Morning at the Orphanage

Hidden Leaf Village, early morning.

The sun had yet to fully climb over Hokage Rock, but smoke was already rising from the orphanage kitchen.

The oily smoke carried a burnt smell, mixed with the sour tang of what was probably yesterday's leftovers being reheated. Senju Shinichi had smelled it for six years, and by now, he no longer found it unpleasant—he called it "the smell of home." Whenever he said that, his tone was so sincere that even the orphanage matron could not tell whether he was praising it or mocking it.

"Breakfast! Get your asses down here!"

The matron's voice worked better than a morning bell. The instant she finished speaking, a clatter of footsteps erupted from the stairs. Seven or eight children tumbled down from the second floor like spilled beans, scrambling toward the dining table. Thin porridge with pickles, and on rare occasions, a few strips of meat sliced finer than hair—this was the orphanage's standard breakfast.

Six-year-old Shinichi did not fight for it.

There was nothing good to fight over anyway. That was the life lesson he had learned during his six years in this orphanage. The matron's hands trembled whenever she served food, and all the meat got shaken out. Rather than squeeze into the front and watch her Parkinson's performance, he would wait until everyone had settled down before going over. At least he would not get less porridge than anyone else—the porridge was ladled last, by which point the matron's hands were tired of shaking.

Six-year-old Senju Shinichi climbed up from the corner and dusted off his clothes. The orphanage issued everyone the same gray short-sleeved shirts, washed until they had faded pale, with frayed cuffs. He stood at the stairwell and yawned, his black eyes half-open, looking no different from any other child who had not fully woken up.

But if someone looked closely, they would find that the light in those eyes was completely unlike that of his peers.

It was the expression unique to an adult, one forged only after life had beaten them down again and again.

No, more accurately—

It was the gaze of an office drone.

Wait a second.

A six-year-old office drone?

Even he was amused by the thought. Shaking his head, he headed for the table. Strange thoughts always surfaced in his mind, and he could not explain where they came from. Sometimes he thought they were dreams; other times, they felt more real than dreams. For instance, yesterday he had dreamed of working overtime until three in the morning in a city filled with steel buildings. When he woke up, his neck actually ached, as though he had really spent the entire night sitting in front of a computer.

Though he was not sure what a "computer" was.

He just knew.

It was absurd.

"Shinichi! If you don't come over now, there won't be any porridge left!" a freckled boy shouted at him, his cheeks stuffed full. Rice grains sprayed from his mouth as he spoke.

"Coming, coming." Shinichi strolled over and accepted the bowl the matron handed him. He took one look—sure enough, his bowl had a third more porridge than everyone else's. It was not because the matron favored him. He had arrived late, so the porridge at the bottom of the pot was thicker.

What was this called?

This was called strategy.

At the dining table, the children chattered about what they would play that day, who could climb the highest up a tree, and who had found another new secret passage. Shinichi sat in the corner, drinking his porridge as he listened. He occasionally nodded along, but his eyes remained half-lidded, as if he were thinking about something else.

In truth, he was thinking about that dream again.

No, not a dream.

A memory.

No, that was not right either.

He set down his bowl and looked at his small palm. A six-year-old's hand was still tiny, its knuckles distinct but its skin tender, with a few faint lines across the palm. He turned it over and stared at it for a long while, feeling that these hands should have been larger, rougher, capable of typing afterimages across a keyboard—

What was a keyboard?

And what was an afterimage?

"Big Brother Shinichi, aren't you playing with us today either?"

A little girl with twin pigtails walked over carrying an empty bowl and asked timidly. Her name was Little Flower. She was also an orphanage child, a year younger than Shinichi, and she usually loved following him around.

Shinichi snapped back to himself and smiled at her. "Of course I am. Who said I wasn't?"

Little Flower immediately brightened. "Then let's go catch bugs on the back hill!"

"Sure."

He agreed without hesitation. Little Flower cheered and ran back to tell the other children the "good news," while Shinichi himself sighed inwardly. Catching bugs. He had been catching bugs for a full six years. Scorpions, centipedes, rhinoceros beetles—he could identify them by touch with his eyes closed.

But what else could he do?

It was a time of peace, and he was an orphan. Other than eating, sleeping, and catching bugs every day, what else was there to do?

It was not like he could go to war.

Holding his empty bowl, he stood up and planned to take it to the kitchen. After two steps, he suddenly froze. It felt as though something had violently slammed into his head—

A scene flooded into his mind without warning.

Scarlet light filled the sky.

A gigantic black shadow.

The village was burning. People were screaming. An enormous orange-red beast roared, its nine tails sweeping across the heavens. Each strike brought tremors like mountains collapsing and earth splitting apart. A blond man in a Hokage cloak stood atop a toad's back, covered in blood, yet smiling at the corners of his lips. A red-haired woman leaned weakly against a barrier, cradling a newborn baby in her arms, tears streaming down her face as she said something.

Then the flames swallowed everything.

"Shinichi?"

The matron's voice pulled him back to reality. Shinichi realized he was still standing there, his hand held out in the same position. The bowl slipped from his grip with a crack and shattered into three pieces on the floor.

He was stunned.

Those images were as clear as if he had witnessed them himself, every detail vivid in his mind. He could even recall the fine lines at the blond man's eyes and feel the warmth of the red-haired woman's tears.

But...

Who were they?

Where was that?

Was that the Nine-Tails Rampage?

Nine-Tails Rampage.

The phrase suddenly surfaced from the depths of his mind, carrying an unquestionable certainty, as though he had always known about it. But the question was—how could he know? The Nine-Tails had attacked the Hidden Leaf Village six years ago. He had been a baby then. There was no way he could remember anything.

The matron came over, looked at the shattered bowl, then at his pale face. Rarely, she did not scold him. "Didn't sleep well last night? You look awful."

"...Yeah." Shinichi gave a vague reply.

"Then stop running around with the others. Rest indoors this morning." The matron waved her hand. "You don't need to pay for the bowl. It was chipped anyway."

Shinichi nodded in thanks and turned toward the stairs. He climbed step by step, moving slowly, his mind a complete mess. Those scenes kept flashing through his head, playing fragmented snippets like a broken projector—the massive fox, burning streets, a crying infant. Every image was both unfamiliar and familiar, like scenes from a movie he had watched, yet also things he had personally experienced.

He pushed open his door and threw himself onto the hard bed.

There was a crack in the ceiling, stretching from the corner of the wall to the edge of the light fixture like a thin bolt of lightning. He stared at it for a long time, trying to piece together the fragments in his head, but the more he tried, the more confused he became.

Nine-Tails Rampage.

Hidden Leaf Village.

The faces of past Hokage carved into Hokage Rock.

This information was arranged in his mind with an eerie sense of familiarity, like a résumé torn into pieces. He could recognize every piece, yet could not put it back together. He knew that he knew many things, but he did not know where that knowledge came from.

Most bizarre of all—

One face kept flashing through his mind.

It was a face wearing an orange spiral mask. There was only one hole in the mask, and within it was a single scarlet eye.

Whenever that face appeared in his mind, his chest tightened as though someone had seized his heart and was pulling it out. Anger, fear, hatred—emotions that clearly did not belong to him became so real in that instant that he could barely breathe.

But he did not know that face.

He swore he had never seen that face before.

"Who am I, exactly?"

Six-year-old Shinichi lay on the bed and asked the ceiling that question.

No one answered him.

Children's laughter drifted in from outside. Little Flower was calling his name, her voice floating up from downstairs, soft and delicate. Sunlight shone against the window, casting a bright patch of light that landed right beside his hand.

He reached out and touched it with a finger.

It was warm.

Whether those fragments were dreams or memories, at least this ray of light was real.

Shinichi took a deep breath, rolled over, and buried his face in the pillow. The matron had told him to rest that morning, so he would rest. His mind was such a mess now that if he went out to catch bugs, he might bring back a scorpion thinking it was a rhinoceros beetle.

Before he closed his eyes, the last thing he saw was—

A book.

A book filled with all kinds of symbols and hand signs.

Three words were written on the cover, the handwriting messy but forceful.

"Chakra."

Then he fell asleep.

At the moment his consciousness sank into darkness, he heard a voice.

It was soft, as though it rang directly in his mind. It had no source, yet it was exceptionally clear. It spoke only a few short words, but they made his eyes fly open in his sleep—

"Bloodline confirmed."

"Senju."

Shinichi shot upright in bed, his heart pounding wildly.

There was no one in the room.

The sunlight outside was still brilliantly bright. The children downstairs were still playing. The matron was still grumbling as she scrubbed pots in the kitchen. Everything was the daily routine he knew so well. But that voice had been too real—so real that he could even tell it was synthesized, devoid of any rise or fall in tone, cold as if it were reading a report.

He sat on the bed and panted for a long while before slowly raising his right hand.

Calm down.

Take a deep breath.

He tried to imagine a force flowing within his body, starting from his dantian, traveling through his blood vessels and meridians, and gathering in his palm. Though he did not know where the word "dantian" had come from, he instinctively felt that this was what he was supposed to do.

One second.

Two seconds.

Three seconds.

Nothing happened.

Six-year-old Shinichi stared at his palm for a long time, then burst out laughing.

"Just a dream after all."

He rolled out of bed, put on his shoes, and decided to go downstairs and join the bug-catching squad after all. Staying inside and overthinking things would only drive him crazy. When he reached the door, he looked back at the room once more to make sure no one had entered while he slept. Then he shrugged, pulled open the door, and went out.

The corridor was flooded with sunlight.

As he headed downstairs, he thought that today he absolutely had to catch the biggest rhinoceros beetle and redeem yesterday's loss. Little Flower had bragged yesterday that her beetle was a whole size larger than his. That could not stand.

As for those strange images and that strange voice—

They did not matter.

They were all dreams anyway.

What unusual thing could possibly happen to an ordinary orphan?

That was what he thought.

Until that night, when he drifted into sleep once more and saw the book called "Chakra" slowly open to its first page in his mind.

There was only one sentence on that page.

"All bloodlines may be devoured."

Then his memories came rushing back like floodwaters bursting through a dam.

(End of Chapter One)