"So?" Naruto yawned in address of the customers. "What's up?"
"You? I'd heard you were young..." The red-haired man said. His cloak didn't do much to obscure his facial features, even with the hood up. Well, it was noon so it wasn't like it was dark or anything.
"Un. We came here to ask you a question." The other man offered. He rather resembled Ino from his class.
Which was eerie because Ino was a girl.
Though that red-cloud cloak was manly enough Naruto supposed. Everyone knew black and red was manly.
"Sounds good." Naruto agreed, waking up a little more. Way more interesting than another commission. He was getting a bit tired of flaming swords, chakra-receptive kunai, and sealing all those damn five-course meals into travel-scrolls for the Akimichi. "What is it?"
"The Uzumaki are acclaimed far and wide," the redhead began, "as most highly devout towards their art."
Naruto shrugged.
"This question seems like it would be too profound for a little kid like you, but... what would you say... 'art' itself is?"
"It's an explosion, right?!" the blonde offered. "Like, bang! Un!"
"Idiot." The other man elbowed the first. "We agreed not to bias his opinion." And despite himself he added. "Art is something pristine, that lasts for generations. As an ignorant brat kid, you may not fully understand this."
Naruto frowned. He pursed his lips and held his chin. That sounded like some kind of existential nerdation. And not anything in this world tickled Naruto's fancy like existential nerdation. Except perhaps the meeting of other people so similarly devoted.
As such, he wracked his brain furiously to it's greatest and most nerdiness extent ever. "Art, huh? I don't know so much about art in the broad sense but... If you mean the sealing art... it's like... Ramen, I guess."
Both men leaned in. "Ramen?" They chorused.
"Yeah." Naruto nodded, eyes narrowed as he felt a proof form in his mind. "Like..."
The door to 'the back' opened, and Tenten stepped through. She placed a cup ramen in Naruto's hands without a word and Naruto, for his part, smiled and proceeded to go about eating it.
"It's like that." He finished, after taking his first drag of noodle.
The pair of strangers looked a bit consternation, if anything, but neither would admit that they had been lost in this philosophical discussion.
"Like," Naruto began, "I've been making instant Ramen for years. And for years, I've used the same kettle. The same sink. The same six competing brands. Everything." Naruto instructed. "And then I started to get Tenten-chan to do it for me, and now it... well it doesn't taste better, and it doesn't taste worse." He explained. "But it tastes more meaningful."
Both men stared at the young kid. Then, they struck mirroring poses of holding a fist up to their chin and tapping one foot.
"C'mon. I think I've got an objective proof for this." Naruto offered, ushering the two out and leaving a blushing Tenten behind.
Besides the Uzumaki Sundries, was a rather large sandbox. It stretched a full house's worth in both length and width. It was here that Naruto sometimes practiced drawing lines in the sand with a staff, stick, or his feet.
In the middle of this sandbox stood, none other than the towering, imposing mass of...
...The Jericho.
The cloaked figures stopped before the sandbox and stared.
Noticing that his compatriots had stopped following, Naruto doubled back and assessed what would be the appropriate action as the host of this little intellectual gathering. "Ah, that's a rock." Naruto explained, taking up the mantle of tour guide. He searched for something else to say about it. "A big rock." He finished. "Possibly a boulder. I'm not sure, since it's more egg-shaped than ball-shaped. I'm not familiar with the nomenclature of rocks. Anyways, the proof's down there in the shed. I've got a scroll somewhere in there, I'm pretty sure, that turns blue when it's used to bludgeon something that's not really, really similar to what's sealed inside it and -"
"It's... It's... " the redhead struggled to gasp out, as if the words had to be dredged up all the way from the depths of his very soul. "It's... beautiful."
"What, the sand?" Naruto asked. He didn't recall leaving any seal in the sand, in particular. "The rock?" He hazarded.
The blonde fell to his knees, arms limp, staring up at the majestic sight before him. Sexually ambiguous tears flowed down his face like a shameless expression of shame. "I've... I've been such a fool." He then proceeded to cry out loud a little, in a manner that sounded a lot like 'Uuuun. Uaaauuuun.'
It was very strange.
"Explosion. Not explosion." The cloaked blonde said between sobs. "Who cares? There's more... there's more to life than explosions! Un!" He proclaimed loudly. "There's the moment before the explosion, on the brink of release, when all the emotion and the world are concentrated so fully into one point - reflected by this bold carving of 'Baku' upon an immortal, giant rock. Un! So small is the seal, compared to the size of this rock, and yet so large it is compared to the one who carved it! Un, the duality! So sloppily is the explosive seal carved, and yet so passionately that it would surely rip the giant in two! He does not explode it, un, and he does not erase the destructive proof of his passion, un. He walks away!" The man's words then proceeded to be rendered insensible by his emotion. "He walks awa-ha-haaaaay! He walks ahwaaaay!"
The other man walked up to the Jericho. He stared at the carving of 'Baku' upon it's base. He returned to Naruto and asked the boy simply: "Did you carve that... with your fists?"
"Yeah." Naruto admitted awkwardly. "I was, uh, in an odd place."
"I can still see traces of dried blood lodged into the cracks."
"Yeah."
"I see."
The redhead nodded simply, turned back to face the Jericho, and slowly sat beside his cloaked and crying friend on the edge of the sandbox.
"I have made... one thousand puppets." The redhead said. "In each, I strived for nothing but perfection. A perfect melding of aesthetic and functional beauty. But in... in the face of this... it's all so fake!" He closed his eyes tightly as if in pain. "Now I know why I could never say that my puppets came to life on my strings. Before this raw majesty, I am ashamed. This - This is real life! I just make dolls! Heartless dolls! What future? What preservation? I have only been preparing to leave relics of unreality behind!"
"Please!" The cloaked blond interrupted, standing and bowing stiffly, all a sudden. "Take this!" He rigidly offered a scroll to Naruto... or rather he shoved it into the boy's abdomen. "It's nothing to me now! Un! I don't deserve it - I don't even want to look at it! Goodbye, Great Uzumaki Danna! I need... I need to go rediscover myself!"
And he left in tears.
Naruto stared. "What is that I don't even - "
The redhead stood and turned to Naruto. He grasped the boy tightly by the shoulders. "Please." He said. "Don't die."
"Haaah?" Naruto borrowed his shop assistant's catchphrase.
"This world... requires you." The man squeezed Naruto's shoulders more tightly. "It might not be in this generation, as true genius is rarely rewarded in so timely a manner... But in one generation, somewhere in all of time, someday, surely... your work will redeem humanity."
"Haaaaaaaaaah?"
The man patted Naruto's shoulders firmly, before handing him a scroll. "Goodbye Sensei. I'm going to go reinvent myself."
And he left.
Naruto was left in the middle of a sandbox with two scrolls and a lot of confusion.
