The Prince of Olympus - Chapter 6
"Why do they have to be here anyway?"
Zeus asked blankly as all of his children, including the children he had through affairs with immortal women were present in the throne room, the place where he and Hera planned to have a warm welcome for Naruto.
Speaking of his wife, she was pacing back and forth around the throne room, looking nervous and worried. He could understand what his wife was feeling, as he was also experiencing the same feelings but hid it better than her.
What if something goes wrong? What will Naruto do when he reunites with them? What is he going to say to them for all the years Naruto had to live alone without his family in the Elemental Nations?
He knew that Hera was also having similar thoughts.
While the parents were worrying about their son, the other Olympians however were having different thoughts about the incoming blond.
"Damn man," Apollo was chatting merrily with Hermes with his usual "shiny smile" displayed for all to see, much to their annoyance "I don't know what to say but, I think we're gonna have sooo much fun hanging out with lil' fishcake. You know? I think it's about time we did our jobs as big bros and take our lil bros to a brothel"
"A seventeen years old hormonal teenager? Yeah, it's good to be young" The god of messengers nodded his head "and Naruto seems pretty fast too, I want to challenge him for a run already" his sandals flapped their tiny wings rapidly while the Olympian God grinned.
Dionysus, as usual, was reading a wine-magazine and really not that interested in Naruto. Being here was just an excuse for him to get away from Camp Half-Blood as long as possible, baby sitting a bunch of disrespectful demi-gods could get boring in just a few hours after he received his punishment.
Demeter was sitting beside the goddess of the hearth, Hestia who was tending the main hearth. Aside from Zeus and Hera, Hestia was one of the only goddesses that really wanted to get to know Naruto as a family member, which wasn't a surprise since it was her main domain...
Demeter, however...
"Do you think that he loves cereal sister?" Demeter asked, clearly unaware of the blonde's love for a more unhealthy kind of food (even if Ramen noodles were made of cereal).
"I don't know sister" the kind goddess shook her head with an amused smile.
At the far side of the throne room, sitting on their respective thrones were the rest of the Olympians who were present in the Hall of the Gods.
"Hephaestus, I need you to fix these weapons up for me" Ares said loudly and dropped a magical bag full of weapons, from the traditional ones like swords, spears, shields to the more modern, heavy-weapons like machine guns, explosives, RPG's... "I need them in the best condition when little brother arrives" he said with a bloodthirsty grin.
"Why should I?" Hephaestus grumbled, picking up a spear which had many cracks adorning it. He really wondered what Ares did these days when peace was a lot more spread out than before for his weapons to end up in this state "you're going to give them to him as a welcome home gift?"
"No, I want to have enough firearms to show that blondie who is the bigger man here" Hephaestus just shook his head. Since he currently didn't have anything to do, he took the bag and began to fix Ares' weapons.
The last Olympian however was in her own little world. Aphrodite was looking at herself in a mirror, with her hand holding a pink lipstick and gently moving the tip on her kissable lips.
"What are you doing?" Ares asked his lover with an annoyed tone.
"I'm making myself perfect" Aphrodite said as she winked at herself in the mirror, the make-up was applied flawlessly "the Prince of Olympus is going to arrive so I can't make myself look bad, can I?" She giggled to herself.
It was bad enough that Naruto had showed himself to be a better warrior than Ares, as much as he hated to admit that (and never will), the blond also caught Aphrodite's interest as well.
Not only was she making herself look even sexier than their daily routine, but she also took to her true form.
As the Goddess of Beauty, Aphrodite could change her appearance at will, depending on the perception of beauty of the person she was in the presence of. But this power only applied to mortals, demi-gods and minor gods, as Olympians could see through her power and get to see her true form, which at the founding of Olympus had driven the gods mad with lust.
She was more beautiful than any mortal's perception of beauty; breathtaking wasn't the right word to describe such an example of physical perfection. With deep sky blue eyes and long, curly golden blonde hair that flowed like a waterfall on her back and the sides of her beautiful visage, the latter which was perfectly decorated with magical make up that seemed to enhance the woman's beauty even further.
She was dressed in a skin tight hot pink back less dress that hugged her otherworldly voluptuous figure and showed off her sexy curves, especially her wide hip and round ass. The dress was tied together behind her neck, with the upper part just enough to cover the front part of her large breasts and left the rest of her cleavage for all to see.
"Babe, you don't have to look perfect for a little, pretty boy who doesn't have a single drop of ichor in his veins" he tried to reason with her, leaning over and put his massive muscular right arm on the armrest of her throne, showing off his muscles "you do know that you have me, right baby?"
"Even with these muscles, Naruto still has more charm than you dear" The smirk on Ares' face instantly dropped after hearing Aphrodite said that "he's so handsome, not to mention so adorable with those whisker marks, it just gives him a feral look, it's so appealing...and from what I've seen, he sure has lots and lots of stamina~" Aphrodite day-dreamed.
This was just more reason for the god of war to punch Naruto's face in.
'Father, we're ready' Athena's voice rang inside Zeus's head which snapped him out of his musings.
The master bolt instantly appeared in his hand and Zeus shot a massive bolt of lightning to the sky, making the other Olympians look at him in surprise before understanding what was about to happen.
Naruto Uzumaki was about to come.
About a minute later, a blue lightning bolt shot out from the sky and struck the throne room's floor, those who were standing near it instantly backed off to make the room for the ones who just arrived.
Artemis and Athena were the first ones to appear from the lightning bolt, followed closely by Zoe.
Naruto, however fell face first onto the ground crashing into the hard floor, his clothes were singed and his hair became even spikier and blackened at the tips. Transportation like this, while very cool, made Naruto feel like Sasuke just punched him with a full powered Chidori and the fact that he wasn't used to it, made him fall and look like an idiot.
"I'm good" He instantly got on his knees to his belongings which had fell out of his backpack before standing up with a large grin "I'm good…whoa! Damn!" his eyes were as wide as dinner plates, totally amazed at the sight of the place he was in, which was big enough to make the Chunin exam arena look like a small closet.
Twelve gigantic chairs with different kind of designs, the Thrones of the gods, stood in a U-shape around the Hearth. Even standing at a distance, Naruto could feel a massive amount of energy radiating coming from those thrones, which surprised him… This whole place has yet to blow up and could withstand such a powerful amount of energy
"NARUTO!"
The blonde was surprised once again when a beautiful brown haired woman threw herself as him with tearful eyes, wrapping her hands around his neck and hugging him tightly against her body, openly crying.
Normally Naruto would have blushed because of the sudden close-contact with such a beautiful woman like her, but at e moment, a sudden familiar wave of warmth washed over him.
Slowly looking down at her, he gasped.
"M-Mom?"
"YES! Yes, it's me Naruto" she looked at him and put a hand on his cheek "it's your mother, my baby boy"
Naruto wanted to smile, to cheer in glee…but all he could do was let tears fall out from his eyes as he hugged the goddess who called herself his mother, his arms wrapped tightly around her. He had waited so long for this moment, to be able to feel the motherly love from his mother, who a month ago he thought was truly dead. A little moment in his mindscape wasn't enough to tell her how much he loved his mother, his family.
"You're wearing the scarf I made for you" Naruto looked at the green scarf he had wrapped around his neck.
"I found it a few days ago" Naruto nodded his head "Hey mom, where is dad?" He pulled back and asked his mother, using his right hand to wipe away his tears "Is he here?"
"Yes my son, he's here" Hera nodded her head, letting go of her youngest child and stepped aside.
"Hello son"
The King of the gods slowly approached his son with a smile on his face. Like Hera, while his appearance looked nothing like Minato Namikaze, he could feel the familiar feeling of his father coming from the man standing in front of him, the same feeling he felt when he met the Yondaime in his mindscape during Pein's invasion and when his father came to his aid with the previous Hokages during the Fourth Shinobi War.
This man was his dad, and he knew it.
"Hey Pops!" Naruto grinned widely, walking towards Zeus.
Zeus spread his arms a little to welcome his son in a fatherly hug…
However…
The instant Naruto got in front of his dad, Zeus found his son's fist buried in his stomach and delivered a massive blow into his abdomen, knocking the wind out of the King of the Gods.
Every Olympian save for Ares gasped at his sudden action.
"N-Naruto…what the hell?" he coughed. His son really knew how to punch. It had been ages since Zeus received a hard blow like that and he would never think that his youngest son would be the one who struck him this hard.
"That's for sealing Kurama into me!" if someone ever ask him, Naruto would say that punching his father in the gut for the second time felt extremely good was an understatement.
"Well I think I do deserve-" but he wasn't able to finish that sentence because Naruto's bandaged right hand suddenly engulfed in Kurama's chakra and went straight at his face, sending the proud and prideful King of the Gods himself flying across the room, straight into the opposite wall with so much force that it shook the entire place violently.
"And that's for cheating on mom, bastard!" Naruto said, loud enough so that Zeus from the other side of the Hall could hear him loud and clear.
Hera didn't know what to say. Her son just punched her husband in the face with so much force it sent the most powerful god flying like he was just a simple punching bag. A side of hers was so satisfied to have her beloved son stand up for her like that, which never happened before with her other sons but another side of hers wanted to scold her son for what he did.
"Damn" Apollo and Hermes said at once with dropped jaws, turning their eyes back and forth between Naruto and a stumped Zeus, who was wiping the ichor from the corner of his mouth and checking his slacked jaw, which appeared to be punched out of the place by his human child.
"Wow, did you see that Kurama?" Naruto said in amazement while looking at his right hand, which had returned to normal "I think that with this new hand I really don't need to transform my whole body to fight"
"I agree but…was it necessary to do that?" Kurama asked, sighing boringly.
"Well, he des-…" but he was stopped when his mother swatted him on the back of his head slightly.
"No fighting between family, understand?" she told him with a motherly glare, the kind of eyes a mother gave to her child when she caught him with his hand in the cookie jar.
"Huh, yeah, but he does deserve it for cheating on you" Naruto said firmly "Athena told me everything after she called dad 'father'. I knew something was off with these gods' thing." During the teleportation Naruto was able to force the goddess of wisdom to tell him everything and to say he was shocked to know that his father was literally a man-whore was an understatement, cheating on his mother for thousands of years without stopping.
Having a punch to the face from his son was the least kind of punishment Naruto could think about.
"So you know?" Naruto nodded his head without even turning around to look at Zeus.
"From now on you better watch your move old man, or I'm going to kick your ass" Naruto turned around and glared at him with a smirk before turning around to look at his mother "so mom, can you introduce me to the rest of our big family?" he asked with a happy smile.
A palm then collided with his upper back in greeting as he stumbled forward to regain balance. Looking at the side the blond saw a handsome looking teenager about eighteen or nineteen, with sandy blond hair and outdoorsy good looks, a bright and playful smile and a look that just screamed "Movie Star". The guy was very tall, taller than him by almost a head and was dressed in jeans, loafers, and a sleeveless T-shirt.
But what surprised him the most was that his face greatly resembled a certain feisty moon goddess.
"Yo little bro" Apollo said with a bright smile "I take that you already know little sis over there" he pointed his thumb at Artemis, who was crossing her arms underneath her chest, but instantly turned to glare daggers at Apollo.
"Apollo for the thousandth time, we're twins!" the goddess of the moon scolded "plus, mother birthed me first!"
"Whatever little sis"
"Don't call me that!"
Naruto chuckled a little at the brother and sister's bickering.
"Well, good to see you Apollo" Naruto grinned at him "the name's Naruto."
"I know fishcake" Apollo said with a hint of humor in his tone and held out his fist, which Naruto punched it lightly "now we're talking" Gai's shinning smile stood no chance against this guy's bright smile, Naruto was sure of it.
"So, I take it we're half brothers?" Naruto grinned at him "That's cool with me" he didn't have any problem with Zeus' other children, it just made the family he always wanted bigger.
"How do you do Naruto" A middle-aged man with a muscular build, curly black hair, blue eyes, elfish features, and a sly grin approached him. He was wearing a black suit and his shoes, the coolest thing about this man Naruto could think about was his shoes, which had a pair of tiny wings flapping slowly on each of them "I'm Hermes…"
"God of Messengers, Astronomy, Thieves, Roads, Swordsmanship and Speed. Yeah, Athena forced me to remember every single detail" Naruto nodded his head, glancing at the goddess of wisdom a little before turning his eyes down Hermes' shoes with excitement "Can those things…you know, let you fly or something?"
"You mean like this?" Naruto whistled when Hermes' body was lifted off the ground and floated on the air with the help of his magical shoes.
"Where can I find one of those?" Naruto asked, amazed.
Suddenly, a thick and powerful scent of perfume hit his nose, the kind of perfume Ino and the more girlish girls of Konoha would use but about a hundred times or so stronger.
"What do you want Aphrodite?" Naruto could hear annoyance in his mother's voice as the most beautiful and attractive woman he had ever seen in his life slowly approached him with an alluring smile on her face.
"How cold of you Hera" the goddess of Love giggled, her blue eyes fixed on Naruto "Well hello there, Handsome~" her voice was sweet.
He could hear Artemis snickering mockingly behind him.
"Any advice about her, Kurama?" Naruto asked his partner. This woman smelt exactly like trouble, she made his instincts go haywire.
Athena never mentioned anything about this woman during her lectures and since she definitely didn't forget to, there must be a reason when the goddess of wisdom decided to not tell Naruto about something.
"Let's see," The fox scratched his chin slightly "your mother once told me about her. Aphrodite? The Goddess of Love and Beauty"
"Oh" Naruto nodded his head, his mind replayed Artemis and Zoe's reaction when he asked about whether or not they had a love gods.
"And also of Lust and Sexuality" Naruto nearly fell face first to the ground "when it came to keep a close relationship, maybe she is only second to your dad. Hera always complained about her"
"Uh huh?"
"She cheated on her husband, who is your brother" Kurama groaned, these humans' relationships were too complicated for his liking "for her lover, who is also your brother."
"Ah I think I get it now" Naruto, at the outside world, slammed his fist into his the palm of his other hand, surprise everyone "I think I read about these kind of girls in a book Athena lent me"
"Oh, and?" Aphrodite asked sultrily, slowly closing the gap between them.
"Let's see, the right word is...floor, no, no…score, um...score..." Athena instantly knew what Naruto was going to say "...whore? That's it, you're a whore!" He declared like it was the most obvious thing in the world, leaving everyone stunned and froze in absolute shock.
Aphrodite felt like her world was just shattered right in front of her eyes after hearing Naruto calling her that, a 'whore'.
She had been called that many times before, to the point she was now completely immune to insults. But those insults were never said by a male, most of the time it was Artemis, never a mortal man like him.
And that pissed her off to no end.
"Uh sorry?" She then used her Charm speak "but what did you call me again Naruto dear?"
Kurama roared out in laughter before shaking his head, reacting rapidly and negating the affect of the goddess of love's Charm speak.
"She is using her godly power to charm you Naruto" the fox warned "be careful"
"Sorry, but that won't work on me" he took a step forward and used his index finger to flick Aphrodite on her forehead, strong enough to push her down to the ground and stun here momentarily .
Aphrodite gasped in shock when she fell on her backside. Her charm speak failed, her charm speak never failed before, not even the gods themselves could withstand the effect of her full-powered charm speak.
"If you know what is good for you Aphrodite" she heard Hera's voice talking to her through telepathy "stay away from Naruto, he isn't someone you can play around with"
The goddess of love bit her lips, it seems that she would have to wait for another opportunity.
Naruto turned his head to the next god who was slowly approaching him.
He was a huge and ugly lump of a man with his shoulders at different heights and a huge, bulging, misshapen head and his leg in a creaking steel brace, with a wild brown beard that sparks fire from time to time. He was the only Olympian he saw so far to show such extreme physical injuries; however, he was also very muscular. His face is red, lumpy and covered with welts.
"Hello" Naruto greeted him politely.
"Hello Naruto" Hephaestus' voice was deep, booming, and rumbly "I'm Hephaestus and I'm your brother" his eyes glanced to Hera slightly but quickly returned to Naruto quickly, Naruto saw bitterness inside his eyes "and as you can see, I..."
But Naruto stopped him by stepping forward and wrapped his arms around his brother's neck in a brotherly hug, grinning from ear to ear as he held the god of smiths and craftsmanship in his arms.
Hephaestus was stunned and looked at Naruto in confusion. None of his siblings, especially a certain warmonger, had showed this much brotherly affection towards him like Naruto.
"You have no idea how much I wanted to meet my...well, full-blooded siblings" he chuckled when he saw Zeus look down in guiltily "but what happened to you, you seem like someone who had been ran over by a train"
"Well, as I was saying..." Hephaestus said, his usual "permanent scowl" disappeared "I'm not the most handsome kind of Gods here"
"Nah, you're cool to me" Naruto patted the man's muscular arm playfully "I heard that you're very smart and talented in making things, how cool is that?"
Never judge a book by his cover. Hephaestus might be ugly, but he was extremely talented and could make almost anything, having such a cool brother like that was something he always wished for in a family.
"Well, if you say so, brother" a smile made it to his face when Hephaestus nodded his head at his younger brother.
"Hey mamma's boy" voice laced with arrogance made Naruto turn his head slightly to see a rather tall handsome man with scarred cheeks and an oiled crew cut. He wore black jeans, combat boots, a leather duster, and muscle shirt with a bulletproof vest and an iron padlock necklace, red tinted wraparound sunglasses to cover his flame-filled eye sockets "come and greet your big brother"
"I take it that you're Ares" Naruto said blankly before a blank smile spread out on his face "well, hello"
"Show some respect to your elders little punk" Ares pulled out his massive knife and twirling it in his hand "the only reason I didn't gut you right here for that disrespectful greeting is mom and dad's presence here"
"And the only reason I didn't do anything to you yet was because mom doesn't want violence between family members" Naruto said lazily.
"I like that kind of tone…watch your steps punk" he walked towards Aphrodite and grabbed her by the arm "let's go Dite"
"Hey, let go of me!" Aphrodite shook her hand from the strong grip of her lover, feeling rather annoyed by his sudden action.
"So...I take that she's your wife, neh?" He only had two older brothers and one of them was trying to pull the beautiful love Goddess with him. It was not that hard to figure it out.
"Yes she is" Hephaestus grumbled. He used to love her a lot, but after three thousand years of being cheated on constantly, he didn't feel any love to the love goddess anymore and would happily divorce to her if his mother allowed him to.
Too bad for him thought, Hera was the goddess of marriage and there would be absolutely no chance for him to have their marriage-bond broken.
Ares left the place while mumbling about going to the mortal world to find a woman, as Aphrodite had refused to go back to his place this time.
"And nice to see you too brother" Naruto shouted over.
The love goddess turned around and winked at Naruto, who just laughed forcefully at that. From what Kurama told him, Aphrodite was a woman with a happy go lucky attitude and immunity to insults similar to him...
She was someone who usually just shrugged off insults and lived her days without caring about it one bit. Naruto could already see himself in a future with Aphrodite poking her head into every single corner of his life, as the goddess seemed to take a liking to him already.
Oh how right he was…
"Forget about it, now" Naruto looked around "where is this super kind goddess of the hearth and family, who Athena told me about?"
"I think she was talking about me" another goddess walked toward him gracefully from the hearth, followed closely by a woman with long blond hair the color of ripe wheat, and wore a bright green dress with a dark cape, which gave her the appearance of a fresh plant breaking through fertile earth whenever she moved. She also wore a crown of woven corn leaves and adornments of poppies, and she had a scent of a rainstorm over a field of jasmine.
Unlike Aphrodite whose beauty seemed otherworldly, the goddess of Love didn't have the kind of natural beauty Hestia, the goddess of the Hearth, had. She was sweet and beautiful in an unpretentious way. She had an honest smile, warm brown eyes, and black hair that framed her face in ringlets. She wore a plain, modest brown dress and kept her hair tucked under a linen shawl.
"Aunt Hestia right?" Naruto smiled and hugged the black haired woman tightly, who welcomed him with a tight hug.
"Welcome to Olympus, nephew" she smiled warmly at him after pulling back "and welcome to the family"
"Thank you, aunt Hestia" Naruto smiled and turned to the last woman "and you're aunt Demeter right?"
"Why yes I am" the goddess of the harvest nodded her head "tell me Naruto, do you like cereal?" she asked hopefully.
"Uh no, truthfully it is one of my least favorite meals" Naruto shook his head and Demeter was taken aback by his declaration "I like ramen more" he smiled sheepishly.
The blond hair woman shook her head before turning away, huffing and flashing away with a scowl on her face.
"Uh, did I say something wrong?"
"Of course not Naruto" Hestia shook her head with a kind smile "she is just upset that you don't like cereal that is all"
"Ahem," Zeus cleared his throat "now if everyone is done with their greetings and introductions, I would like you to all return to your duty, we can't leave the world running without the gods watching over it".
"Then I will return to the Hunt father" Artemis was the first one to say that to the King of Gods and put a hand on her lieutenant's shoulder, flashing both of them away in a silver flash.
"Naruto if you need any help, feel free to ask" Athena told the blond, who nodded gratefully, before flashing away as well.
"See you later, Handsome~" Aphrodite approached Naruto and tried to kiss his cheek goodbye, but the blond blocked her lips with his bandaged hand "aw~, you're no fun at all" she winced playfully "playing hard to get~" with that, she teleported away in a thick cloud of perfume, returning to her duty of spreading love and broken hearts all over the world.
Naruto coughed while using his hand to blow the perfume away. 'Hard to get'…he didn't even understand what she mean by that.
"Naruto, if you want any kind of ninja weapon made or just want to chat feel free to come over my forge." Hephaestus offered.
"Are you kidding me? Of course I will" he then reached his hand into his pocket and pulled out a kunai "check this out, I don't think this world has this kind of metal so have a look at it" the god of smiths nodded his head and disappeared.
"Oya, I think it is about time I ride my baby around the world again" Apollo said cheerily to Naruto "Sayonara bro" Naruto chuckled when the god flashed away in a blinding flash.
"If you need ant delivery made, or just want to hang out, contact me" Hermes said "cause I'm the fastest being alive" he teleported away as well.
"My place is here" Hestia walked toward the main Hearth and sat down "you three should go somewhere else to have a family bonding moment"
"You don't have to tell us sister" both Zeus and Hera said at the same time before leading Naruto out of the throne room.
Line Break
"Damn" Naruto muttered, standing at the cliff of Olympus with his hand leaning against the barrier, looking at the city below "you mean this mountain actually floats in the sky?" even from this place, high above the clouds Naruto could hear the sound of bustling in the city, with strange vehicles and people in strange outfits. He was looking at the city from the cliff of Olympus with his father who was standing next to him with his back leaning against the barrier. Hera, who decided to let Naruto have a few moments with his father, who didn't give a very good first impression to his son, had gone somewhere else and would return later.
Naruto could also see a lot of tall buildings, called skyscrapers from this position as well, actually amazed by the capability of the humans of this world. Maybe when he returned to visit Konoha he would bring the idea of making skyscrapers back with him to the Elemental Nations as well.
"Yes, Olympus is originally located on Mount Olympus in Greece, it has steadily moved over to the west, following the heart of Western Civilization over the centuries." Zeus nodded his head "Instead of being located on a physical mountain, it is a metaphysical duplicate. This mountain does not connect with the ground and cannot be detected by mortals due to the Mist"
The two stood in silence for a moment before Naruto decided to speak up.
"Dad, can I ask you a question?"
"Of course my son"
"Why did you cheat on mom?" Naruto asked, his voice remained as calm as possible "was she not enough for you?"
"I had nothing to say for my actions in the past Naruto" Zeus shook his head "I fathered too many children with other women…Athena, Artemis, Apollo, Hermes..."
"But you Naruto" the god turned to his son with a smile "you're my redemption to her. After everything I had done, Hera agreed to start everything over with me, not as immortals, but as two normal humans" he then chuckled "well, not entirely normal, but we did start over"
"I came to love her again, more than ever" Zeus looked at Hera who was running toward them with a basket in her hand "we got each other once again with the love of two mortals, unaffected by Aphrodite because we formed it in a different dimension…you're the result of that love"
"Alright dad" Naruto smiled at him "and you better keep it that way or else a punch won't be the only thing you will get from me"
But for some reason, something was telling him there were more to this.
"Okay guys" Hera smiled at them, kneeling on a colorful picnic sheet and the basket next to her "come here"
Zeus looked at Hera in confusion while Naruto just grinned and sat down in front of his mother with his legs crossed.
"C'mon dad, come here" Naruto called him.
"I made some of your favorite ramen Naruto" Hera reached her hand inside the basket and pulled out a few bowls of ramen and since she already took out about a dozen of them, the basket must be a magical thing to be able to contain that many "and since I don't really know which ones you like the most, I made everything I can think of"
"Wow, this many mom?" Naruto asked, picking up a bowl and took a sniff "and it smells good too, you made this yourself in such a short time?"
"Of course I made them myself" Naruto looked at her "okay okay, I did make them with the help of magic, but I didn't just summon them"
"Now eat up Naruto" Hera smiled "Eat and tell us everything"
Naruto opened the first bowl of ramen and took the chopsticks from his father, starting to eat while re-telling his story at Elemental Nations.
From the day he became a genin to the day Sasuke left the village then Naruto and his friends nearly lost their life to the Yonin Shuif not for the help of the sand siblings and Lee. He retold his fight with Sasuke at the Valley of the End and his departure with Jiraiya for the two and a half years training trip. Hera scowled a little when she heard the part where Jiraiya tried to make Naruto read his Icha Icha Paradise series while his father just laughed it off while shaking his head.
Naruto used to think about what was it felt like to have a family that you could return to, a real family where you could share the most important moments with them.
And he finally understood that feeling.
Later
Clang! Clang!
The sound of a hammer hitting hot metal could be heard all over the forge of Hephaestus.
"You work here?" Naruto asked as he picked up a celestial bronze sword from the basket full of weapons made in the same metal, it was nine o'clock in the morning and after saying goodbye to his parents who returned to their duty after their unofficial picnic he began to wander around Olympus and Hephaestus's forge was the first place he visited "what is this metal anyway?"
"Celestial bronze, the powerful metal used by the gods" Hephaestus explained "It is mined by the Cyclops from Mount Olympus. The ore is shaped by tempering the metal in Mount Etna and cooling it in the River Lethe."
"I take that it it's hard to make" Naruto swung the sword around.
"Try stabbing yourself" Hephaestus returned to his work "because our parents gave birth to you in artificial mortal bodies, you're fully mortal therefore it is useless against you" there wasn't a single drop of godly blood within Naruto, so the celestial bronze would pass through him harmlessly.
Just like Hephaestus said, Naruto touched the sharp edge of the sword and he didn't feel anything at all. He could still feel the weight of this sword and yet he didn't feel it cut him in the slightest.
He then tried to do something more extreme, putting his hand on the table Naruto took out a celestial bronze knife and stabbed his hand with it. He waited for the pain, yet it never came.
"Cool" Naruto grinned before turning to Hephaestus "You need any help?" he asked when the god thrust the weapon into water to cool it down.
"Don't worry, there is nothing I can't handle"
Line Break
"What can I say" Hephaestus chuckled as he sat down on his chair, using a rag to wipe away his sweat "it wasn't everyday that I have so many useful workers like this" he could use his machines, but it looked like Naruto and his clones worked more effectively.
Clones could be seen everywhere around the large forge of Hephaestus, as they were doing everything they were assigned to. From sorting weapons to moving objects, with Naruto's superhuman strength his clones made work look easier than usual.
Clang!
"Careful" Hephaestus called out to the original, who was trying to make his very first weapon "you won't be able to get it into shape if you hit it too lightly"
"So I should hit it with more strength?" Naruto grinned and went into Sage mode, raising the hammer above his head "Fine then" he slammed the hammer down the glowing hot sword.
However due to the strength he used behind that hammering was too great, it not only completely broke the incomplete sword in half but also the table the anvil underneath used for crafting was sitting on as well.
"Damn kid" Hephaestus roared in laughter as Naruto looked at the hammer while scratching the back of his head, unsure what just happened "you really pack some serious strength there"
Naruto chuckled and put the hammer down, it didn't take him long to realize that he wasn't good at crafting like his brother.
But this was just the beginning of Naruto Uzumaki's new adventure in this new world.