Naruto: The New Sealmaster

This story will follow along with canon rather closely, without actually repeating it. It will focus on different aspects but not change much of what is established, so the story will take place alongside canon without being a part of it (at least to start with). If that is not to your liking then I suggest you leave now. The only thing I'll be changing right now is the time frame in which those events take place. It'll take a lot longer in this fic so that my character has time to sort out some things other than just fighting for a year straight. Shippuden lasts less than a year in canon. I'd like to change that. Naruto is 17 by the end of the series in Canon, I'd like them all to be in their actual primes, so 20+ years old. We'll see how it goes.

This story will follow an heir to a very small clan, as he tries to establish it once more from the ground up. He will have ties to canon, his best friends will have ties to canon but one of them will also be an OC. His "enemy" will also be an OC with ties to canon, and he will be representing what I think of most of the SI portrayals I've read. You'll see clearer signs of that longer into the story.

Have fun!

----

A loud yelling could be heard in the room next to this one, and suddenly a flash of orange could be seen if you looked out the window. It appeared the Uzumaki kid had done something again.

This room in question was a classroom, filled with 21 students seemingly writing an assignment of sorts. Most of them were about 12 years old, though some had clearly repeated a year or two.

There was one paper in particular which was of most interest to this story. The topic of the assignment was to write in a profile and description of yourself. The one we'll be focusing on said the following:

***

Name: Rokushō Aoshi 

Age: 12

Physical description: 158 cm tall, 38kg; Green, neck long hair; Purple eyes. I often wear an open haori, black with dark blue outline. Underneath I can wear anything.

Specialisation: Fuinjutsu

Known jutsu: Academy three, simple seals. A couple of genjutsu.

Family: Father Rokushō Ashiro, barrier ninja. Mother deceased, was once named Yuhi Asami, genjutsu specialist. Brother Rokushō Aoi, missing-nin.

Dream: Become a seal-master, increase the standing of my clan, bring my brother to Konoha's jail cells.

Area in most need of improvement: Physicality

Area in least need of improvement: Chakra control

Ideal three man squad to compliment yourself: One with a powerful body and quite a bit of chakra and another with either genjutsu or some kind of long ranged jutsu.

Most important part of being a ninja: Protecting the innocents.

***

And the boy who was writing it was finished. His description of himself was rather accurate. He was a skinny boy, a bit tall for his age, who truly needed to gain strength so his chakra reserve could increase.

His yin side was large enough, he inherited his mother's brain. Boy was Aoshi glad he didn't inherit his father's mind like his brother did. Aoshi always thought his father was rather lost in life and he always attributed it to the clan's tendency to 'keep it within the clan'.

Aoshi's generation was the first in a long time where someone from outside the clan married into it. They still carried the iconic colours of green and purple but Aoshi had gotten his mother's mind and face shape. He had a rather gentle and rounded look instead of his father who looked more haggard than a beggar in his honest opinion.

He never understood why his mother settled for his father. Ashiro was a mad man who instilled dreams of greatness and ideas of greed into Aoshi's brother Aoi's head. Aoshi completely blamed his father for Aoi's defection.

That being said, if Aoshi could just graduate from the academy next month he might be able to take the position of clan head away from his father soon. He just had to become stronger than him first, and that shouldn't be much of a challenge.

Aoshi's father often spoke on three subjects. Former glory, Aoshi's mother and finally, Uzumaki. Apparently, according to his father, their clan was once known as an extremely talented bunch with a specialisation towards sealing. The Rokushō's purple eyes were proof of their bloodline powers.

Nowadays, every single power the Rokushō once had was attributed to the Uzumaki. The Uzumaki clan was created by an exiled Rokushō who managed to marry a Senju. This caused a lot of irritation within the clan. Not only that, but the marriage to a Senju fixed the sickly problem Rokushō often faced.

Even though the Rokushō had the power to summon giant adamantine chains from their bodies and the ability to sense an entire battlefield perfectly, they usually had a rather sickly and thin body. Because of their yang side being so weak, they were almost never able to properly use those powers and was therefore often stuck making simple seals.

Aoshi wanted to change that! He would-

"Are you finished?"

He looked up to find his teacher waiting with his hand held out and sheepishly nodded while giving away his paper. Aoshi had been stuck in his own mind once again, like he usually was.

He was bumped on the side. "Oi, focus! We don't have a lot left of the academy. Then you can finally learn whatever you want!"

The girl who sat next to him was one of his two best friends, Higurashi Tenten. The girl looked just as she usually did when they were either training or at school. Her black hair was in two buns, one on either side of her head, her grey eyes had a gentle look to them as did her currently thin lips due to annoyance, she wore a pink sleeveless blouse and dark green pants as well.

Aoshi leaned his head on one of his hands and smiled at her. "Excited to finally try and follow Tsunade's footsteps?"

That brought a grin to her face. "Yes! Finally I can study medical jutsu! You'll see, I'll become just like Tsunade one day"

"Then I'll be like Jiraiya!" That momentarily brought her out of it, but only enough to hit him on the arm gently and berate him. "I'll not watch my best friend become a womaniser!"

He chuckled at the irony. By that logic she wanted to become a gambling drunk who ran away from her troubles. But he didn't raise that point, it never went well. She slowly drifted back into her dreams after that.

And so he had taken her focus completely off the class as she stared into the distance with a dreamy look on her face. Aoshi kept the smile as he lazily looked towards the teacher for the rest of the lesson.

This was how most of their days at the academy went. They had sat together ever since they first properly met as 8 year olds.

~~~~ Four years earlier ~~~~

Aoshi's father had once again spent all of his salary on saké. He had been doing that a lot since Aoshi's mother died a few years earlier.

Ashiro had already sold all the little scraps of legacy they had left to the Konoha library so now Aoshi had to figure out a way to keep food on their table. Luckily, the bills were paid automatically when he got his salary so they could keep their house, electricity and water.

But Aoshi had known it would come to this for a long time. Every little ounce of faith in his father had disappeared as soon as he started selling their legacy to the village, instead of dropping down on the sake. So he kept one scroll to himself hidden away. It was "A foundation to the art of Sealing" written by his great grandfather. A man who was very talented with low effort seals.

So over those months and months where they only just scraped by, Aoshi had improved his sealing out of necessity. It all came down to this day.

He had created a few stacks of simple seals and would go around trying to sell them to different stores.

It was a large stack of explosive tags, a slightly smaller stack with storage seals which could contain the same as a small pouch and finally a couple of his own creations. They were seals so small they could be hidden almost anywhere without detection. You could only fit a single kunai into them but sometimes that's just what you need.

The idea in his head was to make some kind of fake tooth or something, roll it up and place it inside so that you could always have a weapon at hand if necessary. For now he had made some drawings of extra large rings where the seals would fit in a grooved out part on the inside.

Main problem was that he couldn't get an audience with any of the shopkeepers. His clan's name had already been forgotten after two bad generations so why would they trust an 8 year old kid?

That all ended when he stepped into a newly established shop called Higurashi's.

A light young voice called out to him, it was vaguely familiar. "Welcome to Higurashi's! We're not fully in stock yet but feel free to browse around!"

She looked up and they shared a look of confusion. He was the first to answer. He was pretty sure this was one of the girls in the A-class. "Tenten-san..right?" She nodded "and you're...Ao-kun" She coughed to hide her slip-up "Aoshi-San." She was clearly flustered by calling him by the nickname he had among the girls in her class, but as he stepped up to the counter she grew confused.

He put up all his seals and a scroll with his ring idea on the counter. He hoped it would go better this time since this owner even let a girl his age attend the store, surely then he'd at least listen to what he has to say. "I've made some seals I'd like to sell. Can I please talk to whoever owns this place..?"

Tenten blinked once, then twice and finally thrice. "Y-you made them?" She quickly picked up one and inspected it. "This is a good quality explosive tag!" His eyes lit up as she had actually inspected it instead of throwing him out like the rest.

"Thank you Tenten-chan. I've been trying hard to make them. I need the extra money you see." He looked down at that last bit, feeling ashamed of who his father was. That's when a large, burly, and rather scarred man with otherwise similar features as the girl came in from the back. He took a look at what was in front of him, closely inspecting Aoshi for a few seconds before talking to Tenten.

"And what do we have here then? Academy students aren't allowed to shop for weapons you know." But then it was Tenten who answered him, full of joy and wonder in her voice. "No papa, he made these seals! Look at them, they look great even though he's my age. Apparently he needed some extra cash."

For a split moment, Aoshi was certain he saw recognition and then pity in the man's eyes. He sighed. "We do need quite a few seals in stock. Alright kid, I'll take a look at them." Aoshi openly celebrated his great success which got him a smile from the older man and a giggle from Tenten.

In a serious tone the old man spoke, he had a rather dark and raspy voice "Know this though. Since you're not a seal master, I have to personally inspect every single tag and seal in here. That'll mean more work for me, which means less money for you. And I'll have to test a few of them out. Agreed?"

Going back into as serious a mode he could, Aoshi nodded at the man and reached out his hand. A moment later, they shook on it and then brought the goods to the back. "I'm Higurashi Tenchi by the way. You're Rokushō's kid right?" After a meek nod he responded rather quietly but loud enough for everyone to hear anyway. "Glad you're not following in his footsteps.."

Tenten gave her father a confused look, which then carried over to Aoshi who just looked down at the ground clearly ashamed. They got to a small sealing room when Tenchi stopped the two kids. "I'll inspect them. You show him around the place. If these are good I'm sure we'll be seeing more of him." With that he went inside with the bundles of tags and papers and the single scroll.

Aoshi saw a couch nearby and flopped down onto it. "This better work.." he told himself. Without him noticing, Tenten had sat down next to him and looked at him with an inquisitive look. "Why do you need money so badly?"

Aoshi was startled for a second but then let out a heavy sigh. "It's a rather personal family issue. I'm sure your dad will tell you as soon as I leave though." She shook her head. "No, it seems like it's your story to tell. Maybe you'll tell me next time…"

He tilted his head. "Next time?" She smiled brightly and it truly brought up the mood of the entire room. "Yeah, when you need more money. I saw that tag, it was good! Maybe we could hire you to make more of them!"

She looked so hopeful, Aoshi couldn't understand why. It's not like they knew each other, but for some reason she seemed to want him to stick around. He just decided it was an issue for another day. "You know what? I'd like that. It'll give me a lot of practice. But I don't know any more difficult seals.."

She waved him off. "Normal shinobi rarely use the rarer ones anyway. And when they do, they keep that one scroll for years. These minor ones are where a common store like ours would make their profit anyway."

He inspected her for a few seconds, second guessing his initial profile of her. "I thought the store was new, you sound like you're raised in here."

She laid her head back on the sofa. "Yeah, papa's been planning this for a long time. He's been teaching me all about it since I could first understand it." They shared a laugh "I love it though. Weapons just feel right in my hands."

Aoshi could agree with that last sentence. He had seen her yearly exam with weapons as all classes did them together for some reason. Maybe to get inspired by the top class, he figured. Tenten had perfect scores with all kinds of weapons, a true talent. This is why her next sentence surprised him. "But my real dream is to become like Tsunade-sama! To prove to all these men that women can be just as strong!" She flexed the non existent muscles on her arm.

Aoshi held in a laugh. Seeing as she noticed and wasn't pleased he was seemingly laughing at her dream, he decided to explain himself quickly. "I'm not laughing at your dream. It's just that it should be obvious, shouldn't it? But for some reason there haven't been many powerful women through the years.." He took a pensive pose. "Maybe you can change that and become a beacon of hope for the next generation, huh?"

He looked over to see her reaction but he had lost her. She was completely in her dreams with a gentle smile across her face. He took her hand and dragged her up. Completely surprised at the sudden awakening she looked around only for her gaze to land on their hands and then up to his eyes. "You were going to show me around right? Lead the way!"

And so with regained vigour, she showed him around the place. She showed him their rather empty storage, their forge, their testing grounds and their store. Basically everywhere except their personal quarters.

"And that's it! What do you think?" He gave her a small smile. "I think it's brilliant. Once you get started here it's going to be great!" Her eyes lit up at that and she exclaimed "Right?!"

It was at that time her father came out of the sealing room. He sighed heavily before talking to Aoshi "Alright kid, they're all good. And I like the way you think. How about you come work for me and we'll see if you can get a better deal for your ideas?"

~~~~

Since that time he has spent most days at Tenten's place. As an investment in him, Tenchi managed to get hold of another Fuinjutsu book. In it were a couple of more seals to sell like prisoner seals and storage seals which could launch out whatever was stored in it. But other than that there were two which piqued Aoshi's interest.

One was a larger seal which you had to perform in a sealing room, it was to be placed on something which would then gain the ability to absorb chakra. The other was a way to bind part of a person's chakra in a battle situation.

Since he needed the money, he had learnt what he could sell first and it was only recently he properly got the hang of the other two which were for personal gain.

It was just a month left until graduation and he wanted to have something special about him at that point so he wouldn't be left without a sensei like many of the civilian kids.

As soon as he got out of the school grounds, Tenten caught up to him. "Are you going to train with me today or is it going to be another day of you shutting yourself into the sealing room?"

Seeing her cheeky smile he playfully punched her arm. "You make it sound like I'm a shut in. Today is the day. Today I will make the seals, mind if I test them out later?"

She shook her head enthusiastically "I'd be glad to see your success. Come on then, let's hurry home!" She started dragging him. It's almost a bit sad how her home felt more like a home than the one where his father was currently sleeping, but Aoshi was just happy he found that family. He owed the Higurashis a lot.

***

Three hours later he had meticulously drawn all of the necessary seals on the ground. Since he was going to be marking himself, he wanted it all to be perfect. He had spent the last few months perfecting the seal and reverse engineered one which did the exact opposite and instead granted chakra.

The only thing left was for him to activate it and place his hands in the middle of the circle. In his mind he counted down the seconds but before he got to zero, he just did it.

Countless little seals crawled over the floor and over his arms to focus on the palm of his hands. On his right hand was the chakra absorption seal, and on his left hand was the chakra transfer seal. Slowly but surely all of the crawling seals had concentrated into two markings on his hands. His right had a wavy line while his left had a cross.

It was time to test these out!

He ran out of the room in excitement "Tenten! I'm done! Are you ready?" She came from around a corner with a surprised face?

"You're done? I was just going to set aside some food for you. But since you're done we might as well test it right away, right?"

At his nod, she walked up to him and let him place the right hand on her shoulder. He gave her a nod, and then he activated the seal.

Suddenly a blue light came from her shoulder and Tenten fell down on her knees out of breath. "A bit much there! I barely have any chakra left!"

And Aoshi could feel it. So this was what it was like for those powerhouses like the Hyuuga in his class. Ever since he moved up to the top class it had all been about that guy. If only Aoshi had this much chakra naturally.

He placed his left hand on her shoulder and tried to slowly transfer over some chakra instead of testing its limits like he did before.

Slowly she regained her normal breath and stood up feeling refreshed once again. They shared a look and then she jumped into his arms. "You did it Aoshi, you did it!" 

Hugging her back with vigour, he responded rather relieved. "I guess I did. Did you say it's time to eat?"