PART 1: IT’S REAL

Papa, I don’t want you to feel guilty. Mama I hate seeing you run yourself ragged for a worthless scum like me. Elly, my precious little sister, I’m sorry for being a leech in your life. Suicide costs money to clean up the mess. Running away would make you hire expensive investigators. I can’t disappear without a trace or erase your memories of me when I was still your daughter and sister.

Why won’t God just… make me disappear.

…

She wanted to reach out for her phone but found herself unable to move. Was it sleep paralysis? Possible. She remembered being drowsy in the bus, waiting for the darned traffic to move. It would be embarrassing to shout for help and even if she wanted, her mouth would not budge.

She could not breathe.

Just then she realized that her face was horizontal on something solid. Her nose inhaled the carbon dioxide and water vapor back into her lungs. Her lungs. She could feel her chest rising and falling faster and faster each time, searching for air.

Was she going to die? Despite the pain in her chest, she mentally chuckled. Even after death, she somehow managed to make other people’s lives harder. A frail old man next to her might contracted heart attack after noticing someone died next to him, the driver had to delay the bus’s schedule to remove her body, then after the medics removed her, a superstitious rumour about the bus’s company would spread and ruin their business. Her family—

“Kusari, wake up.”

Someone jerked her head to the side, poking her right cheek multiple times.

Her nose and mouth greedily breathe the rich air and with that, her sensory organs all receive signals at the same time. Light pierced her eyes, forcing her to squint as they registered multiple blurry figures and a white wall far behind. Her ears rang from the sudden influx of vibrating air; whispers, murmurs and someone shouting all melded into one. Cold polished surface squeezed the other half of her face and the wetness of her own saliva shocked her until she choked and coughed many times.

“Hey, are you alright?”

She winched as the nearest voice drown out the others, stopping the ringing in her ears too quickly.

“Where… am… I…?” she said in between fits of coughing.

“Sensei, please stop shouting at Kusari, I think she’s unwell,” the voice said.

Kusari? That was not her name. Her name was—!!!

Her name was—!!!

Why can’t I think of my name?

In fact, how could she understand what they were saying? The voices around her did not sound like English nor Indonesian nor German nor Japanese. Her mind told her she did and should not understand but something else, a faint whisper in the corner of her head told her what she should hear and speak.

“Kusari,” a deep and stern voice called out as she was pulled back to the rails of her chair.

She, who the voices addressed as Kusari, stopped her coughing fit and blinked until the blurry vision cleared. In front of her desk stood two females starkly contrasting one another. The younger one holding her hands had long brown hair, deep onyx eyes and a single mole under her right, her adorable face showed concern for the coughing friend? —in front of her. Contrasting the conservative long-sleeved, high-collared purple shirt the little girl wore was the woman’s black skin-tight bodysuit with open green flak jacket that framed her generous bust. The tall woman leaned in and squeezed her cheeks, forcing her to look at her jade eyes.

The woman reminded her of Yamanaka Ino from one of her favourite manga/anime series. Shoulder length, light—almost white—blond hair framed her heart shaped face that was otherwise flawless if not for a scowl marring her beauty. !!! would’ve blushed if she wasn’t terrified.

“Where am I, ma’am?” she dared ask.

She immediately regretted her action as the beautiful woman’s scowl deepened.

“That’s Kira-sensei for you, brat, now pay attention to the class.”

Class? I graduated high school a year ago!

A squeak came out from her mouth as the woman pinched her cheeks before turning back to continue teaching.

Snickers prompted !!! to look around at her supposed classmates who immediately stiffened and looked back at the blackboard after a loud smack of a ruler echoed in the large classroom. She looked at herself as a pit was growing inside her stomach. Smaller hands and fingers, dark-blue almost black hair tied in a ponytail replaced her blonde locks, basic blue t-shirt and white skirt that was supposed to be a formal dress for a university interview…

Whose body is this!?

“You’ve taken a liking to ignoring me today, huh?”

“Huh?” she looked up to see the girl before pouted and folded her arms.

Those arms that shot up and grab hers.

“Excuse me, sensei, I think my friend here is still unwell and sleepy. May I take her to the restroom to wash her face?”

Kira considered the girl’s word before nodding, “Be quick, this is your first introduction to chakra theory.”

Chakra?

Before she could think about the teacher’s words, the girl dragged her outside, earning stares from their classmates.

***

.

“Have you been pulling an all-nighter again?”

“Huh?” That was the second thing she said to the girl which seemed to upset her more.

The cute little girl sighed and gently push her in front of the sync before helping !!!—Fine, Kusari! Now let me think of my name, darn it! —wash her face, removing the fatigue Kusari didn’t know she had until now.

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“I know you’re still getting used to living by yourself but that’s not an excuse to study until dawn cracks. That’s not how you catch up to us,” the girl then stopped to judge her reaction, seemingly expecting an argument.

“Huh, oh,” Kusari slapped her mouth. “Sorry, I, uh, umm…”

The girl harrumphed, “No excuse this time it seems. Now come on, we need to get back to class and stay awake if we want to catch up to Itachi.”

Her stomach dropped, “Itachi? You mean that Itachi?”

“Yes, that Itachi, my over-talented thirtieth cousin trice removed who absorbs everything like a sponge and applies them the next day. That Itachi.”

As the girl dragged her inside the classroom and sat her down, Kusari’s mind went to overdrive. Children with varying hair colour in one room, an exotically beautiful teacher explaining about Naruto’s chakra system, a boy and a girl with puppies on top of their heads and a mention of the Itachi in the restroom. There was no mistaking it, !!! had been transported into another world and was piloting a seven-year-old girl’s body. It was not just any world but the Naruto’s world. The fussy girl next to her was Uchiha Izumi, Itachi’s unofficial girlfriend that will die by his hands five years from now.

!!! now known as Kusari could only do one thing as a response to the overwhelming info dump—

“Kusari!”

—and that was to empty her stomach on the desk for everyone to see.

In the OG world and this one, making bad first impressions seemed to be a habit she could not break.

***

.

At some point, every otaku had dreamed about going into their favourite series’ world and grow alongside their favourite characters. Unless of course their favourite started with a B and ended with -eserk. Even then, who would not want to at least shake hands with a hot hunk like Guts before getting brutally murdered by monsters?

That was why unlike some of her favourite self-insert fanfiction characters, Kusari was not mad at God for sending her to an extremely dangerous world like Naruto’s. Knowing the plot in-and-out, she was confident she could live in a world filled with superpowered individuals whose morals were on the darker shade of grey. Heck if she played it right, she could help the main characters reach maximum happy ending.

Kusari just had to pass the academy with flying colours and get chummy with her jōnin sensei to get access to powerful jutsus.

She yelped as the tip of a mop poked her in the bum. “Ah! Lord Jesus Christ!”

“Huh, who’s that?” Izumi said after giggling at her reaction. “Anyway, we should clean up fast before our classmates get the fun spots in the playground. Come on, barf girl.”

Kusari blushed, “Barf girl?!”

Izumi continued laughing as she poked her cheek. 

Another stick poked her this time it was her other cheek. “Never thought you’d be the confident one, Kusa. What, finally done acting like a victim?” It seemed Kusari had another friend in high places, this time it was Inuzuka Hana, clan heiress of the Inuzuka Clan. Kiba’s sister.

Hana in the academy looked almost like Princess Mononoke. Her shoulder length hair exactly matched the princess only Hana’s brown was darker, on each cheek was a tattoo of a fang dyed red, and in replacement of Moro the big bad white wolf were three cute grey-and-white puppies whose names she had forgotten. One sat on Hana’s head and the other two on her shoulders.

Hana herself dressed like a tomboy, wearing short grey pants and a boy’s green tank top that revealed her undeveloped chest. Soon enough, Kusari knew Hana would cover that up.

Kusari shook her head to make her friends stop playing with her face, “Did I say that out loud?”

“Loud enough for me and my pups to hear,” Hana grinned as the puppies yipped in agreement.

Darn Inuzuka genetics!

“I-I did not mean to be cocky.” And that was true. It mattered not if she knew the plot, what mattered was if she could get by with a weak body like this. The original owner did not eat enough nor sleep enough. After the adrenaline rush from realizing where she was, Kusari felt all the accumulating bad habits this girl developed.

“I mean, if I do not pass the jōnin’s secret test, I would be sent back here to try again the next year. So, if I do not give up, I am confident I would eventually be in a jōnin team.”

Hana shook her head but Izumi spoke first.

“Secret test? My cousins never said anything about a test after got into teams.”

Hana snickered, “Can’t believe the civie girl knows more than the Uchiha girl.” Izumi threw a half-hearted punch which Hana blocked. “Kusa’s right, my mom spilled the secret after I got top marks last year.” She wiggled her eyebrows at the Uchiha while she huffed. “Although it’s not that big of a secret, I’m surprised you know about it.” Hana fixed her gaze on Kusari.

She revealed too much. “Oh, you know, I heard it from… uhm… upperclassmen who had graduated! Yeah.”

“Pretty generous of them. Most would keep that thing a secret since ‘they need to experience it themselves’ mentality prevails over kindship,” Izumi grumbled. Most likely her fellow clansmen treated her that way. “But I didn’t know you’re acquainted with an upperclassman; you need to introduce them sometime.” The hurt look in Izumi made her feel guilty. One for lying, two for doing it in this body.

 “Anyway, Izu is right,” Hana cleared the mood, “Older folks suck for not telling us anything and expect us to succeed on our own.”

“… And I’ll be sure to tell your mother about that.”

Kusari, Izumi and Hana’s head slowly craned towards the source of the new voice. It was a voice Kusari had only known for a day but owner gave enough impression so she would not forget it. Appearing out of nowhere was Yamanaka Kira and her scary scowl.

“Please don’t,” Hana squeaked.

“You girls sure took your sweet time cleaning a single mess. It’s three past lunchtime, get off my class. Now.”

They did not need to be told twice.

 ***

.

After the Nine-Tails attack, the Hidden Leaf village who was still recovering from the third shinobi world war lost more chūnin and jōnin. Her former jōnin-sensei was one of them. Although grief was inevitable, it didn’t hit her as hard as most people. The late jōnin’s philosophy was every shinobi was replaceable and the older you were the more you need to be ready to die on the field. She took his philosophy to heart and aimed to replace him with as many high-quality shinobi she could make. That’s why after getting a promotion, she immediately applied as an academy teacher while her peers laughed at her ‘lowly job’. She would replace them too someday.

Yamanaka Kira held discipline in the highest regard. Discipline created leaders and leaders inevitably became high rank shinobis. If she were to be frank, her class lacked promising candidates. Ignoring Uchiha Itachi, the rest of her students lacked the drive to aim as high as possible, most likely because their motivation came from their parents not themselves.

Even the clan kids became lax after their first year and in this second year they didn’t show much growth.

She absolutely refused to raise lazy shinobis who would overflow the Genin Unit. Even if they got placed in that group of rejects, she wanted them to become the best rejects in the whole world. When she’d expressed this concern to the headmaster, he waved her off, saying they were only in their second year and still had four and a half more to grow. Respectfully, sir, fuck that weak mentality.

Even so she knew children with their chakra system locked had their limits so she didn’t push too hard at physical subjects. Injuries and illness stunted growth the most after all. And that’s why after an unassuming civilian orphan student of hers threw up out of nowhere, that got her alarms blaring.

When she found Kusari dared dropping her head in class, she shouted at her to wake her up. Waiting for ten seconds, the girl went completely still and showed signs of either deep sleep or… death. But after she’d thought about that unlikely possibility, the girl woke up.

Kira checked her eyes and pinched her cheek to check for blood flow and found nothing wrong. She chalked that up to a once-in-a-blue-moon misdemeanour from that girl and moved on. That was before the girl threw-up out of nowhere.

Kira’s first assumption had been the girl’s poor choice of food and lack of parental guidance that led to exhaustion but… the vomit she produced wasn’t normal. She held back both her judgement and the need to lecture the girl, and instead told her to clean up her mess.

The chūnin instructor’s suspicion solidified when she found her unwell student having a hard time scrapping the mucus from the desk and floor. She’d only heard a case of sticky and slightly corrosive vomit once before and she didn’t like what she heard. As any good shinobi should, she took a sample from the rug and head to the medical research facility.

She really hoped she was wrong.