Plan to Grow Strong/ An Impossible Task

*Days pass

Tora was requested to meet the third hokage and he was currently here in hokage office.

"How are you young boy? You took quite a bump in the meeting hall." The third hokage opened the conversation.

"I'm alright hokage-sama, I'm excited to begin training again." Tora replied truthfully.

"I see... I'm sorry child, I've failed you and your village." Hiruzen looked down. Tora noticed the shame and guilt in his voice.

"It was our fault, we should have been stronger. I will make sure this will never happen again." Tora replied, anger was starting to fill his voice.

The third looked helpless, he remembered Akio's message. Akio requested him to guide his grandson, he wished for his grandson to be able to live in the light rather than be consumed by the darkness. Looking at the boy, he realized it was too late, and that Tora was already on a dark path regardless of his intervention. Only Tora himself could decide to change his path. The best the third could do now was make himself available to guide him to become stronger and ensure he does not fall to the levels of Orochimaru and Danzo.

Additionally, at this point, after failing the child's grandfather, he felt he had no right to force the child to do anything.

"I see, if it is alright with you child. I would like for you to come here once a week for training in preparation for your academy enrollment in a few months, I owe your grandfather a great debt. It was due to the improved mystique peacock technique that we were able to beat back the kumogakure shinobi sooner than expected. With your grandfather present, they didn't even try to do anything clever when they sent the diplomatic treaty. I only wish I could have paid it back sooner, I have no excuses."

The third had a reasonable plan. If Tora was seen regularly going to the third hokage for training, it would eventually show the Hoshi clan was under his protection.

Tora was lost in thought when thinking of the third's offer. He remembered all the memories he had of the third hokage.

'Not gonna lie,I think the dude would be a cool grandpa, but the third was incompetent during his 2nd reign as hokage. He let Danzo and the elders walk all over him just because they were his friends. He let Orochimaru run wild to torture, kill, and rape because he didn't have the heart in him to kill his old student... Luckily, the three idiots are gone so that takes care of one problem. The other one... I'll just have to be strong enough to deal with it myself when the time comes. The third may be a terrible administrator, but he's strong AF. Any of his tutelage will definitely help me grow stronger.' Tora surmised his opinion.

'Also, what was that about kumokagure not doing anything during the peace treaty signing? So this means that Neji's pops, Lord Hizashi is still alive and the hyuga clan drama isn't as escalated as before. That's nice I guess.' Tora was intrigued by the effects his existence had on those around him.

"That would be great hokage-sama, thank you." Tora bowed though there was still some anger in his movement.

"No, thank you child. For giving this old fool a chance to stop making mistakes."

Tora's rage softened. He saw the contrition and regret in the old man's face. It was at his point he started feeling pity for the old man.

'Sigh... it seems that I don't have the heart to get mad at him for his mistakes. He never should have been forced to become the hokage again. This man should be in a retirement home teaching his grandkids, not trying to do a job that's passed him by.'

Tora then simply nodded respectfully, and left.

As Tora left the office, the third hokage looked towards a corner of the room.

'Sigh... that boy is already a strong genin-level shinobi at the age of five. I truly wish I could delay his warpath for Akio's sake. I already know the child has had his first kill when he was 4, but Akio would roll-over in the grave if his grand child gave up his happiness and started a killing spree due to him dying'

"Inu, I have a mission for you." The hokage ordered.

An anbu with a dog face mask appeared in front of him kneeled.

"Yes hokage-sama."

"You may pause your previous mission of watching over Naruto for now. Now that the Danzo and the elders are gone, and with Mikoto's fiery speech during the last clan meeting, it is likely that his treatment will begin to improve significantly." Hiruzen said.

'Ah, that Mikoto, she was always good friends with Kushina. It must have broken her heart when the other clans stopped her from adopting Naruto.' Hiruzen thought of what had recently happened.

During the last clan-head only meeting, Mikoto shamed everyone for keeping quiet about Naruto's identity and allowing their clansmen to mistreat the son of the 4th hokage; which garnered ashamed looks from everyone in the room. Many of the clan heads were friends and were at one point in time saved by Minato. Their inaction to alleviate the discrimination of Minato's son, caused them great guilt.

However, the main target of Mikoto's outburst was Hiruzen. She blew-up at him for allowing his past friendships to cloud his judgement. She said that he chose the rotting roots of the leaf over the village's future. She even said that the first, second, and fourth hokage would be ashamed to see what he had become.

It was during this point Hiruzen truly realized how much he had failed during his 2nd reign. He could only look down in shameful agreement as Mikoto verbally abused him for his incompetence. He did nothing for Minato and Kushina. Instead, he chose to help his friend who had fallen into darkness, and his two other friends who were incompetent. It was after this meeting he made a decision.

"Inu, I would like for you to look and call for Tsunade back to the village. It is very likely she is still in Tanzaku gambling her life away."

"Yes hokage-sama, but..." Inu was about to say something but was interrupted by Hiruzen.

"If she says no, tell her that an old fool is retiring and will tell her the truth about her clan if she comes back and becomes hokage... The position will also come with a bonus gambling allowance. "

"Hai, hokage-sama." Inu then body flickered out of the hokage office.

*Meanwhile with Tora

Tora was walking towards training ground 69, he was planning to alternate between 69 and 96 for his training. Why specifically 69 and 96? Well because it was farther and helped train his endurance of course.

His current goal was getting stronger, and becoming at least low Jounin level by the time the chunin exams arc had begun. He had a snake he wished to help kill.

On the way there he mentally went over his plan.

[Operation: Raid Boss]

- Train physical attributes and starscourge jutsu by using gravity to increase his body weight.

- Learn enough medical ninjutsu to help recover faster from his training

- Improve chakra control enough to be able to properly use medical ninjutsu

- Improve taijutsu and kenjutsu, he was a close ranged fighter at heart.

- Improve Scarlet Rot Release to avoid gaining side-effects and to have a strong trump card.

- Find a better weapon than a pair of tanto. For his raidboss build he needed a more strength based weapon that he could channel his chakra through better.

This was the rough outline of his plan. He knew that this build fitted his personality and body specs the most. His abilities and bloodline would let him be unparalleled and impossible to fight at close combat in the future. Gravity release and Rot release would particularly help him in mowing down heaps of ninja who got to close in the future, his potential was made for large scale war and he knew it.

As he was walking through a park, he noticed three children under a tree. They were two young boys and a girl. One of the boys and the girl were painting, while the other child was watching them with interest. Tora smiled when recognized who they were.

'Ah, I see. Now that root has been disbanded, many of the kidnapped children were freed. In this case, it looks like Sai and Shin were adopted by the Kurama clan to be playmates for Yakumo. It feels like the demon of the Kurama clan will have a harder time losing control in this timeline... Huh, I never thought of it, but Sai and Yakumo would have a lot of chemisty with each other, art buffs and all. Their a year older than me so I won't see them in the academy as much, but its nice to know this timeline is already happier than before.'

'Hey Tora... how are you doing?' The goddess spoke nervously in Tora's mind.

The goddess let Tora be by himself for the past few days, she knew he needed time to think. And she also felt guilty not foreseeing the destruction of hoshikagure.

'Im fine goddess, I'm doing better than a few days ago.'

'I see, then I take it your training? Where are you headed?' She then asked.

'Training ground 69.' Tora replied nonchalantly.

'Nice!' The goddess got his reference immediately.

'Eyoo, high five.' Tora extended a mental high five which the goddess accepted.

A few minutes later, when Tora arrived at the training ground.

'So... Tora I have a side quest for you that will help you get strong.'

'Uhuh... I don't like how you said that... what's the catch?'

'Well... see for yourself.'

When Tora saw the quest in his system, he immediately widened his eyes.

'No! You Can't do this! This is impossible, just let me fight Danzo without the Kishimoto points if this is what your going to give me!' Tora was panicking.

'Oh, stop being melodramatic, I'm sure you can do this.' Goddess tried to convince him.

'F*CK! F*CK! F*CK! F*CK! F*CK!' The convincing was not working.

'Tora! If you can't believe in yourself, then believe in me who believes in you.' Goddess tried to shake Tora from his daze and motivate him.

'You just stole that quote from Kamina!' Tora immediately rebutted.

Eventually, goddess was able to calm him down after a period of time. What was the side-quest that immediately broke Tora's will? Well...

[Continuing System Side Quest]

[The Kunoichi Kishimoto Left Behind.]

Make the following kunoichi more helpful, and/or less annoying (When applicable), .

- Sakura

- Hinata

- Ino

- Tenten

- More will be added in the future

No Timeframe

Rewards: Improved growth rate depending on results. ??? depending on results.

Author's Corner

Hey guys!

What do you think about Tora's planned character build. I actually took inspiration a lot from the Radahn festival boss fight. Where Radahn is basically a raid boss wherein you summon loads of summons to try and kill him.

I also wanted to give a quick shoutout to Sai, his bro, and Yakumo. I'm not sure if I'll be using them a lot in the future so I wanted their characters to at least have the signs of a happy ending to show that their alive and happy if I do end-up not using them.

Ah if any of you are curious due to the system quest. Right now, I'm not really interested in writing a harem. Maybe in the future, but as of now, I don't really have any plans.

Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoy the chapter!