An eye-opener

Konoha was often known as one of the largest hidden villages, if not the largest out of all of them. To match that statement, it underwent through expansions several times – both in population and size - there had once been a police force which kept order and safeguarded the village. A police force which it no longer boasted.

That job had belonged to the now non-existent Uchiha clan and only two members of the famous clan were believed to be still alive to this day.

So, to this day Konohagakure was massively understaffed after at least a hundred capable shinobi were murdered in cold-blood. As odd as it might seem, somehow, they had managed to quench the starving criminals of the village with the number of shinobis they had.

But this left much to be desired. They often left gaps in their formation during patrols. Gaps which were used by the more capable. In this case, the more capable being the oldest faction in Konoha excluding the main force itself.

Root.

A tree was large and massive, branches spreading everywhere. To keep that tree stable there must be a foundation, the roots. They do the dirty deed such as feeding and keeping it in one place.

Root was created with such an ideology. The ROOT division of the ANBU in Konoha were the dark side of the village, a dark side which existed under the leadership of an old hawk by the name of Danzo Shimura. An old man and veteran who lacked the use of a limb and the sight in one of his eyes.

He also served as one of the Hokage's council members and had nearly as much power as the Hokage himself. There was nothing in Konoha he could not find out if he so desired.

In a way, he was the Hokage's greatest mistake!

The aged veteran had plenty of scars to prove his loyalty to Konoha. His body was covered in bandages and there was even a scar in the shape of X on his chin which he proudly displayed.

In front of him were several ANBU operatives which one could easily distinguish were from the now long since discontinued ROOT Division based on their mask being different in shape and symbol.

On his hands there was a teacup filled to the brink. He delicately enjoyed drinking the warm tea while narrowing his eyes, clearly deeply in thought about his next series of actions. Placing down the teacup, he shared his wisdom with the others.

"For the last two years the old fool has had some sort of euphony, an awakening or you could even call it opening his eyes to reality. He's been actively trying to suppress whatever power I have over the village. Such crimes cannot be forgiven."

His words did not incur any reaction from the others present. It was not due to them not daring to, but it was as if silence was one with them, and they were one with silence itself.

"Crimes towards Konoha's justice will be punished, even if the source of it is supposed to be the voice of reason and the guardian of it."

Danzo stood up and walked around the room and let out a cold laugh.

…And this same man was now troubled by something he'd beaten around the bush for ages.

"It is time Konoha entered a new age."

xXx

Ren opened his eyes and was meet with the familiar floor which was shared by his house. A sigh soon escaped his mouth as he realized what this meant.

'So, everything which I saw and did in that sewer-like mindscape is actually true.'

He felt something solid and cold laying on his palm. Looking at it he saw the ceremonial knife he had shown the Kyuubi.

'Seals broken or used during a trip to a mindscape will disappear in the real world it seems.'

He used another storage seal and stored the knife away until he had further need for it. Wincing at the uncomfortable feeling passing through him right now, he stood up and looked around.

There was something missing – or rather someone.

"Naruto."

Had he really spent twelve hours inside his mindscape, or had he perhaps underestimated Naruto's Uzumaki physiology… or the fact he was a jinchuuriki. His vitality must be off the chart!

Ren started to panic, he was scared of what an angry and off-the-leash Naruto could do to someone he hated or was mad at. His sensor abilities were not helping him at all, most likely they were disrupted by the contact made with the vile chakra of the Kyuubi.

He leaped to action almost immediately. His hands flashed through several hand seals and the effects were near-instant. The world around him brimmed to life with over a couple dozens of clones appearing with a burst of smoke.

'First let's check the academy, then the Hokage Heads and then the playground.'

XxX

Landing from a tree branch to another was the familiar figure of a blond. Uzumaki Naruto needed time alone to clear his feelings over the development of the last few weeks. First, he had woken up after experiencing what could only be described as a nightmare.

Then, he had found out said nightmare was actually true, and that there was a nine-tailed fox sealed inside him from his best friend who had kept it a secret from him.

He let a leg freely hang out while using the tree itself as support.

"Feeling lonely, Naruto?" A gentle and soft voice called out, earning his full attention. It was none other than one of their academy instructors, Mizuki who still was garbed with a bandage around his head and winced comfortably with every step he took.

Just the look of his current state made Naruto chuckle in his heart who got a reminder of the taijutsu exam which was held recently

'Ren used you as a punching bag and judging by how you reacted to it, you clearly are not a good person.'

If there was anything he detested more than the villagers who ignored, shunned and often hated on, it was people like Mizuki who hid their true personality under a carefully tended appearance and fooled everyone around them.

He was not one to doubt Ren's words as well, excluding the current situation, Ren had never led him astray… Then why did he not let the latter explain why he had hidden the truth from him?

His eyes widened, a sudden feel of wanting to smack himself came to him. 'Why must I be such a fool, I'm literally his best friend and the cousin he knows the best, why would he ever try to make a fool out of me?'

"Hello, Mizuki-sensei. Not like it's my job to state this, but shouldn't you be home with your fiancée instead of bothering with a hopeless boy like me?"

The older man smiled at him and jumped up to the branch Naruto was sitting and also sat down, ignoring the pain which came from his body at the sudden act. Ren had beaten him down to a pulp and it would take well over a week to recover completely.

"You don't need to be so harsh with me. I'm just worried about my old student's wellbeing."

'As if, you double-faced bastard. Instead of talking to you, I could be on my way to apologize to Ren for my previous outburst, dattebayo!'

Naruto opted to stay silent and gathered his legs together and straightened his body, his back facing the tree. The silence irked Mizuki after a minute, to the point the blue-haired man decided to break it.

"You know, I wasn't able to speak to you yesterday due to… the misfortunate incident. You see, there is actually a third part of the exam to graduate which is not directly told to the students, but only to the ones we believe are the brightest."

If there was something which could be more directly translated into "bullshit" than this, Naruto would buy them a bowl of ramen from the Ichiraku's. He'd be the first to admit that he was not that smart, in fact he was pretty dumb most of the time, he was what you could call not the sharpest kunai out of the bunch.

… But he could easily smell out something as dumb as this when it was so obvious, but he still let Mizuki continue. Why did he think tha? Besides that it sounded exactly like a load of bull, he highly doubted Ren wouldn't be aware of it ahead of him and the latter had been with him all day, and was sleeping on the floor of his room…

Oops, had he really ignored his friend who most likely had fainted?

Mizuki misunderstood his silence as him buying the act, so a small smirk made an appearance on his countenance as words rolled out of his tongue.

'Just as I thought, the fox demon must've fucked up his brain or something hahaha. It should be easy to get rid of him. Now he just has to bring me the scroll and distract the ANBU so I can escape with it and go to Orochimaru-sama.'

Lost in the lies of his own success as he spoke, he never noticed a certain redhead spying on the two and Naruto looking that way while closing an eye.

XxX

"So Mizuki ended up being a traitor, how unfortunate. At least Naruto is no longer mad at me and actually agreed to cooperate with me. We've completely fooled him. I hope we get some sort of reward out of this though."

Ren chased after the mentioned person who now held a scroll in his back, a fake one. Ren had the chance to look on the Scroll of the Forbidden Seals, or also known as Scroll of Seals once. A favor and chance he had received simply because of his background and fuinjutsu prowess.

Of course, he hadn't been able to see what's inside of it, but copying the outside had been easy. It was also apparent that Mizuki was in a sort of rush and had not even bothered to check the contents fo it.

If he had done as such, he'd notice that the scroll certainly did not contain forbidden techniques such as the Shadow Clone Jutsu or anything of that sort.

Making a fake one capable of fooling Mizuki, a chunin with no particular eye-catching abilities was a piece of cake for him, not like he was bragging or anything…

… And setting a seal barrier which made Mizuki think he was moving outside the village was even easier. Little did the chunin know that there was an ANBU squad headed this way to apprehend him.

Getting the Hokage to do such a thing was pretty easy, things considered. After all both he and Naruto had lots of power over the village due to the fact that they were the last remnants of the Uzumaki And Senju Clans – at least for Ren it was both.

The last thing Mizuki saw before his eventual demise was the dull side of a blade and the haunting eyes of a person using a cat-shaped mask.