This is a fic that I'm still working on and what you see here is probably about half of what will be the first chapter, I'm still figuring out where I want to take this so don't expect to see the rest anytime soon unless I'm struck with a massive bolt of inspiration. Total word count: 2,737
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Change. That one unstoppable, indomitable force that moved every single last creature and thing on earth and could, at times, shake the very cosmos with its power. It was a force not unlike time as they tended to go hand in hand together, both slow but relentless forces that despite all opposition would continue to march on for all eternity without pause. These were not forces who knew mercy nor even considered it and as such anyone or thing that fell behind was left by the wayside leaving only a small footnote in history, if they were of enough worth, as their epitaph as one who couldnÆt keep up, couldnÆt keep up with change and couldnÆt become.
That was the only answer to the threat that change posed, to adapt yourself to the new circumstances, to change to keep up with the world around you, to become something better than that which you once were. To keep pace with such a force one must constantly be shedding the person that they were yesterday to become the person that today calls for, like the shedding of a snakes skin, or more appropriately like the changing of a chameleonÆs colors as this is a process in which the only thing that is left behind has no bearing in the physical world and is only of worth to sentimentals and romantics, that which must be left behind is the emotions of the former self. To truly be one who can adapt at a moments notice and change to handle whatever the cruel mistress of fate may throw at them throughout their varied existence is to be one who can leave the emotions of the previous moment behind at a seconds notice and become at that instant exactly what is required of them for that exact obstacle that has been hurled before them in the form of the proverbial glass ceiling, it is a ceiling not a wall that blocks people in their endeavors because in their lives people do not move forwards on some proverbial path to redemption or damnation, no that would imply that their was a path to be taken and that would suggest that our fates were set.
That is why time and change are such similar yet polar opposite forces. Time is a force that is not all that different from a battalion of soldiers, a cold, unmerciful force that slowly but surely sweeps over the land on a set course unerringly towards its unknown destination, always waiting alluringly on that next horizon just waiting for you to reach out and take it into your hand. Change, though, is much different, it is to time as the ronan is to the battalion. It is a seemingly small and insignificant thing standing next to the glory and splendor of time but it is a force that is just as relentless and infinitely more unpredictable, with but a few well placed words to the right ears it can stir an entire nation that has been beaten down by time into a new haze of fury and blood lust ready to once again march upon kingdoms across the seas. Though only being a one instead of a many it has proven its worth tenfold by surviving alone where others have only stood with the support of tens of thousands of bodies of those that came before them to support them.
That is why it is called a glass ceiling because, though it is set their by time, it can be broken with change. Just as someone with a physically solid form would not be able to cross a barrier of wire and mesh, they could cross the obstacle without a scratch simply by abandoning their solid form and instead taking up one of either gas or liquid.
So, for all our lives we are not walking a set path but slowly climbing the mountain made of the bodies of the ones that came before us that have tried and failed to change and adapt to continue ascension. So like wretches riddled with plague and disease we scrape and claw our way up the hill of bodies of our brethren, always towards that unknowable thing that lies at the top, out of sight and hidden by the clouds, but still it calls to us in some deep and instinctual part of our being to come and rise, rise above all that destiny sets in our way to stop, to delay, and to lead us off the path, to rise and become. This is what it meant to become.
This was the cold truth of the world that all knew but few realized. It had been shown time and time again that those who could not change would be destroyed, every civilization throughout the worlds history that has fallen has fallen because it could not change. Civilizations that grew too old and set in their ways were culled like overly ripe wheat with the scythe of change. Some were able to escape this fate for a time using the power and clout that they had obtained during their time in the sun but all eventually bowed down before change. Just as no man can escape death these stagnant civilizations cannot escape their fate.
The only ways to escape this is to become, to become something entirely different from that that they once were, to cast off the old ideals and once again rise to meet the challenges of the world as their entire modus operandi has been recalibrated to whatever the times call for. That was the sacrifice required by change for those who resided within its dominion.
If it were not for emotions nothing would hold us back, people, as a whole, would be able to be as mercurial and adaptable as water, it changes to fit the shape of its container but when need be can harden and burst forth from its constraints to once again run freely and without limitations. It can run smoothly and calmly as a summer breeze but without a moments notice can rise up and destroy all that lies before it in but a single earth shattering moment as well.
For all of his life he had been as the smooth calm stream, flowing peaceably throughout life taking all the abuse that all those around him had to give and absorbing it into him with naught but a smile on his face and a twinkle in his eye. But the time for that was over it was time for him to become. To cast off the ideals and morals of yesterday and become what was needed now.
The village of the hidden leaf had grown old and fat stewing within their own power and dominance like someone swimming within an ocean of their own bile and excrement. It was time that he showed them, showed them that the world had moved on and they were currently living in a pocket of the past that was steadily being consumed by that all powerful judge of fates, change.
He knew that within his lifetime konohakagure would cease to exist and be swallowed up by change because of their inability to do just that, change. He knew as well that he was doomed to that same fate if he did not rise from the cesspool of churning sewage that konohakagure had become and adapt to the world and be prepared to survive in it, as he was woefully unprepared to, having resided within this small piece of the past all his life.
But, being the high-achiever that he was, he realized that although he may be able to change and escape this particular shift forward that would swallow up the hidden village of the leaf, what was to say that in the interim between that and the next shift he didnÆt become just as those of the leaf were now and have escaped this change only to be swallowed up by the next.
He would not allow such an undignified end to come to one such as him, so he looked and dug through the very oldest and most forbidden of the records kept deep within the storerooms of konohakagure away from prying eyes that might use their secrets against the very ones who kept them hidden. These were not scrolls containing inane things such as jutsus which, no matter how powerful, could not save one from change, no these were something much more valuable, these were knowledge. The knowledge of men who could see further than just the next day and knew some of the great insights into life and how to survive it, these were the notes of those who had gone beyond simply creating techniques to kill others and had tried to create that something that would prevent that from happening to them.
That was why shinobi, as a race, because thatÆs what they were, a race unto themselves, were flawed. They may have had the same DNA and basic physical structure as those who called themselves humans but they were not, never in the history of the world has a race existed that even comes close to the shinobi in any form or manner, they truly were a race that was an island, completely unlike all that was around them.
Despite this though, every single shinobi in the world, save those that had come to this same realization that he had, were fatally flawed. They believed that they represented not the one but the whole and that, though they may die, that the whole would live on, thus giving birth to the mentality that shinobi were expendable. That was where they were wrong, by consigning yourself to the eventual fate of death you were already giving yourself over to it and now were simply waiting for it to come and collect you. The true way that a shinobi should act is not as one who seeks to kill others but one who seeks to prevent themselves from being killed, once you have eliminated the possibility of being killed yourself than you had truly reached the pinnacle of what being a shinobi meant, one who lives within the shadows that is a silent and unstoppable killing force that comes forth in a flash to snatch the lives of their enemies away and then disappear like the early morning mists right before their opponents eyes.
They had come admirably close to the truth with their ideal that the true shinobi should completely abandon his emotions and live only for the hunt and the kill. But, as most things that are given to the masses are, it was a rule that was learned and acknowledged yet almost never followed, even by those who preached it religiously.
No, this was why enlightenment could not be given to the people at large but had to be a personal undertaking that one devoted all their being to. Every person who saw the truth would merely waste it by attempting to tell those around them because only those who want it can see it and only those who have seen it can want it. This was why it was so rare to find someone who was truly ready to become.
So while digging through those troves of knowledge searching for a record of someone who had come to the same realization that he had and had found a way to truly and absolutely overcome change he found several references to a great traveler who, though he always seemed to be running from an enemy that was just off the horizon, was one of the single most ingenious people any of the writers of said manuscripts had ever met.
It was never clear what exactly drove this man to go to all corners of the earth nor what exactly he was hunting for, the only thing that he would ever say was that he was searching for a way to overcome that which was infallible. There was much speculation on what this was but what was clear was that something was driving him and that he would achieve his goal at all costs.
Though the writers of these works did not know what this infallible thing he spoke of was the reader did and he smiled as he read this for he knew what it that the traveler had been running from and that he had found what he had been searching for, because that thing that the great traveler was trying to overcome was change.
Allegedly this traveler had given the people a scroll so that anyone that was ever able to follow in his footsteps would be able to, and then had disappeared never to be heard from again. He knew what had happened to him, he was able to do what almost no man before him had been able to, he had been able to become.
Apparently this scroll was supposed to contain a roadmap of sorts to follow along the same path that he had taken and come to the same understanding that he had reached, he had apparently left a few waypoints along his travels to those who would follow him and this scroll was the key to them.
This was all assumed for no one was ever able to actually open the scroll as it would, apparently, only open for one who was ready to receive the knowledge and thus it had slowly fallen out of the spotlight and out of history. It passed through a great many hands until it had come into the possession of the man who would one day become the second hokage of the hidden village of the leaf as he traveled the world while his counterpart presided over the hidden village they had established.
Although being unable to open it he was sure it contained something great and important so he returned with it and it had been filed in with all the scrolls of that sort that would eventually come to be locked away in a secret storeroom that, about 70 years later, would be entered by a young shinobi intent upon finding the truth that conveniently enough resided right within that scroll.
He felt that he was drawing close to his goal and so he continued to work his way though centuries of stored knowledge until he came to his prize, the scroll of the greatest traveler the world had ever seen, the scroll of Peregrinus the Wandering Traveler.
He knew that though he had finally come to the end of one search the next was just about to begin. So he picked up the scroll and without hesitation reached out and broke the seal that had held its contents hostage for years innumerable.
Many would have faltered or stalled before attempting to open something that was so daunting but he knew that by its very nature and the nature of what he was trying to achieve that a moments hesitation would be sign to the scroll that he was not yet ready to receive its knowledge. As was stated, to be free of emotions was to be completely mercurial and able flow perfectly along with the rolling tidal wave that was change, hesitation was an off shoot of fear and fear was an emotion, and a most debilitating one at that. No, no one with any fear residing in their heart would have ever been able to open this scroll.
He smiled now, with the final confirmation that he was truly ready, he was prepared to become. So with that last appeasement of his worries he opened the scroll and gazed upon it contents. Looking over it all he saw that it was all there, the goal of the journey, the steps to be taken on the way, all the places that he would need to go to become prepared for his becoming, and where the final stop of his journey would be. It hinted at what he would find at the end and told that he would receive a boon at each marker that he reached that would help him along the way to his Becoming.
Gazing over all of this Naruto Uzumaki, shinobi of the leaf, rank genin, and now one of the first to attempt a Becoming in over 300 years, smiled and, for some reason, decided he felt inordinately pleased with himself.
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Change. That one unstoppable, indomitable force that moved every single last creature and thing on earth and could, at times, shake the very cosmos with its power. It was a force not unlike time as they tended to go hand in hand together, both slow but relentless forces that despite all opposition would continue to march on for all eternity without pause. These were not forces who knew mercy nor even considered it and as such anyone or thing that fell behind was left by the wayside leaving only a small footnote in history, if they were of enough worth, as their epitaph as one who couldnÆt keep up, couldnÆt keep up with change and couldnÆt become.
That was the only answer to the threat that change posed, to adapt yourself to the new circumstances, to change to keep up with the world around you, to become something better than that which you once were. To keep pace with such a force one must constantly be shedding the person that they were yesterday to become the person that today calls for, like the shedding of a snakes skin, or more appropriately like the changing of a chameleonÆs colors as this is a process in which the only thing that is left behind has no bearing in the physical world and is only of worth to sentimentals and romantics, that which must be left behind is the emotions of the former self. To truly be one who can adapt at a moments notice and change to handle whatever the cruel mistress of fate may throw at them throughout their varied existence is to be one who can leave the emotions of the previous moment behind at a seconds notice and become at that instant exactly what is required of them for that exact obstacle that has been hurled before them in the form of the proverbial glass ceiling, it is a ceiling not a wall that blocks people in their endeavors because in their lives people do not move forwards on some proverbial path to redemption or damnation, no that would imply that their was a path to be taken and that would suggest that our fates were set.
That is why time and change are such similar yet polar opposite forces. Time is a force that is not all that different from a battalion of soldiers, a cold, unmerciful force that slowly but surely sweeps over the land on a set course unerringly towards its unknown destination, always waiting alluringly on that next horizon just waiting for you to reach out and take it into your hand. Change, though, is much different, it is to time as the ronan is to the battalion. It is a seemingly small and insignificant thing standing next to the glory and splendor of time but it is a force that is just as relentless and infinitely more unpredictable, with but a few well placed words to the right ears it can stir an entire nation that has been beaten down by time into a new haze of fury and blood lust ready to once again march upon kingdoms across the seas. Though only being a one instead of a many it has proven its worth tenfold by surviving alone where others have only stood with the support of tens of thousands of bodies of those that came before them to support them.
That is why it is called a glass ceiling because, though it is set their by time, it can be broken with change. Just as someone with a physically solid form would not be able to cross a barrier of wire and mesh, they could cross the obstacle without a scratch simply by abandoning their solid form and instead taking up one of either gas or liquid.
So, for all our lives we are not walking a set path but slowly climbing the mountain made of the bodies of the ones that came before us that have tried and failed to change and adapt to continue ascension. So like wretches riddled with plague and disease we scrape and claw our way up the hill of bodies of our brethren, always towards that unknowable thing that lies at the top, out of sight and hidden by the clouds, but still it calls to us in some deep and instinctual part of our being to come and rise, rise above all that destiny sets in our way to stop, to delay, and to lead us off the path, to rise and become. This is what it meant to become.
This was the cold truth of the world that all knew but few realized. It had been shown time and time again that those who could not change would be destroyed, every civilization throughout the worlds history that has fallen has fallen because it could not change. Civilizations that grew too old and set in their ways were culled like overly ripe wheat with the scythe of change. Some were able to escape this fate for a time using the power and clout that they had obtained during their time in the sun but all eventually bowed down before change. Just as no man can escape death these stagnant civilizations cannot escape their fate.
The only ways to escape this is to become, to become something entirely different from that that they once were, to cast off the old ideals and once again rise to meet the challenges of the world as their entire modus operandi has been recalibrated to whatever the times call for. That was the sacrifice required by change for those who resided within its dominion.
If it were not for emotions nothing would hold us back, people, as a whole, would be able to be as mercurial and adaptable as water, it changes to fit the shape of its container but when need be can harden and burst forth from its constraints to once again run freely and without limitations. It can run smoothly and calmly as a summer breeze but without a moments notice can rise up and destroy all that lies before it in but a single earth shattering moment as well.
For all of his life he had been as the smooth calm stream, flowing peaceably throughout life taking all the abuse that all those around him had to give and absorbing it into him with naught but a smile on his face and a twinkle in his eye. But the time for that was over it was time for him to become. To cast off the ideals and morals of yesterday and become what was needed now.
The village of the hidden leaf had grown old and fat stewing within their own power and dominance like someone swimming within an ocean of their own bile and excrement. It was time that he showed them, showed them that the world had moved on and they were currently living in a pocket of the past that was steadily being consumed by that all powerful judge of fates, change.
He knew that within his lifetime konohakagure would cease to exist and be swallowed up by change because of their inability to do just that, change. He knew as well that he was doomed to that same fate if he did not rise from the cesspool of churning sewage that konohakagure had become and adapt to the world and be prepared to survive in it, as he was woefully unprepared to, having resided within this small piece of the past all his life.
But, being the high-achiever that he was, he realized that although he may be able to change and escape this particular shift forward that would swallow up the hidden village of the leaf, what was to say that in the interim between that and the next shift he didnÆt become just as those of the leaf were now and have escaped this change only to be swallowed up by the next.
He would not allow such an undignified end to come to one such as him, so he looked and dug through the very oldest and most forbidden of the records kept deep within the storerooms of konohakagure away from prying eyes that might use their secrets against the very ones who kept them hidden. These were not scrolls containing inane things such as jutsus which, no matter how powerful, could not save one from change, no these were something much more valuable, these were knowledge. The knowledge of men who could see further than just the next day and knew some of the great insights into life and how to survive it, these were the notes of those who had gone beyond simply creating techniques to kill others and had tried to create that something that would prevent that from happening to them.
That was why shinobi, as a race, because thatÆs what they were, a race unto themselves, were flawed. They may have had the same DNA and basic physical structure as those who called themselves humans but they were not, never in the history of the world has a race existed that even comes close to the shinobi in any form or manner, they truly were a race that was an island, completely unlike all that was around them.
Despite this though, every single shinobi in the world, save those that had come to this same realization that he had, were fatally flawed. They believed that they represented not the one but the whole and that, though they may die, that the whole would live on, thus giving birth to the mentality that shinobi were expendable. That was where they were wrong, by consigning yourself to the eventual fate of death you were already giving yourself over to it and now were simply waiting for it to come and collect you. The true way that a shinobi should act is not as one who seeks to kill others but one who seeks to prevent themselves from being killed, once you have eliminated the possibility of being killed yourself than you had truly reached the pinnacle of what being a shinobi meant, one who lives within the shadows that is a silent and unstoppable killing force that comes forth in a flash to snatch the lives of their enemies away and then disappear like the early morning mists right before their opponents eyes.
They had come admirably close to the truth with their ideal that the true shinobi should completely abandon his emotions and live only for the hunt and the kill. But, as most things that are given to the masses are, it was a rule that was learned and acknowledged yet almost never followed, even by those who preached it religiously.
No, this was why enlightenment could not be given to the people at large but had to be a personal undertaking that one devoted all their being to. Every person who saw the truth would merely waste it by attempting to tell those around them because only those who want it can see it and only those who have seen it can want it. This was why it was so rare to find someone who was truly ready to become.
So while digging through those troves of knowledge searching for a record of someone who had come to the same realization that he had and had found a way to truly and absolutely overcome change he found several references to a great traveler who, though he always seemed to be running from an enemy that was just off the horizon, was one of the single most ingenious people any of the writers of said manuscripts had ever met.
It was never clear what exactly drove this man to go to all corners of the earth nor what exactly he was hunting for, the only thing that he would ever say was that he was searching for a way to overcome that which was infallible. There was much speculation on what this was but what was clear was that something was driving him and that he would achieve his goal at all costs.
Though the writers of these works did not know what this infallible thing he spoke of was the reader did and he smiled as he read this for he knew what it that the traveler had been running from and that he had found what he had been searching for, because that thing that the great traveler was trying to overcome was change.
Allegedly this traveler had given the people a scroll so that anyone that was ever able to follow in his footsteps would be able to, and then had disappeared never to be heard from again. He knew what had happened to him, he was able to do what almost no man before him had been able to, he had been able to become.
Apparently this scroll was supposed to contain a roadmap of sorts to follow along the same path that he had taken and come to the same understanding that he had reached, he had apparently left a few waypoints along his travels to those who would follow him and this scroll was the key to them.
This was all assumed for no one was ever able to actually open the scroll as it would, apparently, only open for one who was ready to receive the knowledge and thus it had slowly fallen out of the spotlight and out of history. It passed through a great many hands until it had come into the possession of the man who would one day become the second hokage of the hidden village of the leaf as he traveled the world while his counterpart presided over the hidden village they had established.
Although being unable to open it he was sure it contained something great and important so he returned with it and it had been filed in with all the scrolls of that sort that would eventually come to be locked away in a secret storeroom that, about 70 years later, would be entered by a young shinobi intent upon finding the truth that conveniently enough resided right within that scroll.
He felt that he was drawing close to his goal and so he continued to work his way though centuries of stored knowledge until he came to his prize, the scroll of the greatest traveler the world had ever seen, the scroll of Peregrinus the Wandering Traveler.
He knew that though he had finally come to the end of one search the next was just about to begin. So he picked up the scroll and without hesitation reached out and broke the seal that had held its contents hostage for years innumerable.
Many would have faltered or stalled before attempting to open something that was so daunting but he knew that by its very nature and the nature of what he was trying to achieve that a moments hesitation would be sign to the scroll that he was not yet ready to receive its knowledge. As was stated, to be free of emotions was to be completely mercurial and able flow perfectly along with the rolling tidal wave that was change, hesitation was an off shoot of fear and fear was an emotion, and a most debilitating one at that. No, no one with any fear residing in their heart would have ever been able to open this scroll.
He smiled now, with the final confirmation that he was truly ready, he was prepared to become. So with that last appeasement of his worries he opened the scroll and gazed upon it contents. Looking over it all he saw that it was all there, the goal of the journey, the steps to be taken on the way, all the places that he would need to go to become prepared for his becoming, and where the final stop of his journey would be. It hinted at what he would find at the end and told that he would receive a boon at each marker that he reached that would help him along the way to his Becoming.
Gazing over all of this Naruto Uzumaki, shinobi of the leaf, rank genin, and now one of the first to attempt a Becoming in over 300 years, smiled and, for some reason, decided he felt inordinately pleased with himself.