2 Money Makes The World Go Round

Hiruzen blew a bit of smoke out of his mouth as he gazed out the window, the Village Hidden in the Leaves sprawled out below him.

It had been six years since Naruko had declared her dream to him. At the time he had thought it was a childish dream that she would grow out of soon, like any other child.

He was wrong.

It was time for his monthly visit, which was often the thing he looked forwards to most. He loved Naruko like a granddaughter and would have spoiled her rotten if not for her special status.

Naruko was Jinchuriki of the Leaf, holder of the Nine-Tailed Fox Demon, and that was why he could not get closer to her. If the other heads of the clans in the village thought he was getting too close, they would accuse his clan, the Sarutobi clan, of trying to usurp power.

The status of a Jinchuriki was often very controversial in many of the hidden villages. Being one of the largest military weapons available to most villages.

But it was also common for them to be treated as less than human, which often made them build hate towards their corresponding village, making their cooperation hard.

Hiruzen had made sure to put many laws into place that prevented any physical harm to come to Naruko, but this did not stop the villagers from isolating her and generally avoiding her. Even the clans generally avoided her, in fear of being called out. Especially since of the situation that happened with the Uchiha and their failed plan at a coup d'Etat. Many clans felt like they were walking on eggshells, causing them to avoid the Jinchuriki and anything that may put them into the spotlight.

The slaughter of the Uchiha clan had occurred two years ago, two years after their youngest child Sasuke had started the academy and turned eight, and Hiruzen let out a sigh of regret even remembering it.

He had tried to be at peace with them, offered a treaty that had been declined. Unfortunately, this plan had failed. His next option was utilizing the Mangekyo that Shisui Uchiha had obtained, the Kotoamatsukami, that would allow them to brainwash Fugaku, clan head of the Uchiha, so that he could change their opinion.

Unfortunately, Danzo, a member of the Konoha Council and Leader of the allegedly disbanded Root branch, had other plans. Hiruzen had disbanded Root after the catastrophe that happened with the Uchiha. And acted against Hirzuen's wishes, attempting to steal Shisui's Mangekyo for his own. This plan failed and led to Shisui's suicide and the passing of Mangekyou to Itachi Uchiha, who was just recently initiated as an ANBU of the village.

Itachi had been then one who kept reporting the status of the clan to Hiruzen, who soon realized he had no options left other than to nip the problem at the bud.

He sent the thirteen-year-old Itachi to kill his clan in the name of the village, dragging his name and reputation through the mud all the way. The young Uchiha was forced to flee Konoha where he would act as a spy in the recently formed criminal group 'Akatsuki.' And leave his younger brother behind with plenty of trauma and the status as an orphan.

Hiruzen shook his head to rid these thoughts from his mind, he knew this was the only way, and if he had let the Uchiha attempt the coup then the casualties would have been much more.

Hiruzen finally arrived at his surrogate grand-daughters house. When he had first given it to her, it had been a nice cottage home in a section of the woods surrounded by nature. But it had been transformed into an oddly covered area, with all kinds of slashes and burns that scarred the landscape. Probably from testing those inventions that she loved so much. The home itself hadn't changed much on the outside, but Hiruzen knew that inside was a whole new world with all kinds of odd inventions that did pretty much anything. She had even created instant ramen warmer, claiming that, 'the food of the lords waits for no one.' He chuckled slightly remembering that.

Hiruzen knew that Naruko Uzumaki was an enigma. She was the perfect combination of her parents, inheriting her mother's foul mouth and loud attitude, along with her father's prodigious talents. Add a large splash of slightly insane and an ocean of determination and you would get one Naruko Uzumaki. She was an anomaly, Hiruzen had seen what she does in the academy. She smashed through records that once-in-a-lifetime prodigies like Kakashi Hatake and Uchiha Itachi owned with no effort. And she did it without even enhancing herself with chakra.

But Naruko's true talents were not in her physical prowess, but instead in her mind. She learned fuinjutsu at a speed that made Hiruzen gawk in astonishment. And her ideas, while crazy, were still pure strokes of genius regardless.

Hiruzen knocked on the door and heard a bit of tumbling from inside the house. For as strong as she was, Naruko was a bit clumsy, he wasn't sure where she had inherited that from.

It was quiet for a few moments before the door practically flew off its hinges, revealing the proud-looking little girl in all her short glory. She was wearing a pair of black combat boots that came up to her shin, along with a pair of orange khaki shorts that matched horribly. She had an orange turtleneck tied around her waist and had an oversized white dress shirt that was stained full of ink on. Along with this, a pair of green aviation goggles adorning her head.

She stood at a height slightly short for her age, four foot six inches. Her once short orange hair had grown long and was now usually pulled into a loose ponytail that reached down to her mid-back, with fringe bangs and jaw-length side bags, similar to her father but without the spikiness of his hair. Her once chubby face was now more angular taking more after her father. She had the same bright blue eyes he had that shone brightly like sapphires.

She had also built her body with streamlined muscles meant to get as fast as she can. But Hiruzen knew the strength she had, he had seen her throw a kunai at a tree in the academy so hard that it was into its handle.

"Ah, gramps! What are you doing in my humble abode." The little girl snickered. The Hokage had a small smile on his face at that.

"Who says I can't visit my favorite surrogate granddaughter whenever I want." He teased back.

"Oh yeah! I got something to show you old man, my newest invention!" She dragged him into her home. He observed the surroundings as she dragged him past, seeing many odd things, but not commenting on them. It was also a mess, with plenty of books scattered along the floor from what he saw in the library and other kinds of inventions lying around on the floor. He also spotted the instant ramen maker, one of her first inventions, that made him chuckle a bit.

He was pulled down the stairs into a large excavated room filled with all kinds of materials. There were large jars of ink that lined the walls, along with large stacks of blank sealing paper. On the other side of the wall, there were all kinds of metals and woods, along with different blueprints that lay scattered all over the floor. Naruko had asked for help making this room two years after moving in, realizing that she needed more space for fuinjutsu and creating things.

"Well Naruko, what are you trying to show me." He asked before she chuckled mischievously and pulled out a scroll that lined one of the shelves line up on the back wall.

"We have to go outside to show you, but it's worth it gramps!" She exclaimed, and the Hokage quickly followed after her.

Once outside, she put the scroll down, before unraveling it and showing an enclosing seal printed on it. She channeled a bit of her chakra into it as a poof of smoke appeared. Once blown away, an oddly shaped weapon was revealed, along with a couple of small metal beads.

"What is this, Naruko?" He asked in curiosity, only getting a cheshire grin from her.

"This is a gun. Now I know that regular guns are way too slow, and don't actually do enough damage to actually matter. And they are only used by civilians to hunt animals, and sometimes bandits. But I modified this gun to actually be usable." She picked the handgun up, along with the ammunition, and showed them to the old Hokage. "You see, the body of the gun is made with a type of metal that negates chakra flow through it. This is to make sure no chakra is wasted in the charging of the weapon. In the magazine, which is where the bullets are loaded, there's a small single-item transportation seal that connects with another in the chamber, along with a small detection seal to make sure that it automatically reloads for you. The trigger is connected to a special metal that conducts chakra, and this is connected to a seal behind the bullet where a regular gun would deflagrate the gunpowder it stores all the chakra in a large chakra-storing seal, that is connected to a detonation seal. Except the seal doesn't detonate in a large radius, but instead a straightforward blast that acts as the propellant for the bullet. Except with this amount of force, almost any type of metal would immediately disintegrate, or at least be reduced to tiny shreds. So these bullets have a tiny seal in them that acts as a shield to negate most of the explosive damage, without losing any of the pressure that is pushing it forward." Naruko explained.

"But there's another thing I recently discovered and have been working on in the past year that will make this gun even more effective." This caught Hiruzen's attention. "You see, chakra is the combination of both physical and spiritual energies in the body. This is common knowledge, but what most people do not know is that you can use both your physical and spiritual energies individually if you train enough." Hiruzen watched in fascination as Naruko raised both arms, and on one hand, cyan-blue energy made itself present, it burned like an uncontrolled wildfire. While on the other hand, magenta-colored energy came to life, as it seemed to drift of her hand like blowing wind. "Of course, this usually does not matter as most ninja techniques use both components of both the spiritual and physical side of things, but." The Hokage watched as Naruko's body suddenly started to glow a dim cyan-blue light. "You can, effectively, boost your body twice as much with the absence of the spiritual side of the chakra. And this also affects genjutsu too, making them twice as potent." Naruko explained. And the Hokage was floored.

"Naruko, this is revolutionary. If this got out... it would change the world! Taijutsu would become a need and genjutsu along with genjutsu resistance would become a must-have!" He exclaimed.

"But that's not the best part," Naruko stated. She put the bullets into the magazine and then loaded the gun, before lifting it and pointing towards a tree. The Hokage watched in fascination as her hand was lit with massive amounts of physical energy and siphoned into the gun. Naruko stood like this for a couple of seconds, before a malicious grin lit her face.

"Gramps, I would hold onto your tighty-whities, this is gonna be big!" She cheered. And then she pulled the trigger.

The world was silent for a moment before a ray of cyan energy was shot out of the gun at high-jonin speeds, devastating the trees in front of it. What followed was a pop that put any explosive tags to shame.

The Hokage looked over at Naruko's happy face, and couldn't help but shiver. He could imagine an army of ninjas armed with these, it would take the world by storm. He was only relieved when he realized just how complicated it was to make. As even he, a middle advanced fuinjustsu user, couldn't make sense of half the seals she used. He guessed Jiraiya, the Toad Sage and godfather of Naruko, probably could. He was, after all, an early master fuinjutsu user. He guessed with Naruko's talents and a large amount of Uzumaki fuinjutsu books in the library that were owned by Kushina, Naruko's mother and the last of the Uzumaki clan, that Naruko was probably nearing middle master fuinjustsu if not approaching late master. Fuinjutsu ranks were quite odd, there was beginner, adept, advanced, master, and then grandmaster. And each of these had three stages, early, middle, and late. For Naruko to achieve a master at the age of ten, makes her a once-in-a-lifetime prodigy, even by the Uzumaki standards. The only one who could compare to her would be Ashina Uzumaki, said to be the forefather of Fuinjutsu. He had achieved fuinjutsu master by the age of fifteen, and later was entering the grandmaster stage by thirty. To be able to have done this without the help of countless texts like Naruko had displays the Uzumaki's monstrous talent in the art of fuinjutsu. It was said that even entering the grandmaster stage took countless seals, and progressing through it was even more difficult. But a single grandmaster fuinjutsu user was the equivalent of an army of jonin ninja. Of course, Hiruzen could neither confirm nor deny this because no ninja had ever achieved grandmaster after Ashina, who had served into his late sixties with his inhuman life potency. But, he, like all Uzumaki, had perished in the destruction of Uzushiogakure, home of the Uzumaki, during the second great ninja war.

"Is it possible to mass-produce these, Naruko?" He couldn't help but ask. And he was sure the ANBU who had followed him and seen this was also salivating at the prospect. Even though it is quite loud, to be able to produce that speed and power with just a few seconds and charging would make it the ultimate assassination weapon with a few modifications. In response to his question, he got a sly grin.

"Depends, how much dough can you fork up old man, after all, money makes the world go round." She said. The Hokage's eyes bugged out at this. This cheeky brat isn't she ten! Spare this old man some pride!

"Well then, you got yourself a deal, I'll send an ANBU here later to work out the loose ends. Ah, I almost forgot to hand you your weekly allowance." He fished for something in his coat before pulling out a large stack of Ryo and handing it to the adorable little girl who was looking at it with sparkling eyes.

"Well then, little Naruko, I'll see you later so we can work out our deal. Also, work hard in the academy, I don't want to hear about my surrogate granddaughter slacking off. Even though you can't graduate early due to the peaceful times doesn't mean to stop trying. Also, make sure to eat healthily. You want to grow up and be healthy." He chuckled as he saw her cheeks blow up into a pout as he patted her head. Even though he was quite short, at only five foot four inches, he was still a foot taller than her.

"Got it gramps, and make sure you stay alive, after all, we still need to visit the stars together, I can't have you kicking the bucket on me!" He heard her exclaim, and he laughed at her childish behavior.

"That's right, Naruko, to the stars." And with that, he walked off to formulate a deal for the first of many weapons that would be the beginning of a new modern age for the ninja world.