Shadowkage

Training

"Neji? What are you doing here?" I never thought I'd see anyone else around this far away from everything else in the village, especially him. Knowing his strict clan he most likely had to sneak away to get here. His head quickly turned in my direction shocked but then relaxed once he seemed to remember me.

"Oh it's only you Naruto. To answer your question I'm secretly training to learn the main branch's taijutsu style. I'm not allowed to learn it since I'm not in the main branch but to be the greatest Hyuga, I need to learn everything." He said with a warm smile. I was a bit stunned to see how much he's changed over the last few days. I then explained to him that I was here to train too and what I've learned so far. "Wow that's impressive for someone who just turned four."

"Well since we're both here for the same reason, let's keep this place secret from others. It'd be fun to see some people's expressions by how much we've grown at a young age." Neji cheekily chuckled while I immediately agreed, but then thought to myself.

'Wait what would happen if people knew I was stronger? Will they think of me as a threat? Will they fear me even more?' The more I thought, the worse my questions became. My mood subconsciously began to change and Neji started to notice something wrong.

"What's wrong, is it a bad plan?" He asked with a concerned look. I then continued to tell him what I was thinking and his mood changed as well. "Oh...right that may be a problem later on." He said with a lowered tone as we both stood for a few seconds in silence.

Suddenly his head shot up to my surprise like he had an idea. "Wait, what if people didn't know about you? You could wear some type of disguise or something that'll mask your appearance. Then nobody will ever know it's you and they wouldn't hate this side of you." I went over this plan in my head making sure there wasn't any problems.

'This might be a solid plan. In the disguise I could walk around the village freely, I could become a high rank ninja, and nobody would know my real self.' I couldn't see anything wrong with this plan and if things were done right then everything would work out perfectly. 

"I think I'll do that, I don't see any problem with it. You could do the same thing too, so your main branch wouldn't get mad or anything." I suggested to him as he agreed as well. After that we both discussed what our disguises would look like then went back to training.

(Time skip that evening) Naruto's pov
We both were pretty tired after a few hours of training. I was only able to control some wind and have it stay for a few seconds around me before it disappeared. "For your first day with learning an element jutsu you're improving very fast."

'Yeah I'm just glad to have another person to talk to while I do this, especially since we're training before everyone else.' I say looking at the boy who's taking a short break. "Since I see you guys will be pretty good friends I feel like I can trust him with something." I had a confused face after he said that and questioned what he meant.

"I want him to meet me." He bluntly stated as I flinched and hesitated at the mere thought of it. 'I know he seems like he'll be a long lasting friend but are you sure Kurama?' Overthinking and nervousness began running through my head. He's my first friend even if it hasn't lasted for long and I haven't seen him too much since our first encounter. I don't want it to be ruined.

"Yes I'm sure, besides I've already thought of what to do if this fails. Now for him to meet me he has to close his eyes while you place your hand on his head." I hesitated until eventually trusting the fox and his words and began walking up to him, deeply inhaling before speaking.

"Um- I know this might be scary but trust me this is completely safe and will benefit you. I need you to close your eyes." Neji looked a little worried but remained calmed and did what he was told. Once he did I placed a hand on his head as told him he could open his eyes.