1 Chapter: 1
*GROAN*
With a loud groan, Kaori raised her hands to shield her face from the sunlight filtering through the windows... wait!
"Where the fu...?"
Her words were cut short as a furious wave of headache crashed and assailed her sanity. She felt her memories gradually re-emerge from the depths of her mind, her eyes twitched once, and her mouth hung wide open from the horror of her new reality,
'I am a ninja!?'
She was in some place called Konoha... in an anime!
Year 43... maybe 44? Who knows?
The true owner of her body was also named Kaori, Kaori Hanada, a civilian ninja. No major bloodline or... any bloodline. Born in the year 26, she was roughly 18 years old, a couple of months give or take, orphans didn't much pay attention to their birthdays especially since they were busy surviving.
Her predecessor was inducted into the ANBU, not because of her physical fitness or ninjutsu talents, but because of a very peculiar talent that she had since childhood, she had no presence...
Well, that would be going a bit far but her presence was quite easily overlooked. Heck, even the matron almost starved her to death because she didn't notice her crying.
The ANBU took her in right after she graduated from the Ninja Academy, and trained her for another three years till she was promoted to a full-blown Chunin. Unfortunately, her talents were more suited to surveillance rather than frontal combat and so she hadn't been out of the village her entire life.
'Wait... I need a moment...'
*BARF!*
Kaori rolled over to her sides and puked.
She wiped the bile from her lips, her head spinning with disbelief. As the reality of her situation sank in, she couldn't help but feel a sense of disbelief and despair. How the hell did she end up in this absurd world, as a ninja no less, a freaking black ops amongst the Ninjas too!
Struggling to steady her breathing, Kaori forced herself to sit upright, only to wince as pain shot through her ribs. Distant memories surfaced and she groaned again as she remembered the feeling of a kunai slicing open her belly.
It was her last mission, nothing major, just keep an eye on a Sand Merchant, sand as in Sunagakure. He was a git, always wondering about the red-light districts, harassing the workers there, and she was forced to watch and not act because of orders... meh, the Uchihas knocked the snot out of him, so at least that was something.
About a week ago, the ANBU moved in to intercept the merchant, only that he turned out to be a Jonin and a puppeteer on top. He slaughtered the ANBU squad, gutted her, and killed half a dozen civilians before someone from the Akimichi clan bashed his head into a mashed potato.
That was a week ago, she had been in a critical condition since then and had barely survived thanks to the grace of a senior Iryō-nin.
'I roughly understand what's going on.'
Before she could read her new memories carefully, someone knocked on the door of her hospital ward, interrupting her thoughts,
"Enter."
*squeak!*
The wooden door squeaked open and a middle-aged woman wearing a white gown walked in.
"Good morning dear, although, I guess it's probably late evening now."
The Iryō-nin's gentle voice pierced through Kaori's disoriented thoughts, momentarily grounding her in the present. She blinked, trying to focus on the woman before her.
"Good... uh, morning,"
Kaori managed to murmur, her voice still hoarse from bile and disuse.
The Iryō-nin approached, her expression softening slightly,
"How are you feeling, dear? Any pain?"
Kaori hesitated, unsure of how to answer the doctor's questions. She attempted a weak smile but to her facial muscles, it was a foreign notion to do so,
"Uh, I... I'm not so sure. Everything's a bit... fuzzy."
The woman nodded understandingly,
"Yeah, being gutted does that to people."
The doctor's words dealt a hammer blow to Kaori's fragile sense of reality. Gutted. This was not a dream, not anymore,
"So, how long was I out?"
She rasped, forcing the words past the knot of pain in her throat.
"A week,"
The doctor replied, taking her pulse.
"You were in a bad way. Lucky for you, a senior Nara-clan Iryō-nin took interest in your case. Her healing jutsu is top-notch."
A flicker of amusement crossed the doctor's face,
"Not Tsunade-sama good, but good enough. Still, a nasty wound like that takes time... a lot of time. You'll be here for another couple of days."
Kaori sank back into the pillows, exhausted. A week. She had been dying for over a whole week.
"So, what happens after I get out?"
She inquired, her hoarse voice barely above a whisper.
The doctor turned to look at her with a raised eyebrow,
"That's your business, right? ANBU spooks? The Hokage would probably want to see you and debrief you on your mission. Depending on your condition, you might be given some light desk duty for a while."
The doctor chuckled and left the room.
*GROAN!*
Kaori groaned, what little hopes she had of this world being a dream were squashed. No point in being stubborn then, she would have to accept her new identity, and she should probably start planning how to survive more than a week.
Like most children of her generation, she had seen the anime 'Naruto' and found it pretty interesting... not to mention pretty dangerous as well. And if her memories were anything to go by, the Third Shinobi World War was about to start soon.
Fortunately, the Barrier and Security department's main job was to man the fort... or village.
Just as Kaori was thinking about how to survive in this dangerous world, an emotionless mechanical sound suddenly sounded in her head and a transparent blue panel suddenly appeared in front of her eyes.
{Congratulations! You have successfully activated the Card System.}
{You can get cards by completing missions, reaching milestones, and killing enemies. The more difficult the task, the better the cards.}
{PS: Two cards can be merged to create a better card.}
Kaori studied the blue panel. The message disappeared as soon as she had read it once, and in its place were three options: Personal Template, Deck, and Inventory. She selected the personal panel with an internal thought.
[Name: Kaori Hanada]
[Age: 18]
[Chakra: 5800]
[Physique: 4900]
[Affinity: Fire(Lv.2)]
[Chakra Control: 66%]
[Skills:
- Ninjutsu: Substitution(MAX), Transformation(MAX), Cloning)(MAX), Body Flickering (Lv.3/5)...
- Fire Style: Fire Ball(Lv.3/5), Burning Circle(Lv.3/5), Dragon Fire(Lv.3/5), Fire Dragon Bullet(Lv.3/5), Fox Fire(Lv.2/5), Hidden in Fire(Lv.2/5)...
- Taijutsu: Elementary Taijutsu(MAX), Intermediate Taijutsu(Lv.3/5), ANBU Taijutsu(Lv.2/5)
- Genjutsu: Elementary Genjutsu(MAX)
- Kenjutsu: Elementary ANBU Kenjutsu(MAX), Intermediate ANBU Kenjutsu(Lv.3/5)
- Bukijutsu: Elementary Shurikenjutsu(MAX), Intermediate Shurikenjutsu(MAX), Advanced Shurikenjutsu(Lv.2/5)]
[Talent:
- Ninja Nobody!(Green)]
[Evaluation: A Chunin. Ordinary ANBU operative. A common cannon fodder.]
Kaori glared at the blue panel, her skills were decent for a Chunin, but the evaluation read: 'Common cannon fodder.' Her eyes twitched in annoyance,
'I'll show you cannon fodder.'
Still. A Card System? It sounded like something out of a video game.
With a hesitant thought, she focused on the 'Deck' option and found it empty.
'So, I start with nothing,'
Kaori dismissed the panel for now, focusing on the 'main menu,' there she noticed that, unlike before, the Inventory option seemed to be glowing. The panel changed, displaying nine empty slots and a letter, she tapped on the letter and a message appeared:
{Starter Pack Available. Claim?}
'Of course.'
She thought, mentally tapping 'Claim' on the glowing letter.
A flurry of light erupted from the panel, momentarily blinding her. When her vision cleared, ten cards materialized in the empty slots of her inventory. They shimmered with distinct colors that might hint at their rarity.
There were six plain white cards, three faint blue cards, and a single card that shimmered with a scarlet glow. Her eyes narrowed in anticipation.
Tapping on a white card, a holographic image flickered to life, displaying a simple kunai with the words 'Ordinary Kunai (50)' emblazoned beneath it.
[Ordinary Kunai(White): 50]
She was a bit disappointed. Fifty kunai? That's all? But then again, it was a starter pack.
'A durable ordinary kunai costs 2,500 ryo, so 50 durable basic kunai costs about 125,000. The shopkeeper might cut down the price to 120k ryo for being a regular but that's all.'
So, she made about as much money as a single C-rank mission could get her.
'Not bad.'
With a strained smile, she swiped through the remaining white cards, revealing more basic equipment - 'Ordinary Shuriken(100),' 'Ordinary Bomb(10),' and 'Explosive tags(10).'
[Ordinary Shuriken(White): 100]
[Ordinary Smoke Bomb(White): 10]
[Ordinary Exploding Tag(White): 10]
A single shuriken costs about 500 ryō. So that's 50k ryō's worth of shuriken.
A smoke bomb's usually at 3k ryō, another 30k ryō.
An Exploding tag's never less than 10k ryō which makes it 100k ryō,
Kaori smiled broadly, she made a total of 300k ryō sitting on her bed. That's more than half a year's worth of salary for a surveillance ANBU!
But the last two cards seemed a bit peculiar. One, she understood, was a talent card: 'Tranquility(White).'
[Tranquility(White): Mind is calm and therefore, passively restores a small amount of chakra over time. Even while engaged in combat.]
'Seems like a useful talent,'
Kaori lingered on the 'Tranquility' card. Passive chakra regeneration, even if minimal, was of a huge advantage to Special Jonins and above, especially considering that the talent states 'During Active Combat.'
Her smile, however, faltered slightly as she moved on to the last white card. It depicted the silhouette of a human being, their hands forming the Seal of Confrontation. The card shimmered with a faint white light, marred by the black of the silhouette, and its introduction appeared as she tapped it.
[Subordinate Card(Tier 0):
[Name: Ordinary civilian]
[Age: 8-18]
[Chakra: 10]
[Physique: 10]
[Affinity: Water(Lv.0)]
[Chakra Control: 0%]
[Skills: None]
[Talent: None]
[Evaluation: A perfectly ordinary civilian.]
Kaori stared at the card in disbelief. It was certainly not something she expected of the system, she was a trained ANBU operative with a decent skillset for a Chunin, yet the card was labeled as 'A perfectly ordinary civilian,'
'A glitch?'
She thought before being blinded by a flash of light and when her vision returned, a rather unique message in golden color appeared on the interface,
{One-time explanation: A Subordinate card is essentially a blank slate, serving as a blueprint for creating a person. Initially, you can customize basic details like gender, age, name, and bloodline, but this can only be done once. Once generated, the backstory is set as an orphan with minimal financial resources. However, further modifications and enhancements can be made by combining the Subordinate card with other cards like Talent cards, Skill cards, etc. Think of it as laying the groundwork for a person, with the ability to shape and refine them using unique cards to build them up step by step.}
...
..
.
'Eh?'
