History
Little is known about Naruto's birth or parentage, and
it is very probable that he has no living relatives at all. Around the
time his mother was about to give birth to him, the Nine-tails Demon
Fox (Kyūbi no Yōko) attacked his village, Konohagakure (Hidden Leaf),
and the Yondaime Hokage (Fourth Hokage) decided to seal the demon away
with a forbidden technique inside him, sacrificing his life in the
process. Yondaime's wish was for Naruto to be remembered as a hero by
the people of the village.
Naruto as an infant. The fresh-made Kyūbi seal can
be seen on his stomach.
Bluntly, things did not turn out that way. The people of
the village needed something to blame and channel their bitterness and
loss onto, and he was the perfect candidate. The adults of the village,
without known exceptions, knew him and treated him as nothing more than
the demon fox that has attacked the village; As a result he grew up
alone and isolated. It is implied in the manga that he went through
very difficult emotional times and often shed many tears, but kept
reprimanding himself for doing so and telling himself nothing would be
achieved by crying. Eventually he developed into the loudmouthed,
hyperactive prankster he was at the start of the manga, though as the
Sandaime Hokage observed (and even Naruto himself, in a moment of rare
enlightenment, once admitted this), it is only an act to cover up for
his deep insecurity in a desperate plight for recognition.
By chance or fate, Umino Iruka, who had felt much of the
same desperation as Naruto in his younger years, was Naruto's teacher,
and he was the first person to recognize Naruto as a human being and
ninja, and not just as a stupid screwup or the Nine-Tails. Naruto, at
one point, says that when he is with Iruka, he often wonders whether
that is what being with a father is like.
Personality
and Characteristics
Naruto is, at
times, lighthearted and a merciless prankster.
Naruto is very determined and has very strong values
that he never once fails to act by, even in hopeless situations. His
dream is to become Hokage, as it is the epitome of his ambitions to
have the village acknowledge him and live for the sake of protecting
his important people.
Naruto has a knack for inspiring people to realise their
potentials and resolve to work harder or change their ways for the
better; his determination and resolve often earn him sympathy from
other characters. One early example of this is Konohamaru, the grandson
of the third Hokage, who was inspired by Naruto to stop trying to find
shortcuts to becoming Hokage, as there are no shortcuts and the only
way is paved with plenty of hard work. (He and his friends later wear
the same kind of goggles that Naruto wore in the first two episodes,
when Naruto began to wear the Konoha headband) Another is Inari, whom
Naruto helped by making him see that anyone can make a difference and
by confronting him about his refusal to come to terms with his painful
past (as Naruto's past was similarly tragic). Both of them have gotten
very attached to Naruto and have taken to calling him Onii-chan (big
brother).
Though he is naturally impetuous, hyperactive and tends
to rush into combat without thinking, Naruto is capable of devising
some quite clever plans by creative usage of his jutsu. He has more
than once upstaged what looked like a superior opponent by exploiting
the element of surprise an unconventional usage of a technique entails;
Kakashi even dubs him the "number one ninja in surprising people".
Another main driving force behind his otherwise average Taijutsu and
Ninjutsu abilities is the huge power and chakra reserves of the Kyūbi.
Kyūbi is by no stretch of the imagination a particularly pleasant
character, but nevertheless does everything in his power to help Naruto
- lending chakra as requested, healing NNaruto with his extreme healing
ability and so forth - if only for the fact that Naruto's death would
apparently mean the Kyūbi's death as well.
Naruto is a
strongly determined character.
There are downsides to the huge chakra load that is
Kyūbi; like most of the biggest weapons, it can't be lifted, let alone
wielded, with ease. Naruto is a relatively small container that cannot
quite handle the whole of Kyūbi's chakra, which might account for
Naruto's inability to control and focus chakra consistently for jutsu
during his days at the academy. Even later, when Naruto learns to
better control his chakra, any technique relying on Kyūbi's chakra to
work properly runs a chance of failing, as it takes great conviction or
control on Naruto's part to draw Kyūbi's chakra effectively.
Unfortunately, Naruto's Chakra and Kyūbi's chakra are slowly fusing and
are expected to eventually become one, which is bound to drastically
change this status-quo.
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