Fuzen was living a simple life where repetition made days meld together and time stand still.

Within the massive training hall allocated for his personal use, Fuzen was practising his craft like any other day before this one.

Under Danzo's supervision, he'd positioned himself in the middle of the open space with six Root members encircling him. Everything besides killing was allowed.

Making the first move, Fuzen activated his 'Black Sea'. Tendrils of pure darkness emanated from his shadow, eventually taking the form of a 25 feet black circle on the ground. Each of his opponents had already gone through multiple battles against him before and knew what was coming.

As Fuzen moved using 'Body Flicker', he became little more than a blur when he disappeared from his initial spot. The easiest way to track his general whereabouts during this time was the black circle moving along with him at the centre.

Knowing their best chance to beat him revolved around somehow stopping his fast movements each of them began forming a jutsu meant to immobilize or slow.

However, before the first seal had been formed from the one directly in front, Fuzen was already on him. Knowing the others wouldn't wait for him to finish with, Fuzen went for an immediate finishing blow.

With a style of taijutsu optimised for taking advantage of Fuzen's immense speed and fast reflexes, his opponent wasn't able to dodge the palm aimed for his lower abdomen and crumbled gasping for breath. Anything moving fast enough would do serious damage, even his still small hands.

Right as he finished him, Fuzen felt the surface beneath him rumble. Moving quickly, he avoided being encapsulated in a dome of earth. He knew what their plan was and had no intentions of falling for it like the first time.

As Fuzen near instantly arrived behind the Root who'd tried the earth jutsu, and just about to send him flying with a kick, he was suddenly halted mid-movement.

Knowing he'd been caught inside a sealing formula, Fuzen instinctually powered up his chakra levels and broke the formation using brute force before any of the others could make a move against him.

After none of their initial attacks worked, they knew the same tactic as before wouldn't work again. Knowing they would be easy to take down apart each of the five remaining moved as a cohesive unit and grouped up. Ready for close combat. Together they tried their best to overwhelm him at close range, but the gravitational downforce made their movements just slow enough for him to avoid or block each one of their strikes. One of them did manage to get in a quick lucky punch, never the less they all fell. Either unconscious or groaning in pain. Between his speed and taijutsu prowess, it had become very difficult for his opponents to find enough time to form even a single hand seal.

"Enough!" Danzo said after he finished the last one, satisfied with what he had observed.

Listening, Fuzen halted the kick he was about to give the downed Root who'd managed to land a hit. He retracted the dark circle to once again resemble a normal shadow and left to continue his practice at the other half of the training hall.

The fact people could track him using the black circle was a definite weakness. It was like walking around with a huge target on his back, and if they'd collaborated using the sealing formula or some other kind of large-scale jutsu he didn't notice, then he might have been caught. Fortunately, he knew it'd be much less of an issue as managed to increase its radius. Given enough time he felt confident in his ability to expanded it so none of those fighting him could actually see the dark sea moving since its edges would be beyond their sights.

"You have improved the range..." Danzo came up behind him.

"Not by much, if I extend it any further it begins losing effectiveness."

"It appears you've found other uses for it as well."

Danzo looked at Fuzen who'd surrounded himself by a small black circle, barely wide enough to contain himself. He was doing weighted taijutsu training while placing himself under the gravitational downforce normally directed at his opponents.

"Yeah, it has its uses," Fuzen readily agreed while taking a deep breath steadying him himself. He had a feeling Danzo wanted to say something important.

"I've spoken to Hiruzen."

"And...? Please, don't make this a talk about how I shouldn't leave this facility using my 'Shadow Walk' without an escort."

Fuzen didn't feel any desire to argue and tried to shut it down right away.

"We both know I can take care of myself," he said.

"Of that, we can agree. Which is why I've arranged for you to have a place inside Konohagakure city. You will have your own little apartment and until after graduation from the Academy you'll receive a monthly paycheck."

"Wait, so you're telling me I'm out of here?" Fuzen asked for confirmation.

"Yes! Sadly –"

"No no no. This is perfect" – he interjected before Danzo could go on – "I was beginning to get bored out of my mind."

Danzo wasn't terribly surprised hearing this. He knew Fuzen had been known to use his 'Shadow Walk' to sneak off more than once or twice. In the beginning, they tried to limit his movements but it didn't take him long to improve his manipulation of darkness and by that point, none of them could truly stop him.

"There's just one thing before you leave."

"Hmm? What's that? Wait, you're not making clean up the library are you?"

Fuzen really didn't want to clean it up. It'd be so boring. Not to mention mundane. He was put here for a much higher purpose. You might even call it a noble mission. One where he was supposed to conquer all battlefields while at the same time spreading pleasure to all beautiful kunoichi's.

"I thought about it. After all, a shinobi's world is one of discipline and responsibility" – he mused to himself – "But, no. Hiruzen has been getting worried after seeing almost weekly changes in your appearance. You're growing much too fast and he's worried it might damage your body."

Fuzen zoned out after hearing that he'd been liberated from library duty.

"To that end, Hiruzen has arranged for a meetup at the hospital inside the city so medical-nin can perform a full physical check-up on you," Danzo continued.

"When are we going?" Fuzen could hardly wait.

"Now, preferably. We're actually a little late."

"Hang on...we? You're coming along?" His mouth opened in surprise.

Never once, had he went along with him into the city.

"I'm worried of course," Danzo said with a straight face.

As Fuzen walked over to make his and Danzo's shadow overlap, he couldn't help thinking it was fortunate he hadn't chosen a career path as an actor cause his acting sucked.

As their shadows crossed, he could feel it becoming an extension of his own. Seconds after manipulating the darkness within both shadows Fuzen and Danzo disappeared from the training hall.