The forest floor was soft beneath Naruto's bare feet, layered with fallen leaves and old roots that twisted through the earth like sleeping snakes. The air was cool and quiet, broken only by the steady whap of wood striking wood.
Naruto moved with purpose, swinging a short wooden sword through the air, again and again. His steps were light, quick, and almost playful. But each strike had weight behind it, a sharp snap when the blade met the side of an old, scarred tree trunk. He wasn't following a form. He didn't even know if there were proper forms. He just moved until it felt right.
His shirt was tossed over a branch nearby. His body was small, wiry, but already lean with the signs of muscle forming from endless motion. His hair, spiky and sun-bleached, stuck to his forehead with sweat. But he didn't stop. He didn't think about stopping. Training wasn't a chore—it was just something to do. Like breathing. Or eating.
He spun, ducked, swung again—this time pretending the tree was some weird bear monster he saw in a dream once. Then he jabbed upward, flipped the wooden blade around in his palm, and let out a quiet, satisfied breath.
That was enough for now.
He wandered back toward the little camp he'd made, a shallow circle of smoothed-out dirt and half-carved logs, where a stick of roasted meat sizzled slowly over a tiny flame. The smell drifted through the trees, thick and smoky and perfect.
Naruto sat, crossed his legs, and picked the stick up with both hands. He bit in. Grease dribbled down his chin. He chewed like he hadn't eaten in days—though it had only been a few hours.
Around him, the trees swayed gently. He liked it here. Nobody yelled. Nobody asked questions. There was space to run, to climb, to move. He could do handstands for no reason. He could talk to squirrels. He could chase shadows just to see where they led.
The air here was different. It wasn't just the cool breeze or the way it smelled of fresh pine and wet earth—though that was part of it. It was the space in it. The way it felt to inhale, to feel the air fill you, not just pass through.
Here, in the forest, there was freedom in the air. It wasn't thick or suffocating. It didn't try to choke your lungs with the weight of a thousand obligations. It wasn't polluted with the smell of car exhaust or the heavy perfume of too many people living too close together.
It was fresh. It was clean.
The grass beneath his feet was soft, lush with moisture from the evening dew, not the dry, harsh pavement of the world he used to know. He could hear every blade shifting in the wind. Every rustle of the leaves, every small animal darting between branches, all spoke in the same language—a quiet, peaceful one. Everything was connected. Everything had its place. There was no hurry, no rush, no sense of needing to be anywhere other than exactly where you were.
He took another deep breath, feeling the air fill his chest like he was finally breathing for the first time in his life.
This was the life he was meant for.
---
Flashback to His Last Life:
The memory of his last life was as blurry and forgettable as a half-finished dream. It wasn't like a typical death, not a loud bang or a final, dramatic moment. One second, he was just… there. The next, he woke up—alone. In a world that didn't feel like his anymore.
He was three years old when he awoke here, the world already so vast and strange. No transition. No warning. He didn't understand why his hands were small and chubby. Why his eyes saw the sky so wide. But it was a quiet awakening, one that didn't scream in his mind. It just… happened.
The first thing he noticed was the emptiness. The way the world felt so dense, like every building, every street, every corner he turned was just… small. Everything was packed too tightly, every street corner suffocating with people in a hurry. They didn't even notice him. They just walked past, heads down, eyes cold. The air stank—of gasoline, of sweat, of metal and plastic. No trees, no grass. No space.
He could breathe, but it didn't feel like breathing. It felt like he was being pressed into the world, a grain of sand caught in an hourglass. People… didn't look at each other. They looked through each other. All of them, racing toward something he couldn't see. Toward something they probably didn't even understand.
He'd lived like that for years. In a world where no one smiled unless they had to. No one laughed unless they had a reason. The space was always tight, always crammed with some unspoken weight. People were more interested in sucking life from each other than actually living it. Every day was the same. He worked. He slept. He worked again. There was no room to breathe.
And he had no idea how it ended.
One day, his life just… faded out of focus. Maybe in his sleep. Maybe in an accident. There was no drama. No realization of oh, this is the end. He just woke up here.
Here, where the sky felt bigger, the air was crisp, and he could actually stretch. No one to tell him what to do. No deadlines. No noise. Just the forest and the endless sky above.
Kaito never thought about it much. His old life didn't matter anymore. It wasn't worth thinking about. This was his life now. And he was going to live it as fully as he could—no regrets, no strings.
He reached for another skewer of meat and took a slow bite, savoring the warmth in his mouth. Maybe the village was dangerous. Maybe the people there were complicated. But he was free here. For now, that was all that mattered.