Naruto: Traveler System

Synopsis:

Utakata woke up and realized that he returned from death. He woke up at the time when he first met his disciple, Hotaru. When he felt helpless facing the eventual death in the fight against leader of Akatsuki, the Traveler System got installed in his very being. With this system, he journeyed to another dimension in search for power.

A Second Chance

Chapter 1: A Second Chance

The young man woke up and immediately see the world once again through his vision. He saw her. Young and lovely face, fair unblemished skin, long wavy blonde hair, and emerald-green eyes shone with a hint of innocence and naivety. 

She was his self-proclaimed 'disciple', Tsuchigumo Hotaru.

Perhaps she was Utakata's biggest regret before he left this world. It was just then, that he decided to change for good. Trying to become a better shinobi and a person, after he made peace with his deceased master and persuaded by Naruto's words full of optimism. But at that exact time, the Akatsuki already started the Tsuki-no-Me and sent their member on a bijuu hunting spree. It was such a bad luck, really. He faced the leader of the Akatsuki, the man with legendary dojutsu Rinnegan, Six-Path Pain themselves.

'Even after all these years, your appearance really didn't change in the slightest huh?' Utakata mused a bit seeing her face as a small smile escaped his lips. 'But what happened, did some bastards revive me with Impure World Reincarnation again? But my soul already left this world and reside in the Pure Land.' 

"Excuse me ..., but we need to immediately tend your wound, please follow me to the fortress." said Tonbei, an old gray haired old man. He was the guardian and also a servant of Hotaru.

'This sounds familiar somehow ...,' Tonbei circled his arm on Utakata's shoulder, trying to perform a walking assist. 

He had seen, or rather, experienced this situation before. On the way to the Mt. Katsuragi, the Tsuchigumo's clan fortress with odd layout and fortification could be seen from afar. 

The young man rearranged his thought. 'Was that just a dream ..., or I've returned back in time? This is confusing, I have memories of my future self!?'

Utakata didn't really know how to explain this situation. He died and then revived with that cursed forbidden jutsu along with six other jinchuurikis, fought against Naruto and the Killer Bee. Then after that, they met again in the bijuu's inner dimension before his soul depart to the Pure Land for the second time. But instead, he didn't. He didn't return to the Pure Land but woke up just a few weeks before he experienced his first dead.

'So be it. If this is a second chance, then I will survive this whole predicament.' his mind relaxed and he closed his eyes for a light sleep as Tonbei tend to his injury.

---0---

The next morning, Utakata woke up with bandaged arm. He wore his blue yukata and fastened the orange obi. He sensed the two occupants of this fortress was in adjacent room, so he went to that room. The two noticed him immediately after he opened the sliding door.

With a calm and a bit aloof voice, Utakata greeted them first. "Good morning."

"Good morning to you too." the young girl replied with an upbeat tone.

"Thank goodness your wound isn't that deep. If that happen, I'm afraid only iryo-nin would be able to help you. Young man." Tonbei stated. "We're just about to have a breakfast, come and join us."

"I'll be intruding then."

"Well, take a seat then uhhmmm ... " Tonbei elongated that 'uhm' as he had no recollection of this young man's name.

"I haven't properly introduced myself, have I? I'm Utakata."

"Nice to meet you Utakata-sama, I'm Hotaru!"

"I'm just a servant, but you can call me Tonbei."

"Thank you for helping me with the wound." Utakata said to the old man.

"It's the least that I can do, and I can't say enough thanks for saving Hotaru-sama."

Utakata left the dining room right away as there's nothing much to talk about with the Tsuchigumo duo. Sure, he regretted that he couldn't teach anything worthwhile to Hotaru when he died. But he won't beg her to be his disciple this soon. The girl has to have self-motivation and seek him out herself. It might be his pride, or anything. However, from the bits of memory that he could remember, it wasn't until the second day of his stay in this fortress that Hotaru seeks him and pestered him to be her mentor.

He lied down on a root of a birch tree nearby the artificial cliff around this fortress. Out of habit, he blows up a bubble and filled the clear sky with the floating balls. 

'Right now, my priority is to prepare the showdown against Rinnegan no Pain.'

Utakata still remember clearly about that fight, and he spend most of his time in the Pure Land just to muse over that fight. Pondering on how to improve his fighting style and all that 'what if' stuff. He realized that, despite quite versatile and cost-friendly, his Bubble Techniques were full of weakness. 

First, it was speed. Yes, the bubble can act as ranged attack with unexpected outcome. He could mold its properties into acidic, caustic, adding it with a hot steam, or black ink that could disintegrate the opponent, or even turn it into a sticky glue upon contact. Even he could explode it like an explosion tag. Though the explosion released is only around 1/10 of explosive tag, it still quite amazing as the material cost of of his bubble soap is not even 100 ryo. But in the end, the bubble technique could never be as fast as throwing weapon like kunai, shuriken or senbon. All this time, he relied on deception and sheer quantity of his bubble to overwhelm his chaser. 

The next drawback was its firepower. The bubble ninjutsu definitely lacked those. Even if he could instakill a chunin-level shinobi with a pop, but against Pain? It was never a competition, Preta Path can just absorb his bubble before the bubble come into contact, Deva Path can just use Shinra Tensei to blow his bubble back or whatever. It was a nightmare experience for Utakata, as he forced to transform into his bijuu beast cloak form. Utakata was still unsure if Pain could absorb a bijuudama. But maybe it was worth to try it, those balls are pretty overpowered. Just below truth-seeking ball.

'Maybe ..., I can try incorporating Naruto's signature move into my bubble ninjutsu? What was it again, rasengan?

He wondered that maybe with this jutsu, as long as he could imbue a massive amount of chakra and balance it into the bubble, he could make a bijuudama. That was how Saiken —the six-tailed slug beast sealed inside his stomach— made a lesser version of a tailed-beast bomb. Of course, that was only his shallow understanding of the beast bomb, he hadn't even tried to experiment it.

But in the end, Utakata only has chakra capacity around peak-jounin level. Even though he has a bijuu sealed inside, he can't tap on the bijuu's chakra without losing control of himself. Making a bijuudama with his bubble ninjutsu is theoretically possible, but it was improbable with him as of now. 

'So, what can I do now? Developing a new jutsu that I thought over in the Pure Land, or train what I have first? But do I have enough time for that. It would be a couple of weeks before I meet Pain, I'm afraid I won't be able to integrate the new jutsus into my fighting style. Damn, this is more troublesome than I thought ...' as Utakata left himself on his device, he heard a sound and there was a floating screen with strings of text in front of him.

[Criteria matched, system installing.]

[Successfully Installed]

[Welcome to the Traveler System!]

'The what?'