RiaN Chapter 30 (Patreon)

Third Person Point of View

Roughly two years later…

A man wearing a heavy cloak, covered almost entirely, with only a small part of sky blue hair poked from his hood, walked into Konoha for the first time in a long time. He breathed in the familiar air as he couldn’t help but smile and move toward his home. It had been almost two years of some of the roughest training he had ever gone through in his entire life, but now he felt more prepared for what was likely to come.

“Feels nostalgic…” The barely adult scratched his beard as he spoke to himself. “Man, I could really go for a bowl of ramen.” A large part of his blood was Uzumaki after all, and since the Uzumaki moved to Konoha, Ichiraku ramen has flourished, opening many new spots all throughout the village. He went to the original stall, the one with Teuchi.

“Hey, Teuchi. Two bowls of ramen, please. One miso with extra meat, the other shoyu with extra veggies.” Teuchi moved the moment the order was made. Ramen had rather large bowls, and most people only ordered one bowl at a time on account of how much counterspace each bowl took up. Teuchi also wanted to serve the food as hot as possible, so ordering more than one bowl at a time cost a little extra, which he was fine with paying.

The man pulled back his hood as he looked around the stall and saw a familiar face. “Hey Naruto, long time no see.” Naruto looked up from his ramen as he spotted the man who spoke. Instead of Naruto greeting him happily, he frowned as he said. “Man… It’s unfair that you can grow a beard and I can’t.” The man smiled as he itched his scratchy beard, most likely going to shave it now that he was among other people, he could keep it though, it would make him look more like his father after all, one red, the other blue.

They both went back to eating in contented silence, only making passive small talk between chewing. “So… What did I miss?” “Hmm. Jiraiya took me as a student… I got a couple of wives now.” The blue-haired man stopped sucking up noodles for a few seconds before continuing. Chewing quickly, he answered. “Oh, that’s great, congratulations on both things.”

Naruto drank another few spoonfuls of the broth before he asked. “So, coming back after so long, most people only train in their techniques for a year, not two.” The man copied him, putting down his chopsticks before picking up the broth spoon. “Mmm, yeah. Really missed this food. The only thing to eat on the mountain are bugs, sure, they taste fine if they’re covered in chocolate, but there wasn’t that much chocolate up on those mountains.”

Naruto looked down at the noodles in his mouth, imagining them as worms before biting down and chewing more slowly than before. Another few sips of broth or bites of noodles before Naruto asked. “So, when are you going to visit my mom and talk to her about the baby you have together?” The man spat a bunch of broth out of his mouth before he began coughing as it went down the wrong pipe.

He stood up and ran out of the stall before coming back and asking Naruto. “Hey, can you get this packed up for me for later? I’d really like to finish it if I can. Thanks!” Naruto waved him off before chuckling as he knew that would be his reaction.

…

I practically snapped the door off its hinges as I entered the home. Kushina was rich, so when we got married, we just moved to a nearby mansion they owned while giving the house she and Naruto lived in to Naruto. I had only enjoyed living with her for a few weeks before I left for my training, not nearly enough time to have a child… At least I thought so.

Kushina came out of the room upstairs at all the racket I was making with a frown on her face, until she saw me. I took in a deep breath at the little bundle I saw her holding… A little orange-haired baby looked in my direction, and I couldn’t help but start crying at the sight. The baby, not really knowing what was happening, began to cry with me.

“Oh, Tama. Can you stop that? I just got her to sleep; we don’t need both of you crying.” I held my hands out as she made her way down the steps, unable to speak, I just mimed that I wanted to hold her. The baby looked at me, the manic smile on my face doing nothing to make her scared of me, as she looked up at me in curiosity as I asked. “What’s… What’s her name?”

“Yami Uzumaki, until you get your clan name. Then it will be Yami, whatever you choose.” Still crying as I hycupped and made happy noises holding her. “Yoki… Little Yami Yoki.” My big dopey smile was enough to make her laugh, and my heart filled with joy at the sound of her. I get it now. I’d not only die for her, but kill for her as well.

It didn’t take a genius to see that I was going to spoil the shit out of her. There were large families, but very few actually cared for their children… Most families took an offhand approach to raising their children, barely any love or acknowledgment. That wouldn’t be the case for my children. I was already mad at myself for taking so long to complete my training now… If I knew I had a daughter waiting for me, I’d have finished earlier instead of mastering everything I had.

Kushina was older; she only had a few more years to have children, so something in me loosened at the thought of her having another child she wanted. Both she and Naruto wanted a large family, and we had done our duty to expand that family, giving him a baby sister to dote on. Having Naruto here to help was the only reason I wasn’t beating myself up more for missing something this important.

“Look at you. You don’t even realize how much of an oddball your father is. I wonder how long it will take you to figure it out?” I looked up at Kushina, who now had a large smile on my face as she took the baby back. “Welcome home, Papa.” Hearing her call me that gets me excited again. I had two choices when I came back to this village: eating delicious food I missed, or going to see my wife, whom I had been away from for almost two years.

I figured food first, because I didn’t know when I’d get to eat again after I saw her. I wanted to ravish her; the sight of her with a baby made me want to put another one in her, but it could wait. She smiled at me again before speaking in an almost whisper. “I’ll try to get her to sleep again. Then you can show me how excited you are to see me after so long.”

I smiled. It didn’t really cross my mind that, yes, I had abandoned my wife of only a few weeks for years at this point to go train, but she knew about it beforehand; women just behaved differently in this world. There was no arguing or getting mad that I went to train; she was just happy I came back safe.