Truth Well Hidden

Kiba's Secrets

Most people know Kiba as a self-confident prick. The sheer idea of him being unsure about anything or overthinking something is incomprehensible. However, no one really knows him. Not really. They never did see the real him. Kiba had been hiding behind a mask for so long, no one ever saw him for who he was.

Hell, even Kiba himself often forgot who he was on the inside.

Why would such a thing happen? Well, it goes way back. Into a time that Kiba himself could barely recall...

Kiba was born a member of the Inuzuka clan. His mother, Tsume, was the clan head. He also had an older sister, Hana. The Inuzuka clan was known for the members' cooperation with their nin dogs and excellent dog-like senses. However, they were also famous for their brash attitude and loud personality.

Kiba's father was an average jōnin who fell for Tsume due to her loyal nature and the sense of humour they shared. They were happy and had two children together. At first, as is the case with all married couples, they were all sweet and loving.

However, upon the arrival of their first child, Tsume began to show more of her wild personality. Her husband, initially, did not mind that much, only chiding his wife when he found her too hard on their daughter. She normally let her anger recede and let her child off, the girl not minding that she was treated that way by her mother. She did, after all, act the same way most of the time.

After the arrival of their second child, Tsume started to become more stressed with taking care of her clan duties as well as her two children. She was also part of the shinobi council and thus had to participate in many council meetings. She began to become more easily annoyed and impatient with the children.

Her husband did try to cool her down and stop her from yelling at their children, however, this did not work long. Four-year-old Kiba, thinking that his father would be able to save him once more, played a prank on Tsume, unintentionally messing up a stack of paperwork that she had taken the whole day to sort through. Instead of apologising, he had giggled and run away to hide in the kennel, only further fueling his mother's rage when she found herself unable to find the culprit.

His father tried to convince Tsume that Kiba was only having fun and did not intend to mess up her work. In her anger, she lashed out at him and yelled a whole lot of profanities at her husband. He was shocked and had run away right after she finally ended her rant, filing divorce papers on the very next day and fleeing Konoha in fear of the she-demon's wrath. Kiba, seeing how his great unshakeable father run off in fear of his mother, began to blame himself for causing his mother to scare off his father.

This guilt was only further intensified when Tsume had stayed locked up in her room, ditching her shinobi duties for the following week. He heard her crying. She blamed him for upsetting her when she was already stressed.

This was when he lost all of his self-confidence.

When his mother finally left her room and resumed her duties, he stayed out of the way. When he was personally taught by his mother, he tried his best, though he did not have faith in himself to be able to do as his mother instructed. Tsume, however, did not see that. She saw that he was not trying hard enough and needed more encouragement.

She was not wrong, of course, for the young Inuzuka was so unsure of his abilities that he did not know that he was not trying his best. However, she failed to notice that the boy did not know what he was to do. Tsume proceeded to scold the boy for not doing his best and started to compare him to his sister, who was a girl and supposed to be of the weaker category as believed by society.

Instead of providing Kiba with the incentive to try harder, it had the opposite effect. He began to skip out on training and hide while his mother stomped about in search of the terrified boy. While that was indeed what he did, he focused on studying what he could. Kiba sneakily stole books and scrolls from the clan library and studied in a hidden basement that no one else in the clan knew existed. It was packed with numerous books and scrolls that were of a language lost to age and time and was very dusty. However, there were still empty shelves for him to place the books that he was working on and a big study table for him to not down his notes.