Chapter 3

As dawn arrived, trickles of light flashed from the horizon. In the forests of Konoha, there lay a large boar-dead, impaled on a boulder by an arrow through the skull. A trail of destroyed trees and debris from the dead being led to a young, unconscious child that was no older than eight.

Unlike her skin and hair covered in dirt, her clothes were as clean as they could be. A battle dress as black as the night sky covered her body, with a short skirt kept at a length that wouldn't interfere with movement. Thigh high socks that also acted as a shoe covered the majority of her legs whilst dark, claw-like gloves covered her hands. The socks, whilst seemingly flexible, were as hard as metal, acting like armour whilst avoiding discomfort for the wearer.

The skirt also accommodated the nine tails that sprouted from the girl's back whilst two fox ears sprouted from the girl's hair.

A large emerald green symbol of a fox's face adorned the center of the dress, the same colour as the girl's bangs. The symbol only contained straight lines, primarily triangles and roughly depicted a grinning fox. In the two eye sockets were two blood red dots resembling eyes that seemed to glow in the dark.

Under the skirt was a short curved dagger which, unlike her attire, was pure white including the handle and base. A red gem was embedded in the hilt whilst the blade glistened under the sun's light.

Just out of her reach was a white longbow with gold markings. Unlike the day before, it was now slightly smaller to allow the young girl to at least wield properly. At the two ends of the bow were marks identical to the one on the center of the girl's dress, that of a fox.

The girl stirred as light reached her eyes. As she woke, a groan escaped her lips, yet she still stood. Letting out a yawn, she gasped as she saw the gloves on her hand. Suddenly remembering the conversation she had with the Kyuubi, she looked at the ground to find the bow she had used the day before to slay the beast.

"So it was all real… not a dream… alright, let's see what changed then." She muttered to no one in particular.

She grabbed the bow and decided to head towards the nearest lake which was only a few minutes away if she kept at a fast pace, though not before fawning over the new bow that was now in her possession. To her surprise, she found herself noticeably faster and less tired than usual. Though she didn't know what had caused it, she assumed that it had something to do with the clothes that she now donned.

Reaching the lake, she hesitantly looked down.

There she stood, in all her glory, stunning new gear that she could never have even dreamed to obtain with her current circumstances. With the bow strapped to her back, she looked Intimidating. Even with the figure of an eight year old child, her current attire literally oozed serenity. Without her noticing, tears began to form as she gulped.

For all her life, she had never had anything she could truly be proud to call her own. Her old mundane hunting gear, bow and knife were all gifted to her by the Uchiha, namely Mikoto and Itachi. Though she treasured them as they were given to her by her surrogate family, she was never proud of having them. They reminded her of her unfortunate predicament and they reminded her of the pitiful looks her surrogate mother and brother gave her when she received the gear.

But here now she stood, with one of a kind gear and weapons that she could proudly call her own, and hers only. She may not be a part of the Uzumaki-Namikaze household at the moment, but at heart she was still an Uzumaki, and she had the Uzumaki pride.

silence ensued for several minutes as she collected herself. After wiping away the tears, she took out the food that had already gone cold and began to heat it using a basic Katon technique before beginning to eat. Though she hadn't noticed due to the events that had transpired from yesterday, she was practically starving.

What surprised her was how sensitive her smell was to the food that was in front of her. With it, she also noticed how clear the sound of the running water in the lake was.

Probably effects of the Soul-merge, these ears can't be there just for decoration, meaning that my sense of smell is also probably the same. She deduced before indulging in the meal.

***

A lone deer appeared from the nearby bush and cautiously moved over to the riverside to drink, seemingly not noticing her presence.

A good time to test out the bow, she thought as she steadied herself and reached for an arrow from her quiver, only to find something foreign. She then realised that her quiver had also changed slightly, a sleek black quiver that blended in with her clothes. The arrows inside were of the same kind, but had a blood red tip similar to that of the fox symbol's eyes.

As she held the arrow in her hands, she strengthened her grip with chakra to crush it to feel the material, only to find it dissolving into nothingness upon snapping along with slight weight being added to her back. To her surprise, she found that the dissolved arrow had once again made it back to her quiver alongside her arrows.

"W-wha—"

"Those bows are chakra constructs like me Kit, they reform when they are broken. Quite the useful thing, once they're broken they immediately reform in your quiver, meaning that technically you have an infinite amount of arrows." A voice in her head said calmly.

"Kyuubi!?" She exclaimed before covering her mouth with her hand in a hurry after noticing that she almost startled the deer.

"Calm down Kit, just talk inside your head, I can still hear you." 

"R-right, so you can hear and talk to me?"

"Yes, I am in your head you know. Originally I couldn't due to the seal, but since 'that' happened yesterday, we are connected in more ways than one. I am directly talking to you through your, or should I say, our soul instead of through your mindscape. 

"Anyways, as I was saying, those arrows are chakra structures, they don't have a definitive shape, and can be formed into anything through the use of chakra reforma—" 

"Speak in a language I can understand!"

"Just think of it as having infinite arrows," the Kyuubi replied with an audible sweatdrop at Naruko's lack of comprehension skills in anything that required more brainpower than absolutely necessary.

"Could've just said that first."

"I simply thought you would appreciate the insight of a being as great as I." Naruko could imagine the Kyuubi huffing with pride.

"Doesn't matter! All I need to know is that it's arrows that don't run out!"

"Riiiiiiight, call on me when you actually require my intellect, I'll be having a nap." And with that, the voice faded into nothingness and silence permeated through the air-with the exception of the running water next to her.

Nocking an arrow, she attempted to pull the bowstring, only to find it as stiff as steel. Pouring more chakra into her upper body, she finally managed to move it, albeit only about 15%, hardly much improvement from last night.

Remembering the destruction caused from last time, hesitantly retracted some of the chakra before firing the bow. Her instincts from using her old bow told her that the arrow wouldn't even fly a meter out with how far she drew the bow, but ignoring all possible logic, the arrow flew out such force that it blew her back slightly as she was not expecting a recoil. The deer, however, was not lucky enough to only be blown back.

The arrow pierced straight through the skull, decapitating the creature from the force and impaling the head straight on a boulder, which evidently have cracks sprouting from the arrow's origin. A moment later, the arrow dissipated and reformed within her quiver, allowing the head to roll down onto the ground.

The rest of the animal's body spasmed as a gurgling sound could be heard from where the head was ripped off.

Even though she had lived through hunting, she was at heart still an eight year old girl, and couldn't help but gag slightly at the brutal scene in front of her. Hearing the cries of birds from ahead, she could tell that other predators had sensed the blood and were coming to investigate. Without wasting a moment, she began to retreat towards the Konoha walls, specifically the Uchiha compound.

She didn't know if they would recognise her with her current appearance, but the tails and ear should be able to convince atleast Itachi and Uchiha that she was still Naruko.

Arriving at the border, she carefully maneuvered around the rooftops to avoid being spotted by the citizens. Even if they were of Uchiha who had given her shelter, she couldn't trust every single one of them to keep it to themselves. Arriving at the head of clan's household building, she swiftly reached to one of the trap doors on the roof that she often used to get inside the house. Taking a deep breath, she jumped in and landed with a thud in one of the spare rooms used for storage. The trapdoor was also rigged with a seal that automatically informed others of her arrival

Almost immediately, she could feel cold steel touching her neck, drawing blood slightly as her fox ears picked up the sound of footsteps making its way to her location.

She could feel the coldness in the tone of the owner of the blade as he spoke.

"Who the hell are you?"