NOVEL NEXT Chapter 4: Kushina Uzumaki Pt. 2
“Yep! I didn’t want to be too distracted, and… I wanted to keep my efforts hidden from you until they bore fruit. I’m sorry for the secrecy mother, but I didn’t want you to stop me…”
Blinking slowly, Kushina looks like she’s having to adjust her worldview to accept this new information. Which of course makes it the perfect moment to clap his hands together and bow his head.
“Now that I’ve accomplished my goals… I will gladly accept the opportunity to apprentice under you directly, Fifth Hokage. If you’ll still have me that is. If not… I will need to seek out Auntie Mikoto.”
There are three main reasons that Naruto has for agreeing to the Apprenticeship under his mother after all, in spite of his younger self originally rejecting it previously in this timeline. Number One is the most obvious. His older self has never really had a mom before, and while his younger self has plenty of memories of growing up with Kushina, memories that left him feeling like she was being a little overbearing at times… his older self’s yearning vastly overrode those feelings.
Of course, even if Kushina said he could no longer apprentice under her, Naruto would just go to the other woman who had offered him an apprenticeship in this timeline. Mikoto Uchiha, Head of the Uchiha Clan after the massacre and his ‘Aunt’ in a lot of ways. His younger self hadn’t ever been able to figure out why Auntie Mikoto had offered him an apprenticeship after he rejected his mother’s initial offer.
However, his older self had some ideas. Either Kushina had put Mikoto up to it, pressing on her friend to make the offer so that if Naruto accepted, Kushina could feed him techniques and training through Mikoto and live vivaciously through her best friend… or the two had a sort of friendly competition going on, where Mikoto had made the offer to him just to tease and irk Kushina.
Either way, Naruto would happily take either of them up on their offers of apprenticeship in the event that Kushina rejected him. This was because of his second and third reasons for no longer caring about graduating from the Academy and ‘paving his own way’.
The second reason was that the makeup of his class at the Academy was downright strange. Even with the reforms that Kushina had put in place in this timeline, the actual chronological ages of the people that Naruto knew had shifted somehow. Either that… or more likely, Naruto had simply been born a couple years later in this timeline. Actually, now that he thought about it, that would explain why all of his older self’s classmates were somehow older than him and already out there as Chunin.
His younger self did have a love-hate relationship with Hanabi Hyuga of all people, something of a competitive rivalry going on, but beyond that… there wasn’t anyone at the Academy that younger Naruto was overly excited to be teamed up with. And older Naruto couldn’t ever recreate his original Team Seven, so why even bother?
That led to Reason Number Three. With his older self and younger self almost done merging, Naruto had to acknowledge the truth. He was so far from a Genin-level shinobi that it wasn’t even funny. Even with Kushina’s alterations to the Academy, even with Academy Students being the equivalent of Genin in this world, with Genin being the equivalent of Chunin and so on and so forth… Naruto still didn’t compare. He wasn’t trying to brag or anything, which was why he wasn’t saying any of this out loud, but he was perhaps the strongest ninja in all of the Land of Fire at the moment.
Of course, that didn’t mean Naruto didn’t still have plenty to learn. Especially from the mother he’d never had, who came from a destroyed village he’d never gotten to visit. Apprenticing under the Fifth Hokage in this Alternate Timeline was one of the very few ways that he could possibly learn anything new, before ultimately proving that he was ready to jump straight to Jonin.
All of this was to say… Naruto wasn’t above playing dirty to get what he wanted. Which was why he snuck in the mention of Mikoto at the end there. Lifting his head, he finds that both Kushina and Kurama have had a… reaction to his declaration. His foxy passenger, currently still in her busty kitsune form and leaning against the door frame, frowns as she narrows her eyes into slits at him.
Kushina, however, brightens up, beaming happily even with the mention of Mikoto.
“There won’t be any need to go to Mikoto, Naruto! I would be happy to have you as my Apprentice! It was always an open invitation, so you don’t have to worry about me rescinding it! Oooh, this is going to be so fun!”
He’s no longer Naruto from the previous timeline and Naruto from this timeline at the same time anymore. He’s a singular Naruto, one who has crazy experiences from another world, but also remembers this life, growing up with a doting, loving mother and a village who actually liked him. It was still a little hard for him to wrap his head around, but it felt good. It felt right. He felt like… he was finally home.
Of course, that’s when Kurama has to ruin it with a small little scoff. That’s all Kushina needs to hear to see her pulling back from him. The red-headed Hokage turns to face his passenger and her own eyes narrow, her smile dropping into a frown as well when she sees the stormy look on Kurama’s face. Naruto opens his mouth to step in and mediate between the two, but before he can do so, Kushina speaks up.
“That said, I know you wanted to prove you could do it Naruto… but I have grave reservations about leaving the Nine-Tailed Fox free like this.”
Kushina pauses for a moment, her eyes drifting down Kurama’s body, specifically to her sizable chest. It’s obvious from the note of disbelief in her voice that Naruto’s mother is still struggling to come to terms with Kurama’s gender reveal, but at the very least she acknowledges it all the same.
“… She is not to be trusted, Naruto. Whatever she told you, whatever she promised you… it’s a lie. A trick. A trap. She’s not-!”
Naruto could see Kurama bristling more and more as Kushina spoke. He could also see Kushina’s fingers twitching, the Hokage just daring his passenger to make a move so that she could be the one to stop her with Chakra Chains. Before things can escalate that far however, Naruto reaches out again and snatches his mom by the wrists, pulling Kushina around to face him once more. This time however, he’s a lot more confident and poised, with the merging complete and his mind, body, and soul as one.
“You do not need to worry about her, Fifth Hokage. I promise you; I have things well in hand. Moreover Kurama is MY passenger now. Our dealings are our own. I love you with all of my heart, mom… but in this one area, I will not let you boss me OR Kurama around.”
He hates to do this. To set an ultimatum like this so early on. He knows Kushina might blow up at him. That she might try to force the issue. If she does… he might have to go Missing Nin, chased from the village by his own mother. And yet, if that’s what happens then that’s what happens. This is a hill that Naruto is more than willing to die on. This is the line in the sand he must draw, because without Kurama, he wouldn’t even be here in this state right now. Kurama is everything to him, and he needs his mother to understand that, even if she can’t be allowed to know the full details.
As such, Naruto stares into Kushina’s eyes, trying to do his level best to convey the depth of his conviction towards her. He’s still expecting her to explode at him with that legendary, infamous temper of hers… but to his surprise, that doesn’t happen. After a moment of decidedly uncharacteristic silence, Kushina looks down at Naruto’s hands and slowly pulls her wrists from his grasp. He lets her do so, but only truly relaxes when she nods a moment later.
“… Very well, Naruto. I’ll leave it in… in your capable hands.”
There’s a note of something in Kushina’s voice at that, something Naruto doesn’t quite recognize. But before he can think on it too long, his mother moves the conversation along.
“I’ll go and get things ready. You’ll probably still have to stop by the Academy to pass their graduation test before you can become my official apprentice… but with what I’ve seen you do today, we both know that will be a mere formality. Don’t worry about doing that until tomorrow, however. It will take me the rest of today to get things in order…”
Naruto lets out a quiet exhale of relief, before giving his mother a broad smile and a nod.
“Of course, mom. Thank you… I look forward to training under you.”
Kushina almost seems to pink up a little bit at that, before shooting him a grin of her own and then all but fleeing the room. She pushes past Kurama, and Kurama in turn brushes past her, stepping into the room and closing the door behind Kushina.
Naruto’s not at all surprised when the foxy MILF of a kitsune all but slams the door shut, and as soon as Kushina is gone… lunges across the room at him. The moment his mother is out of the way, Kurama is all over him, half-purring, half-growling as the foxy woman pins him to the bed.
“Mine… all mine. And don’t you forget it.”
Naruto scoffs at that, rolling his eyes. He’s not in the least bit surprised by Kurama’s overbearing possessiveness. But he’s also not going to be cowed by it either. With a flex of his Chakra, enhancing his muscles, Naruto flips them both over and pins Kurama down in his place, grinning at her toothily as he traps her wrists in his hands and pushes her arms down on either side of his head.
“No, Kurama… you’re all MINE. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
The Nine-Tailed Fox moans and writhes beneath him… even as Naruto leans forward and seizes her lips in his own, kissing her deeply for a moment before sliding his mouth across her jawline, her neck… and down to her singularly impressive bosom.
-x-X-x-
Moans and grunts begin to drift through the door of Naruto’s bedroom, followed by flesh slapping against flesh. Meanwhile, Kushina Uzumaki kneels outside of his room, her ear pressed against the door and her eyes wide as she freezes in place. She didn’t… she wasn’t… she had no idea what to do at this point.
It was one thing for Naruto to manipulate his father’s seal and grant the Nine-Tails some level of freedom. It was another thing entirely for the Nine-Tails to take on the form of a sexy, feminine fox girl. But it was ANOTHER-another thing entirely for her son and the Kyuubi to be engaged in a s-sexual relationship with one another!
One might wonder exactly how Kushina, who had some of the largest natural chakra reserves in the entirety of the Elemental Nations, was hiding her presence from Naruto and the Nine-Tails now. She wasn’t a fool. She’d known the moment she barged into Naruto’s room that he and his… passenger had seen her coming from a mile away.
So then how? Well, it was simple really. When you had chakra reserves as big as Kushina’s, you didn’t hide by pulling it all in and making your presence as small as possible, because even when you did that, your presence was as big as a damn room. No, instead… you spread yourself out. You pushed your presence to its utmost limits. You expanded the feel of your power so far that those within it wouldn’t even realize you were around, because ‘you’ were technically everywhere all at once.
… At this moment, Kushina Uzumaki is currently blanketing the entirety of Konoha with her Chakra. The people of Konoha, both ninja and civilians, are used to this feeling and think nothing of it. As such, she is completely hidden, no one able to detect her presence whatsoever.
And yet, that’s no reason for why she’s not barging right back into her son’s bedroom and putting a stop to this madness. She should. She definitely should not let Naruto have a sexual relationship with the Kyuubi. Even if his Kyuubi feels like a totally different person than her own was, Kushina KNOWS they’re the same entity. This… this has to be a trick of some sort. A ploy.
Still, Kushina doesn’t do anything. She just listens while staring down at her hands. No, not her hands. She’s staring… at her wrists. Twice, Naruto grabbed hold of her. Twice, he stilled her and calmed her down. She’s sure he didn’t mean to do it. She’s sure he had no idea what sort of feelings that he was invoking in her.
That didn’t change the fact that Naruto had, in that second moment where he’d put his foot down with her, seemed so much like Minato that it hurt. It’d been so long. She’d lost Minato a decade and a half ago and everyone had told her that that loss would dull with time. It hadn’t. It felt like an open wound to this day. She’d thrown herself into serving Konoha and raising her son. She’d become Hokage and fulfilled a childhood dream, d-damn it!
And yet… until today, when Naruto spoke to her like that and she swore she saw Minato’s gentle but firm face overlaying her son’s… Kushina hadn’t felt at peace. She hadn’t felt contentment like that in a long, long time.
Now… now she knelt at her son’s door, listening to him have sex with a fox woman through the wood and she KNEW she should stop it… but she couldn’t bring herself to move. She was stuck, frozen in place.