In Their Shadow

Chapter 2

After waking up and doing his morning routine, Yuma sat on his floor eating a meager cup of noodles. As he sat there defending his so called "breakfast" from the gnats that constantly swarmed his apartment, thoughts swarmed in his mind. It was the normal self-loathing and pointless blaming he went through every morning.

'I hate this place, why am I stuck with this small bug infested excuse of an apartment. I know I should be grateful for the Hokage for giving me at least someplace to live, but he's the Hokage! He's the single most influential man in the village and probably the shinobi world, surely he could've given me a place better than this'.

Those were the thoughts that always made Yuma angry the most, because it was the truth. Minato Namikaze, with his status and power, could've given Yuma a better place to live, so why not. Why was Yuma always being screwed over by people in a higher class than him. The depressing thoughts always found a way to seep into his consciousness, filling him with annoyance and anger. Always he had to just deal with it, he had to roll with punches the world dished out to him and pretend everything was fine

I hate it

There it was again, the voice in Yuma's head that always frightened him. Ever since Yuma was young he would hear this distorted voice that oddly sounded similar to his own ring through his head making him distrust those around him and cause him to question his own sanity. Usually when he was younger he would ignore it to the best of his ability, but as he grew older, he found himself almost agreeing with the voice sometimes. The thing that frightened him most is that whenever the voice spoke, it filled his body with a strange feeling and caused irrational anger to cloud his judgment.

His life sucked and he knew it, he always had. How could he not? He was reminded of it every single time he went to the academy, most of his peers belonging to clans and the others having working parents. He used to have friends but the would always abandon him whenever he tried to play with them in his apartment. Shortly after the second year he was being bullied by kids for not having a clean house and being poorer then the rest. Whenever he was called to perform jutsu he would fail and be told he had horrible chakra control, causing others to laugh.

The constant lack of money and mistreatment from his classmates are what gave him his dream, his hope, and his goal. To become the richest man in all of Konoha. He hated his impoverished life, this is what drove him to become a shinobi, he knew from others that depending on the type of mission the pay could be any were from meager to huge! He didn't care a single bit about protecting the village or helping the weak, all he wanted was to complete high-paying missions and escape his horrible living conditions.

After eating the ramen from the bottom of his cup, he looked to his wall and began deciding his weapons and equipment. Despite having terrible taijutsu, genjutsu, and ninjutsu, the one thing he excelled at was weapons. The only times he was recognized and respected in his class were the rare times when Iruka-sensei would give everyone a kunai throwing test. That was the only area he excelled at, and because of that he began practicing weapon wielding from a young age.

After getting out of his pajamas and putting his shinobi outfit and leaf ninja headband, he let a smile grow on his face.

'I will become a great shinobi and endure hardships for the sake of my dream'

with that thought he grabbed his assortment of senbon and kunai, placed the kunai in his holster and the senbon into a pouch attached onto the back of his arm for ease of access and marched to the door. As he walked outside,the early morning sun beaming at him, he had one last thought.

'I will show everyone that i'm not just a failure, and will complete mission after mission to achieve my dream life no matter what gets in my way'

and no matter who I have to hurt to get there