A/N - Hello everyone my name is Smurf00, i'm a long time reader *(read lurker) of webnovel. This is going to be my first attempt at writing a story of my own. It's something i've wanted to do for a long time but never had the courage to do until recently. i'm probably going to be making a lot of mistakes, so i would like to ask you the readers to please help me get better. All you have to do is point out mistakes when i make them and if you could offer some advice. Thank you in advance and i hope you enjoy.
Chapter One -
The first memory a person has is usually quite random or strange, My Mother describes it as 'The moment you gain sentience'. It's a strange term but my mother was always a strange person, at least privately.
Anyway, your first memory is usually something random like playing with a toy or walking down a path holding a parent's hand. Mine however? Was the rattling of chains and the view of a party from behind bars.
But before that I should probably tell you why.
I don't remember it at all, on account of being 3-years old at the time. But according to my mother. The small village we lived in Inarimura, -- a small village in the land of fire -- Was attacked by bandits.
They attacked in the middle of the night when both my mother and I were asleep. She was awoken by the sounds of screams not too far way and immediately picked me up and tried to run, but as soon as she got out of the door to our hut she was intercepted by one of the bandits.
Instead of killing her, the bandit saw my mother's beauty and decided it'd be better to take her and me to do who knows what. Maybe he wanted her as entertainment and to raise me as a bandit or maybe he thought we'd fetch a good price. It doesn't matter we never had to find out.
Apparently, the Bandit that caught us wasn't the only one to grab people from our village, since when my mother was being walked out of the village she saw others being led the same way.
After arriving at the bandit camp my mother, me and the rest of the captured villagers sat in cages at the bandit's camp. For whatever reason, the bandits never laid a hand on any of the captives except to get them in line. We were given just barely enough food and water to stop us from dying or wasting away and made to sat there for two days.
That's when my memory begins, trapped in a cage with my mother and over a dozen of scared women and children. Watching as the bandits have a party to celebrate a successful raid for the second night in a row. I watch them as they guzzle down stolen booze and devour precious food all while laughing until their lungs collapsed.
But the ground collapsed first, and their laughter quickly turned to panicked screams.
People jumped out of the trees surrounding camp. I watched with wide eyes as a man still mid-air shouted out "Katon: Gōkakyū no Jutsu!" (Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu). Flames erupted from the mans mouth scorching half the bandits that the ground didn't get.
Meanwhile a couple of men landed in front of the cages we were in and let out their own cry of "Doton: Doryūheki!" (Earth Style: Earth Wall). Walls burst from the ground protecting us captives from crossfire. But not before a bundle of keys got launched in the chaos, straight into the cage next to ours.
Someone grabbed those keys and got to work unlocking all the cages. My mother tried to stand up holding me in her arms, but I immediately broke free and ran as fast as my little legs could straight out the freshly opened gate. "Daigo no!" she screamed towards me.
Once I got around the big dirt view blocker. I saw our rescuers shoot water out of their mouths, summon copies of themselves, and throw sharp projectiles with amazing accuracy. All while moving at speeds I could barely keep track of.
It only took a few seconds for my mother to catch me and start shouting for me to "never do that again." But I couldn't hear her, I was in a world of my own. I was completely mesmerized by the battle in front of me.
The biggest bandit of the bunch wielding an axe even bigger than me charged with a scream toward a man with a strange shirt, only for strange-shirt-man to brandish a sword and just when they were about to meet and the bandit was bringing down his axe. Strange-shirt disappeared and reappeared behind him, and the bandit fell never to get up again.
All my fellow captives erupted in cheers. At this point I was already back to being held tightly by my mother but that didn't stop me from raising my arms and letting out a cheer of my own.
After that Strange-Shirt came over to us, pulling down his face-mask as he did.
"My name is Chunin Yuto," he said, bowing his head slightly. "We are shinobi of Konohagakure, the Hidden Leaf Village. The elder of Inarimura requested our aid, and we were sent here to strike down these bandits and bring as many of you home as possible." His eyes swept across the group of freed villagers. "The danger here is finished. You are safe now."
A wave of relief passed through the captives. Yuto straightened and gestured toward the forest trail. "But we have quite some distance to travel before we reach your homes. Stay close, stay quiet, and follow my lead. We will begin to see you back to Inarimura."
We began the walk home, escorted by the ninjas while I did my best to copy the ninjas way of walking.
After I got tired of trying of my attempts to copy the grown ninjas way of walking (which were totally getting close!) and started to slow down, my mother picked me up and I rested my head on her shoulder. But despite my exhausted body my curiosity about ninjas remained unchanged.
"Hey momma," I whispered, leaning close to her ear, "who are these people? Why are they so strong and fast? How come they could breathe fire and stuff?"
My mother hesitated, looking down at my eager little face. She bit her lip, then sighed. "They're ninja, Daigo. Mercenaries from the Hidden Leaf village."
"Ninja? Mercenaries? I thought they were called shinobi?"
"Mercenaries are fighters that do jobs called missions for a price paid by whoever they do the job for. And Ninja is another word for shinobi." She explained gently.
"What about all the other stuff? The speed, the fire, or that stupid view blocker, stuff like that ya know?"
She giggled "Well all of that comes from the same thing. Chakra, an energy that exists in everyone but only people like ninjas know how to use."
My heart was almost beating out of my chest as I leant back to look at her "so If I learn how to use the chakra stuff inside me, I can go super-fast and breathe fire? Ooh! or make a copy of myself like that one guy!"
"Not quite sweetie. to do that you would first need to know how to use Jutsu, special techniques that only the ninja can use to turn their chakra into all sorts of things." Mother smiled faintly through the deep exhaustion that's built up over the last few days before a worried look took over. "…d-do you want that? Do you w-wanna be a n-ninja?"
I tilted my head as I thought about it for a moment before rapidly nodding my head. "If I have to be a ninja to do all of that then, Yeah!" I showed my mother a wide grin "I'll be the fastest, strongest and coolest ninja ever!"