Chapter 1

[Welcome to Naruto Ultimate Path!]

[Please, insert your character name, appearance, and background.]

Looking at the floating words on the screen, Ryuu smiled happily as he inserted everything just like he had always dreamed.

His name would be Ryuu and he chose to be from a Noble clan from Hidden Leaf Village. Unfortunately, the game doesn't allow him to choose the clan, otherwise, he would have most surely picked the Uchiha for their extremely useful Sharingan. Because he was lazy to change his appearance, he simply clicked the button to use his real-life appearance.

With a foolish smile on his face, Ryuu clicked the start button but something unexpected happened.

Rather than a load screen, what appeared was a string of text with gibberish written on it.

[#$%&*#...]

Rows of code-like texts ran down the left side of his field of view, and before he knew it, a strange smell of barbeque reached his nose followed by a feeling of being electrified.

***

Opening his eyes, Ryuu shook his head and blinked his eyes in confusion. In his stunned state, information poured into his mind. Before long, he knew that he must have succeeded in starting the game.

According to the information he received, he was lucky enough to become Uchiha Ryuu. Born in an era of anxiety and fear for the future, he was among the new generation of descendants from the Uchiha clan that had just enrolled in the academy.

As an unfortunate orphan from civilian parents, although he received the Uchiha inheritance that included scrolls with training methods, many ninjutsu, and comprehensive knowledge of various combat arts and genjutsu, he wasn't qualified to receive the direct training from his seniors of the clan and could only rely on himself.

As part of his background, Ryuu was an impulsive child that wanted to prove himself by relying on his hard work to surpass his arrogant clanmates. With this goal in mind, he joined the Ninja Academy and planned to rely on the teachings of his teachers as well as his own practice to carve a name for himself inside the village.

"Interesting..." Looking around him, the first thing he noticed was that he was already inside a classroom, if the information he received was accurate, this should be his eleventh month inside the academy.

The knowledge of how to use Chakra, the many beginner fighting techniques, shurikenjutsu, and ninjutsu had all been imparted to him already, there was only one problem...

"Next, Uchiha Ryuu!"

Hearing his name being called, Ryu gulped as he stood up and approached the center stage with a nervous expression on his face.

Seeing him going down the stairs of the lecture room, whispers sounded from every angle as the students spoke to themselves.

"Haha, it's that Uchiha again, I bet he will humiliate himself once more."

"Pfft, I bet he won't be able to do it."

"I'm in! I bet he will do it, but that his clones won't even be able to stand up!"

As the animated students started betting on what would happen, Ryuu finally arrived beside his teacher who gave him a helpless stare.

"Please, use the clone technique."

Nodding, Ryuu followed his memory and put his hands together. The hand-seals practiced many times were done smoothly and without any mishap. Uncontrollable Chakra-like chains rose from his body and circled around him but no one could see them. Only a Hyuga or an Uchiha capable of using their clan signature doujutsu would notice this anomaly.

The Chakra gathered in his hand followed the patterns of the seals and subconscious intent. In an instant, this chakra was released through his hand and was divided into two masses of energy that gathered on both his left and right side.

With a puff of smoke, two identical figures slowly appeared from within the smoke, but...

"Hahaha! Look at them! It's like someone spent an hour beating them up!"

The laughs came one after the other at the sight of the two clones of Ryuu. They were both lying on the ground with their mouths wide open and their eyes rolled back into their skulls as if they had just been beaten up into submission.

Gulping hard, the instructor shook his head and said unhurriedly. "You have to practice more, Ryuu. Don't waste your time with meaningless games and take your training more seriously."

"Yes, teacher..." Nodding dejectedly, Ryuu turned around and climbed the stairs back to his seat.

Although he was a little sad, Ryuu wasn't too affected by this failure. Inside the game, he was only four years old, but he had the mentality of a sixteen-year-old teenager. He had the confidence to overcome the problems his game counterpart had.

Maybe he only lacked a more mature mindset. Ryuu comforted himself with the baseless speculation.

Looking toward the raised teaching platform, Ryuu watched as another individual was asked to step forward. His eyes lacked an iris and were a slightly darker shade of white. What made Ryuu stunned was that he felt like he had seen this person somewhere before...

Soon the figure performed the same set of hand seals, but rather than two clones like Ryuu, he summoned three of them, and they were all perfect copies of his body!

The students all raised their voices in admiration as they spoke excitedly to one another.

"This guy is so amazing! Not only does he have the highest grades on the tests, but he is also the best at Ninjutsu and Taijutsu."

"Yeah, if it wasn't for that dark horse in our class, he would have been the best at Shurikenjutsu too."

Everyone nodded in agreement and although Ryuu heard all of that, none of the memories in his mind allowed him to know the identity of this kid.

"Very good!" The teacher exclaimed. "You're always surprising me, Neji, I'm sure your father will be pleased with your progress."

Neji smiled happily with an innocent look on his face and silently went back to his table in the first row where he sat alone.

Ryuu who had been watching with great interest could only stare agape at the kid.

Neji? That Neji?

"But... he doesn't have the cursed seal..." Scratching his head, he thought hard on the matter and it was only a few minutes later that he remembered the game synopsis, this wasn't the Canon Naruto universe, it was normal for it to have some alterations or many of them.

Sighing he stared at Neji enviously. How cool would it be to flaunt his skills in front of the class as well? What a shame that he couldn't do it yet, but maybe it would be possible in the future.

Watching the rest of the class, it was only at 1:00 PM that the classes ended and they were allowed to leave.

Rushing back home, Ryuu sat down inside his home's living room while cross-legged and started thinking hard.

Based on his feeble knowledge of Naruto's universe, one of the possible reasons behind his difficulty in performing the Clone Technique is a lack of chakra control.

If that was the case, it was possible that his Chakra is unstable when performing Ninjutsu and that he's also spending way too much Chakra to cast a simple technique. Not knowing what other thing might be affecting his ability to use techniques, he went to his house's backyard, grabbed the first leaf he saw, and went back inside.

Grinning at his higher understanding of training methods thanks to watching many episodes of the anime, he mocked his game counterpart for being too ignorant and stuck the leaf to his head.

Circling his Chakra around his body, he was prepared to keep the leaf there for a period of time only to realize that it quickly slipped away and floated for a moment before landing on his lap. Dark lines spread through his forehead as he coughed and tried once more.

After a few failed attempts, Ryuu bit his lips in frustration as he cried loudly with anger.

"Shit! What's wrong with this leaf?! Am I doing something wrong?" Scratching his head, he stood up and went to his room to retrieve one of the scrolls the clan had given to his game counterpart a year ago.

Sitting on the mat once more, he read the part of the scroll that pertained to this general training method and gasped. Closing the scroll with a flushed face, he coughed and pretended that his previous attempt never happened as he tried it once more.

Previously, he had only been cycling his Chakra when in reality, he should have directed all of it on the leaf as a focal point.

His first attempt lasted one minute. In this period of time, the leaf was clearly stuck to his forehead before it fell. Smiling at his first success. He was about to try again when something unexpected happened.

[Congratulations! You have learned the E-Rank Leaf Concentration Technique.]

[E-Rank Leaf Concentration Technique experience increased by 1]

Blinking his eyes, a grin slowly grew on his face! "Hehe! I'll surprise everyone soon enough!"

Chuckling to himself, he raised his arms and spread them as a wave of drowsiness hit him. He had been playing the game for some time and it was time to leave.

Calling the game interface, he looked for the quit button. As minutes passed by, Ryuu started to shake as he broke out in cold sweat. "Shit! Where's the 'quit game' button?!"