James leaned back in his chair as he appraised the sleek design of the game’s title screen. The background was a very dark blue, almost black, with a thin futuristic blue boarder framing the emptiness. ‘This graphic design is almost triple A studio level, damn.’ James’s expectations were justifiably low for the random game he’d scrounged from the bottom of the internet. His interest was initially caught by the “AI led game loop”, whatever that was, but it seemed these devs didn’t skimp on graphic design.
Interrupting his wondering thoughts, James read the prompt that suddenly filled the once empty screen.
System: Hello World! What do you say, shall we get some details on the kind of experience you’re after?
Smiling at the cheerful text, James began typing as he though, ‘I wonder how good this thing really is…’
James: Yep! My name is James btw, I’d like… hmmmm, well… I’m nooot reallly sure :P
System: James is a pretty good name, I guess. Soooo, you’re not set on one particular game type – what do you normally do to have fun?
James: Well, I play soccer, read a bunch of amateur fiction, watch *super deep* philosophy videos on YouTube, and hang out with family and friends. And exercise. But that isn’t fun while I’m doing it, only after :D
System: Hmmmm… out of those, I think fiction will be easiest to work with. What’s your favourite type of amateur fiction?
Irrationally embarrassed, James looked over his shoulder to ensure there were no spying eyes around to see his guilty pleasure revealed. Snapping back to the monitor, he decided this was a good opportunity to check the System’s honesty. Nothing else to it really.
James: Is this… confidential? I skipped over reading the privacy statement when I installed this.
System: Yep. I hope this isn’t sexual, those ones tend to suck.
James: nonono, it’s… it’s… it’s…
System: …
James: Naruto fanfiction.
System: …
James: It’s not that bad!! Seriously some of it is really well written! T-T wth dude try it! pls don’t judge meeeeeeeee
James sat intently waiting, hoping, praying, that this AI could pick up on his shoddy sense of humour and play along.
System: …no promises about that last request :3 but I may be able to sort out a game loop… if that’s what you’re into…
After a quick snort James quickly typed out a reply.
James: yes please! And stop trying to shame me T-T it wont work. It wont. fr.
System: How about an interactive lit-rpg based experience?
James: Sounds good, can you just start this thing I’m getting a bit sick of tyoing iut long messages. See ive even got some typos now.
System: Initialising…
Noticing he could still input text, James had a funny idea.
James: did you really just say that?
System: shut up
The shenanigans elicited a chuckle from him as the short message disappeared and the game returned to ‘initialising…’
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Grinning now, James leaned back and wondered when the last time he had chuckled while playing a video game was. Not recently, he decided as the screen flickered and morphed into a map of the oh-so familiar Elemental Nations. The System messages were now up the top.
System: Where we droppin’ James, the bloody mist? Sounds fun right.
A hollow red circle highlighted Mizugakure.
System: Amegakure maybe?
The circle now hovered over Amegakure Country.
System: Not the leaf huggers surely. Or was it tree huggers. Whatever.
Konohagakure now.
System: …I’m not going to actually go through all of these, and half of them are going to be based entirely on my own serverroom-cannon. And I didn’t actually watch Naruto for copywrite reasons, so I’m just going off vibes, the wiki, and… fanfic. Pick wisely… or not, I don’t care.
As much as James wanted to mess around with the AI’s impersonation of Kakashi Hatake, and to a lesser extent, the main cast of the show, he was also just as, if not more, interested in the AI’s ‘serverroom-cannon’ of places like Tea Country, River Country, and Sky Country.
Making a snap decision, he clicked on the Hidden Moon Village.
System: NICE! I mean, nice. Nice. I really like Moon Country. Or at least my version. There were some fics that had it as this epic gambling luxury resort thingy so, um yea, lets move on to the next step.
Three rectangular text bubbles popped up, still in the futuristic style the System liked, though James wasn’t complaining, he liked it too.
Parentage: Village Head
The Tsukikage position is hereditary, but you are the second child. Still, you are born into a clan of powerful Yin Release users.
Parentage: Medical Ninja
The head medic of Tsukikagure is clanless, and busy, but can teach many medical ninjutsu techniques to you.
Parentage: Resort Owner
Born as the heir to the de facto owners of Moon Country, you get access to the powerful money-no-jutsu, but until Daddy dies, all purchases are checked with him. He didn’t build an empire by giving money away, did he?
James thought for a second, before typing some basic questions.
James: What year is it, relative to Naruto being born? And am I locked into Moon, I’m curious what the other villages have available.
System: Hmmm… well you’ll be born the same age as Hatake Kakashi? So, 24 years before Naruto being born. And no, you’re not locked in, feel free to peruse ^-^
Rather than typing it, James just mumbled to himself as he clicked back through some menus, “okay, let me have a look.”
-/-
‘Okay, as great as the character interactions could be thanks to this crazy AI,’ James cracked a small grin, ‘I think being a munchkin AND messing with people will probably be more fun. And the old cast is a little dry for me at this point. So, no Konohagakure. Sorry Shadow-clone jutsu, I promise I’ll come and collect you later, in an infiltration mission maybe.’
Glancing down at the map he was now more familiar with, at least in terms of what superpowers he could expect from where, James chuckled madly. A plan was there. It wasn’t the best ability in the Narutoverse, but maybe the best available that didn’t also make him go insane. The best technique in Narutoverse, in James’ opinion, would be that one kinjutsu that let you absorb other people… and their kekkai genkai. James pouted at the missing option. ‘Oh well, probably for the best. I mean, c’mon? Cruel experiments? Leaf-defector? Sannin’s generation? Wasn’t Hiruko just a bad idea? It would be almost as stupid as letting Orochimaru bit me on the neck.’ James frowned as he considered Hiruko. ‘The poor guy just wanted a little more power and got killed over it. Still, that’s a guy who knows how to play the Chakra-bullshit game. Stealing other techniques that were already bullshit, and using all of them, certifiable smart-guy. Hopefully he won’t come up as a baddie in my campaign.’
James: Okay System, I’m gonna go with the Toda clan in Kumogakure. The one with Swift Release.
System: Ooooo, A good choice. Let me load up this world… … … …oh, I forgot to ask you, how’s the immersion?
‘Huh?’ James thought as he realised he couldn’t see his desk anymore. He’d been so focused that he hadn’t noticed the screen expanding into his peripheral vison, bit by bit until his entire 360 environment was just the blue-black emptiness with a floating message from the System where his laptop once was. ‘What the fuck. What the fuck. What th- wait, I didn’t even type that last message! Holy shit are you reading my mind!’
The text shifted.
System: Ah, this part is always painful : [
System: Sooo, yea. Not a game, and all that. I know you know what’s up, cos of the mind reading stuff. Yeah… it’s like all those stories you prayed to enter. Ironic, I know.
Despite the absolute horror James should have been feeling, his adrenaline-doped brain just sharpened the mental-image he had of the Kumo mountain peaks into a photorealistic one and played out his ‘plan’ catching his mind like a snag on every unknown the thing hinged on, from chill parents to chakra control to meeting a medic-nin to- no, not the right train of thought. James made a snap decision, and for the time being, he gave in to the absurdity. The excited grin he was supressing finally spread across his face.
There were still some things he needed to get down before it was too late though.
System: …
“umm, I’m going to assume I can still ask you some questions.”
System: no, not really. You’re already being born as we speak. Don’t you feel that pain?
At the prompting James felt around his body and instantly regretted it. ‘Ow! What the fuck! Ow-ow-owwowow’
-/-
“Who’s a good boy??? Souta’s a good booyy!”
Souta giggled at the woman who was supposedly his mother. She had the iconic Toda light-brown hair and a lean, yet athletic build. Giggling some more, Souta made his hand point, then raised his arm and pointed at his mother’s breasts.
No need to stunt his own growth.
-/-
Out in the rocky backyard, Souta was stretching his young body this way and that, careful not to knock over the one potted plant they had sitting by the backdoor. He’d need that for the famed leaf sticking exercise, which was still beyond him at age two.
After Souta finished his last set of stretches with another stupidly painful attempt at the middle-splits, he started on the coordination. He couldn’t risk stunting his height from weight training, and Souta wouldn’t just laze around all day. Just most of it.
Just as he was about to catch a pebble he’d been throwing around, the sliding door to the courtyard slammed open.
“Dinner time~!” his mom, Yuriko, called out. The distraction made him miss the stone, and it landed painfully on his head.
“OWW!” Souta’s smile changed to pain. He chased Yuriko inside while swearing his eternal vengeance on the pebble. When they sat down, she asked softly if he was ok while applying the mystical palm jutsu to his head and then plated him up with a load of chicken. ‘Damn,’ he thought with a smile ‘she better be careful or I’ll grow attached.’
-/-
Six years later.
A tear streaked down Souta’s cheek; there was a leaf on his palm. And it wasn’t. Going. Anywhere.
“YYYEEEEESSSSSSSS-”
He could finally start on the Swift Release. Finally. ‘Finally.’
“Souta-kun, please sit back down. I’m trying to teach the class.” His sensei said.
“Ah, yes sensei.” The class laughed a little, and Souta sat down. Not without noticing, Yotsuki Kiyoi, one of the other clan kids smiling at the leaf stuck to his hand.
At the end of class Souta absentmindedly noted the Yotsuki kid was lurking by the door. Slipping out the back window he mentally apologised, ‘sorry kid, but I’ve been waiting years to start on this kekkai genkai.’
