Gene Soldiers

This is a /tg/ attempt on building a world based on Naruto. We mainatin some elements of the original series while change and disregard others to make the shinobi conflicts more realistic.

Some of the important changes are: Chakra users are descendants of ancient jinchuuriki, 20% of human population has chakra, while only 3% are part of a clan. Each Villages have around 10 000 shinobi as their standard army.

Power levels are not crazy. A hard limit is a Biju, it takes the whole village to resist an attack of a biju and no ninja is powerful enough to take it one on one.

Villages

Hidden Mist

Mist is a village in the middle of massive civil strife. The Mist village has always been definedby it's clans, similar to the Leaf, but most of its clans are Kekkei Genkai based (we know of five from canon; the Bone, Ice, Lava and Boil releases, plus the Hydrification technique, all presumably clan-based). There's presumably a couple of others.

The other defining feature is their specialisation in kenjutsu; sword training is a key part of the academy and the village possesses seven legendary swords which are wielded by the finest swordsmen the village has. If one is slain, no effort is spared in retrieving their blade, all of which are sentient. The group train together, including with each other's blades, so that if one falls an a skilled swordman joins the group, he is not automatically saddled with a blade not suited to him.

Although for many years a powerful village, the Fourth Mizukage led to a severe degree of internal conflict. After the death of the Third, the Hozuki and Terumi clans both put forward their own candidates. Delays in the voting amongst the Shinobi Council lead to tension that eventually caused intra-village fighting. Yagura, the jinchuriki of the Three-Tails, was put forward as a compromise candidate.

Although a powerful and skilled ninja, Yagura had difficulty leading the village - ordinary shinobi were distrustful of a jinchuriki and the various clan heads chafed at his leadership; he was the first non-clan member to lead the village.

A few assassinations attempts later and his paranoia began to spiral out of control. He changed the genin final exam to involve killing one's classmates, in an attempt to start inter-clan feuds that would secure his power and also to unite his followers in shared guilt. This bloody tradition only lasted a year before he was confronted by the heads of the Terumi and Hozuki clans. Yagura killed the two clan heads and declared the clans to be missing-nin.

In the so called Night of Blood, members of the Seven major clans were forced to engage in a fighting, confused retreat from the Village, although they caused significant casualties on Yagura's forces.

After purging his forces for failure, Yagura set out to destroy the remaining clan members, all while applying pressure on the rest of Water country to hunt them down as well. The Water Daimyo went along with this due to either agreement over the threat of the clans or intimidation at Yagura's power.

The clans had regrouped and, recognising the seriousness of their situation, nominated Mei Terumi as their leader. An heir to the powers of both the Terumi clan (who wielded the Lava Release) and the Shiken clan (who wielded the Boil Release) she is an very powerful ninja who also symbolised the new era of clan unity, declaring themselves the True Hidden Mist.

The international reaction to the conflict has been one of indifference. Both sides continue to take missions abroad, a major source of revenue. With the Mist neutral in international affairs, the balance of power has stabilised, with the Leaf-Sand-Grass-Waterfall alliance a match for both Cloud and Rock, although to attack one would be to invite conflict from the other.

Thus, the conflict in the Mist village serves to maintain the Balance of power in the wider world. For this reason, the four other major villages have agreed not to interfere in the civil war, although they could change their minds should an opportunity present itself.

Hidden Leaf

Outwardly, /the Leaf is strong. It emerged from the Third Shinobi World War with relatively few losses, weathered the attack of the most powerful Bijuu without significant damage and still has a strong military.

On the inside, the Leaf village is facing a crisis. The current Hokage is old; while still a respected and powerful shinobi, he really isn't up to any kind of long term conflict. His chosen successor died shortly after taking the position, at the age of 25. And the list of candidates for his replacement is small.

Tsunade doesn't want the job, and neither does Jiraiya (although if there was a talented enough ninja who needed a few years to gain experience, he might take the position temporarily). Kakashi Hatake has the lineage and the skill, but there are concerns over whether he has the raw power a Kage needs to intimidate the enemy, and if he would be an effective leader. Danzo really wants the job, but there's enough concern amongst the clan heads about Root that he'd have difficulty even if the Third didn't dislike him.

The clans are also part of the problem. Konoha has a lot of clans, mostly Hiden rather than Kekkei Genkai based, and this gives Konoha a strong combination of tactical flexibilty with tried and tested combat capability. A lot have sensory based abilities that mean Konoha ninja are difficult to ambush and often must be fought head on.

But the corrolary to this is that the clans are fractious and divided, with their own rivalries and alliances (the Hyuuga-Uchiha split was the most prominent), which the Uchiha massacre exacerbated by removing the arguably most powerful clan.

After the Senju line dwindled away, there was an agreement that the Hokage would not be a member of a clan, to keep them neutral in clan politics and serve as a rallying figure for the entire village. Unfortunately, there is no obvious successor.

This wouldn't be a problem if the fourth had lived, because he could expect another 30 or 40 years of combat effectiveness wherein there would be ample time to cultivate new talent to be the Fifth. But since he died the only shinobi who appeared skilled enough was Itachi Uchiha, who would have been inelligible even if he hadn't massacred his clan (this is one of his suspected motives, in fact).

The Third is running out of time, and really hopes he doesn't have to give it to Danzo. He'd prefer Kakashi to that, but knows the man is unsuited to long-term leadership.

At the same time, while Konoha has lots of extremely skilled shinobi, it doesn't have very many heavy-hitters, the kind who can dominate a battlefield. The Fourth is dead, Tsunade is retired, orochimaru is a missing nin, the Third is old and Kakashi is more suited to stealth than direct combat.

Its an open secret Jiraiya is still on active duty and no-one wants to have to fight him up close, but the only other one is Might Guy. Admittedly, he's a big one; the only living user of the Eight Gates, whose last user managed to fight off all Seven Swordsmen of the Mist. Contrast, say, Cloud, which in addition to the Raikage, has the Two- and Eight-tails jinchuuriki and a couple of other heavy-hitters.

Konoha is still a powerful village, and the various minor clans are stronger than ever; Konoha's combat doctrine helps make up for a lack of direct power. Also, high-ranking people across the Elemental Nations know they must have the Nine-tails jinchuuriki stashed away somewhere, although no-one outside the Leaf knows who it is (and they are desperate to find out). The prospect of him or her being groomed as the Fifth terrifies the other Kages.