Chapter 1: The First Blood
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The first thing he felt… was cold.
Not the gentle kind that came with winter air or the brisk morning breeze. This was wet, sticky, blood-slicked cold. His fingers twitched instinctively, brushing against damp soil. Groaning, he opened his eyes to a world both familiar and alien — jagged trees, scorched earth, and the scent of steel, death, and chakra still hanging thick in the air.
"...What the... hell?" His voice cracked. Too high. Too soft.
He sat up, slow and disoriented. His hands were small. Child-like. His body—thin, underfed, but alive. Barely. A mirror shard from a shattered kunai caught his eye. He leaned forward and stared.
A child's face. No older than six. Short black hair matted with dirt. Eyes hollow from hunger. A scar on his brow — a faint horizontal line. But behind those eyes… a mind that was very much adult.
"I'm… in Naruto."
The realization didn't come with fanfare or blaring horns. No divine proclamation. Just the soft groan of a dying shinobi nearby, choking on blood, limbs torn apart, half-buried beneath rubble.
He stood up shakily, scanning the surroundings. The remnants of a skirmish. Scorched trees. Shredded banners. Blood trails. A warzone.
"Third Great Ninja War," he muttered, trying to recall everything. "Aftermath maybe. Which means... I'm before canon."
He didn't feel fear. Not immediately. Instead, he felt something else.
Excitement.
"This is insane. This is beautiful." A manic grin crept onto his face. "The whole world at my fingertips. All the future. All the secrets."
But the grin didn't last long. A breeze passed through, and he shivered violently. Hunger gnawed at him. His legs shook. He was a six-year-old orphan in a shinobi world. Reality hit like a kunai to the gut.
He collapsed beside a half-burned log, catching his breath. He needed food. Shelter. A plan. But before he could rise again, a wet cough drew his attention.
That dying shinobi—still clinging to life.
Jonin-level. His hitai-ate marked with Kusa. Half his face gone. One hand still twitching toward a pouch. Desperate to live.
The child's stomach growled, but his eyes locked onto the shinobi.
He walked forward slowly. Unafraid. Curious.
He didn't want to help. He didn't feel pity.
He just wanted to test something.
"I wonder…"
He knelt beside the man and, without thinking, touched his forehead. A strange warmth surged in his chest. A memory not his own sparked — a tree, massive and pulsating with life… Ymir… a power ancient and alien.
Rewrite.
Blood spilled from his palm, purely instinctual. Just a drop — but chakra-laced, thick and radiant. It fell onto the shinobi's exposed neck wound.
The man twitched.
And then… his back arched.
Bones cracked. Flesh tore. A muffled scream turned into a deep, guttural roar. His spine stretched unnaturally, muscle expanding, tendons bursting outward. Smoke erupted around him, cloaking the scene. Branches snapped. The very air trembled.
The child stumbled back, eyes wide.
From the wreckage of man's body emerged a twelve-meter humanoid creature, its skin steaming, veins glowing, and eyes lifeless.
"…Holy shit."
He laughed — not in panic, but joy.
"I can do it. I really can."
The titan stood still, twitching slightly, awaiting orders. Its jaw slack, eyes blank. Not a beast — a soldier waiting for its general.
The boy walked forward again. Steady this time. He placed a hand on the titan's knee and whispered, "Sit."
It obeyed.
He grinned, heart pounding. This was real. This world. This power. He could shape it. Mold it.
The village? The Hokage? Madara?
They were ants compared to what he was now. Or rather — what he was becoming.
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Three Months Later
He lived on the edge of Konoha, in a shack made from war wreckage and old crates. He didn't bother enrolling in the orphanage. Too nosy. Too many eyes.
He kept to himself. Read books from dumped crates. Collected scrolls. Picked trash. Stole food when he had to.
And he studied.
His chakra control was weak, but improving. He wasn't concerned. He was focused on the real goal.
Using slugs, rats, and stray dogs — he tested. Droplets of his blood mixed with chakra. Infection. Mutation. Control.
Eight out of ten times, the host died. But the two that survived?
He could trigger titanization with a thought.
Two loyal test titans hidden underground beneath a fake garden shed.
Each time they transformed, he tweaked their anatomy. One had claws. Another had a reinforced jaw. Slowly, he was learning how to customize them.
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Thoughts of the Future
He sat on the roof of an abandoned house, staring at the Hokage Monument in the distance. His legs swung lazily.
In his hand, a worn book: The History of the Shinobi Era.
"Hiruzen Sarutobi," he muttered. "Old. Hesitant. Soft."
He turned a page.
"Danzo… a paranoid warmonger with more secrets than bones. Useful, for now."
Another page.
"The Uchiha… so prideful. So angry. So breakable."
He smiled faintly.
And then a gust of wind hit his face, and for a moment — he didn't feel excited.
He felt… bored.
Three months of hiding. Testing. Watching kids play ninja while pretending to be strong.
He looked up at the stars and whispered, "This world has no gods."
His eyes glowed faintly with a golden hue.
"So I'll become one."
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End of Chapter 1
Word Count: ~917
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