naruto replied while giggling uncontrollably.

Kurama sighed as he stepped out of the hollow, nodding appreciatively at the beautiful forest that was Naruto's mindscape.

"You have style, kit," Kurama commented.

Kurama felt his nose twitch and his ears go flat when he saw a large rabbit run across the field. His tails began to swing before Kurama bounded off, chasing after the poor rabbit. Naruto just shook his head at the millennium-old fox, following for a short distance until he reached the other end of the clearing to watch the fox.

"I should go now. See you!" Naruto called out as his manifestation within his mindscape vanished into a breeze.

Naruto opened his eyes to find himself in his own cot at the left of the king-sized bed that Minato and Kushina shared. He sat up to see that the two cots on the other side of the bed were empty, groaning as he did so. Naruto climbed onto the top of the barrier on the side of his cot, which prevented him from falling to the ground in his sleep and jumped. Naruto fell onto the bed with practised ease and rolled toward the side, carefully climbing down the high bed at its foot.

Naruto padded out of the empty room and into the corridor, climbing down the stairs slowly step by step as he took solace in the fact that everything in the house had already been made baby-proof and baby-safe when Kushina decided to adopt him. Naruto entered the living room where he saw the Hokage with his wife and their two children.

Naruto walked over and tugged on the hem of Kushina's skirt, rubbing his eyes and yawning cutely. Kushina resisted her urge to squeal at how adorable her eldest son was and smiled down at the little boy, still but a baby, before picking him up and placing him in her lap beside his new younger brother. Naruto blinked at the little thing, with a slightly misshapen head and eyes closed into slits.

Naruto reached out, looking at Kushina as though asking for permission. Kushina smiled at him, placing the tiny hand on the younger infant's leg. Naruto poked it, watching in amazement as the leg twitched and kicked out. Natsume whined as he was awakened from his nap and began reaching blindly for the offending object, opening his blue eyes for the first time.

Natsume's eyes shifted back and forth, unfocused until Naruto leaned in closer until he was nose-to-nose with the younger infant, which earned him a happy gurgle (the baby's first sound besides crying). Kushina and Minato watched on in awe as their adopted son interacted with their youngest, slightly jealous that Naruto had been the first person that Natsume had ever seen. Natsume gazed into the eyes of his older brother, mesmerised by the swirling undercurrents that neither Minato nor Kushina had noticed. Natsume reached out and grabbed Naruto's shirt, the boy not falling off the woman's lap only because of the arm that the woman used to support his back.

Naruto stiffened and tried to pry off the tiny hands of his adoptive sibling, making Minato and Kushina chuckle at the unrelated siblings as they interacted. Kushina eyes then widened as she noticed something that neither she nor Minato had before.

"Ne, Minato-kun," Kushina said softly so as to not disturb the sleeping Naomi.

"Hmm?" Minato hummed, shifting his daughter to his other arm as he looked at his wife questioningly.

"I thought that the Kyūbi can only ever be sealed in Uzumaki? The fact that Naruto had survived might very well be just pure luck. What would you have done if Naruto did not survive the sealing, huh?" Kushina asked him with a raised eyebrow.

Minato's eyes widened. He had completely forgotten that the chakra of the Kyūbi no Kitsune was too heavy for anyone other than an Uzumaki to be able to contain. This meant that Naruto was either really lucky to survive or that Naruto actually had some form of Uzumaki heritage. Although it was neither, the two adults did not know that.

Kushina gazed at the children in her lap, her two babies. She was glad that Naruto had survived. If he did not, well, they did not know what they would have done.

"It is most likely that Naruto is actually descended from one of the other Uzumaki survivors," Minato paused before continuing, "I am sorry for killing your clansman."

Naruto only listened quietly as the two adults came to the outrageous conclusion that he was an Uzumaki.

"His mother had explosion release while his father was blond. I don't know which one has been Uzumaki. It should have been the man, though," Minato told his wife.

Kushina nodded, frowning. Her husband had killed her relative. She was glad that he had taken Naruto back with him to Konoha, though. Kushina helped to detach the small hands from Naruto's clothes and embraced him tightly.

Naruto squeaked as he squirmed slightly before giving up when he decided that the woman was not going to let go of him anytime soon. Naruto let the woman hold him as he just sat there awkwardly. Minato just smiled at the sight.

💣

Naruto stumbled as he crawled out of his bed in the room that he had just been moved into a week after his third birthday (which was the day the two Konoha nin had decided to celebrate as his birthday despite it only being his anniversary of the day he left Iwa and joined Konoha), the two decided that the boy was old enough to move out of the nursery that he had shared with his two adoptive siblings. He padded out of the room and made his way out into the corridor.

Just as he was going to make his way to the master bedroom to find Kushina to ask her for breakfast, Naruto was tackled by a red and yellow blur. Naruto fell onto his butt, disoriented as he blinked owlishly at the smaller child straddling his waist with eyes glittering in excitement.

"Naru-nii!" the said child giggled as the child rolled off the older boy, bouncing on the balls of his feet while he stared at Naruto expectantly.

Naruto raised an eyebrow, doing his best to keep a frown off his face as the face of Namikaze Minato fleetingly passed through his thoughts due to how much his son had taken after him. The damned Hokage kept trying to convince Kushina to begin training him to become a weapon for the weak village while neither said man nor his wife had ever considered that he might have preferred being returned to Iwa, though that was not much of a choice due to his recent status as Kyūbi Jinchūriki. The two adults practically stole him from his home village without remorse. They did seem to have felt bad for orphaning him, but they never regretted taking him away from Iwa.

For that reason, Naruto decided to call them "cradle-robbers". They did not treat him badly and acted as though he was actually their son for the most part, but the man had already lost his trust on the day he killed the two Kagami that had made up two-thirds of his small world. Naruto did learn to ease up around the blond. Well, mostly.

Of course, Naruto would remain prepared to be attacked by that man in his sleep but that was justifiable considering what the man had done to the young child when he was still an infant.

Naruto sighed and stood up, dusting off imaginary dust as he began to make his way to the bedroom belonging to Kushina and Minato. He had hoped to make his way there without more trouble, but that was just his wishful thinking. He was tackled again. It was a red-haired child, though.

Naruto sighed and carefully pushed the younger child off, groaning, "What is it, Natsume, Naomi?"

"Aniki, it's just that you..." Naomi began, only for Natsume to finish, "Promised to play Shinobi with us!"

Naruto sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, "What did I say about talking like that?"

"Not to do it," the twins chorused innocently.

"So why are you doing it?" a threatening note crept into Naruto's voice, making both children gulp subconsciously.

"Sorry, Naru-nii!" Natsume yelped as Naomi squeaked at the same time, "Sorry, Aniki!"

Naruto only clicked his tongue, continuing towards the master bedroom as the twins followed behind him like little ducklings. After a period of silence and before the immortal boy opened the door, Naruto turned back to the two children. He smiled (there was no reason to blame children for their father's sin).

"After breakfast," Naruto said simply, but that alone made two overly hyper toddlers google and dance around happily.

"Yay!"

Naruto shook his head and knocked on the wooden door, opening it before he received a reply.

"Ōhayo, tou-san, kaa-san," Naruto greeted, repressing his urge to say it with a monotone.

"Naru-chan," Kushina replied with a warm smile, poking Minato in the side to wake him up.

The blond groaned, opening his eyes sleepily, "Hmm? Good morning, Kushina."

When Minato's eyes focused, he added, "Morning, Naruto."

The twins poked their heads into the room, peeking at their family members.

"Tou-san, kaa-chan!" the two called out in glee as Naomi jumped on Minato while Natsume scrambled onto Kushina.

Kushina giggled, poking Natsume in the nose, "Good morning, my little ones."

Minato chuckled at his wife's fond adoration for their children, ruffling Naomi's hair as he greeted, "Good morning, hime, Natsume."

Naruto watched awkwardly, waiting for the family moment to end so he could ask for breakfast. Kushina felt a pang of guilt when she noticed her adopted son stand beside their bed, looking out of place. She smiled at the boy and motioned to the empty spot beside her.

"Come over here, sochi," Kushina invited, guilty that she had almost forgotten Naruto.

Minato's eyes widened as he noticed what had happened, proceeding to smile encouragingly at the boy as a flash of guilt crossed his eyes. Naruto shook his head, refusing to intrude into their happy family. Both Minato and Kushina felt a bit hurt at that. Perhaps they did not do enough to make the boy feel welcome in their home?

"I just came here to request for kaa-san to make food," Naruto rejected politely, "Besides, does tou-san not have to get to his office by eight o'clock?"

"It's okay. I still have an hour," Minato told Naruto, hoping that he would stop distracting himself.

Kushina kicked her husband in the shin discreetly under the cover of the comforter, setting her son on the bed before approaching Naruto. She stopped in front of the child and kneeled in front of him, wrapping her arms around Naruto before he could protest. She held the boy tightly as she felt a tear escape her eye.

"Everything's alright, Naruto. Won't you tell me what's bothering you? We're family, after all," Kushina's words were completely sincere, having thought of the child as her own son (especially since she had found out that Naruto was actually a distant cousin -- which was not true as he only replicated all Uzumaki traits in himself through editing his DNA to make him completely independent from the person he had copied it from, something he had gathered from talking to Kurama which had also lead to his confusion as to why the mangekyō Sharingan been almost an exact copy of that of the unknown man with only a few extra features) from the beginning.

Naruto had to stifle his laughter, only for Kushina to misunderstand his actions as she thought that he was sobbing on her shoulder. 'The poor child deserves to let down his guard and cry sometimes,' Kushina thought to herself as she gently pets Naruto's head.

"There, there," Kushina said reassuringly, only causing Naruto to shake harder as he had to do more to stifle his laughter.

Naomi and Natsume kept their distance despite not knowing what was going on. From the look that their father shot them, it was personal and not something they should intrude on. Naruto took three minutes to fully suppress the guffaws that had threatened to bubble from his chest, breathing heavier at the end of it as he pulled away and made a big show of wiping off his tears of laughter to make it seem more like he had been crying.

Naruto felt as though the two were much too easy to fool sometimes. Were shinobi not meant to look underneath the underneath? At least that was a supposedly important quote from one of the books about shinobi that his adopted parents had told him to read after he had learnt how to read on his own (he had some help from Kurama with the pronunciations of some of the more difficult kanji, though he instantly absorbed the knowledge and never had to ask the same question more than once). Seeing as the two were believing his acting, they probably did not take those words to heart.

Naruto smiled weakly, sniffling before asking when his stomach growled, "Will you please make breakfast, kaa-san? I'm hungry."

The twins' stomachs made synchronised grumbles of agreement, causing the two adults to laugh as they began to busy themselves with preparing for the day ahead.

A week later, Minato brought up the matter of whether Naruto was to start his training — which he would only have to do if he chose to attend the academy, of course. Naruto readily agreed, deciding that he would also train more with Kurama so that he would be able to graduate earlier and get closer to reuniting with his brother. This lead to a whole pile of books that he was told to study before he could actually start on the actual training.

Naruto chose not to complain and studied all the books carefully, researching more about everything that had been mentioned within the books while treating information from said books as a basic overview instead of the study material. Neither Minato nor Kushina had expected it of him. Naruto then made consolidated notes about every topic he had found, detailed enough that even ANBU could make use of his notes. He had obviously studied fūinjutsu and worked on his calligraphy first before going through everything else. This caused Naruto to look through almost every book in the Uzumaki-Namikaze library, which had a copy of almost every book in the elemental nations (Minato and Kushina are actually quite the knowledge hoggers/hoarders).

Naruto managed this with the help of shadow clones, a jutsu he had copied from a silver-haired jōnin who had been sparring with a strange man with a bowl cut and huge eyebrows who was wearing a green latex jumpsuit. Naruto had also copied several other techniques from other shinobi around the village, having had his chakra unlocked from the very beginning.

Naruto had found out about the perks of the shadow cloning technique by accident when he sent a clone off to help him copy techniques from other shinobi -- which actually got him a byakugan -- before it got dispelled and he received the information. Naruto had used shadow clones heavily in his studies, spamming a good one hundred to study a certain topic before dispelling while leaving ten to sort through the information before eight dispelled and the last two wrote everything down neatly. The actual Naruto, in the meantime, stayed in his mindscape and learnt how to use his kekkei-genkai under Kurama's guidance.

Naruto mastered mirror-travel within the first month and had tried visiting Suna where he met a red-haired jinchūriki whom he befriended (and copied the kekkei-genkai of) immediately. Naruto promised to learn more about seals to once day fix his friend's faulty seal and get Shukaku to cooperate with him. This jinchūriki was Gaara, the son of the Yondaime Kazekage and the Jinchūriki of Shukaku, the Ichibi no Tanuki.

Naruto was about to head home after parting with Gaara but fell out of a reflective surface in the Mizukage's office (the glass of a random photo frame). He noticed that a boy who looked like he was nine years old and wore the traditional robes of the Mizukage had the pattern of the masked man's Mangekyō Sharingan in his eyes, looking rather dazed. The boy who appeared to be the Mizukage did not notice the three-year-old who was watching him.

Naruto sank back into the glass surface of the framed picture, deciding to observe the Mizukage for a while. His decision was rewarded with an odd revelation. The Mizukage seemed to be controlled by someone, most likely the unknown Uchiha that had extracted the Kyūbi from Kushina and was fighting back with little success. Seeing as the boy appeared to be controlled by the Uchiha's Sharingan, Naruto thought that it would have made sense for Naruto to release the Mizukage using the same Sharingan.

Naruto saw some reports on the table, obviously written such that all the wars appeared to have been traced back to the bloodlines with kekkei-genkai. He frowned. Was the stupid Uchiha trying to start a civil war in Kiri? What in the world is that man trying to achieve?

Naruto decided against waiting for the Uchiha to actually start the civil war and used one of the unbreakable and unnoticeable illusions he knew how to use with his kekkei-genkai to look like a plain black haired teen with forest green eyes, not yet wanting the Uchiha to know of his existence. He melded out of the glass window behind the Mizukage, closing the distance soundlessly and placing a hand on the boy's shoulder. The Uchiha flinched and quickly hid the control he had over the Mizukage by making the markings in the Mizukage's eyes vanish, at the same time giving the owner of the body more control over himself.

The Mizukage spun around to face the intruder, preparing to call in the two Swordsmen that stood guard at his door. Before he could do that, the taller figure loomed impossibly over him, the green of his eyes shifting to red as tomoe formed by breaking away from the pupils to form comma-like markings in his eyes. These eyes morphed further to reveal a pair of mangekyō Sharingan with a pattern identical to that of the masked man. The Uchiha took full control over the Mizukage who had become his puppet, causing the pattern of the mangekyō to form in the Mizukage's eyes.

The two pairs of eyes stared into one another, the ones belonging to the "teen" were slightly bored while the Uchiha seethed angrily at how his eyes have somehow been replicated.

The controller started grumbling under his breath, Naruto's close proximity allowing him to hear everything, "Must have been Bakashi. He probably let a medic-nin or something use the cells found in my other eye to make artificial copies of my eyes and implanted it into this brat, though I wonder why his eyes were green before. If I had known that the idiot would kill Rin, I would never have let him have my eye! Minato-sensei was useless too. Kiiroi Senko, what a joke. He was too slow to save Rin!"

Naruto raised an eyebrow, thinking quietly, 'So my life was not the only one that the cradle-robber had ruined, huh?'

Naruto was not really that surprised, but he compared the information that the masked man had just revealed with the information he had about Minato's genin team. There were two boys and a girl. One was the prodigy, the other was the hardworking one. The girl knew a bit of medical ninjutsu and was a support type shinobi. The first was Hatake Kakashi, most likely the Bakashi that the Uchiha mentioned. The hardworking one was an Uchiha with different ideals from the rest of his clan, a boy named Uchiha Obito who was said to have died at the Kanabi Bridge during the Third Shinobi War. Their medic was a girl called Nohara Rin, who died a while after Obito.

'From what the Uchiha had said about giving Kakashi his eye, I can already deduce that this person is actually Uchiha Obito!' Naruto shouted mentally, alerting Kurama who merely shook his head fondly at the intelligent child.

"Let me guess, you are Uchiha Obito," Naruto said offhandedly, watching for his reaction.

Obito flinched violently, glaring at Naruto with the appearance of a trapped animal. Obito's heartbeat sped up as he stared at the child hiding under an illusion. Obito looked as though he was beginning to hyperventilate.

"How did you know?" Obito screeched.

"You are too obvious," Naruto replied with a click of his tongue.