Little is known about Naruto's birth or parentage, and it is very probable that he has no living relatives at all. What is known, however, is that around the time his mother was about to give birth to him, the Nine-tails Demon Fox, or 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.
Things, unfortunately for him, definitely 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 loudmouth, hyperactive prankster he was at the start of the manga, though as the Third Hokage (Sandaime) 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.
Naruto Uzumaki is a young boy who has the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox sealed within him. Twelve years before the start of the series, the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox attacked the ninja village Konohagakure, slaughtering many people. In response, the leader of Konohagakure and its ninja military – the Fourth Hokage – sacrificed his life to seal the demon inside Naruto when he was a newborn. Konohagakure, however, regarded Naruto as if he were the demon fox itself and mistreated him throughout most of his childhood. A decree made by the Third Hokage, who replaced the Fourth Hokage after his death, forbade anyone mention the attack of the demon fox to anyone else. This included Naruto, who was not aware of the demon inside of him.
Years later, Naruto is tricked by the renegade ninja Mizuki into stealing a forbidden scroll, but he is stopped by his teacher, Iruka Umino. When Iruka almost dies while protecting Naruto from Mizuki, Naruto uses a Jutsu he learned from the scroll that creates multiple clones of himself, Shadow Clone Technique, to defeat Mizuki. This encounter leads Naruto to realize that he is the container of the demon fox.
The main story follows Naruto and his friends. Naruto befriends two comrades, Sasuke Uchiha and Sakura Haruno, who are assigned with him to form a three-person team named Team 7 under an experienced sensei named Kakashi Hatake. Like all the ninja teams from every village, Team 7 is charged with completing missions requested by villagers, such as doing chores or being bodyguards. During the course of their missions, Naruto befriends other characters that he meets throughout the series. Team 7 learns new abilities, get to know each other, and experience a coming-of-age journey as Naruto dreams of becoming the Hokage of Konohagakure.
After several missions, Kakashi allows Team 7 to participate into a ninja exam in which they can improve their ranks, and thus, take part in more difficult missions. During the exams, Orochimaru, a criminal at the top of Konohagakure's most wanted list, attacks Konoha and kills the Third Hokage in an act of revenge. This forces one of the three legendary ninja, Jiraiya to search for his former teammate Tsunade, who has been nominated to become the Fifth Hokage. During the search, it is revealed that Orochimaru desires to acquire Sasuke Uchiha due to his powerful genetic heritage. Believing Orochimaru will be able to give him the strength needed to kill his brother Itachi, who destroyed his clan, Sasuke goes to him in search of power. Tsunade sends a group of ninja including Naruto to make Sasuke return to Konoha, but Naruto is unable to defeat him and bring him back to the village. Naruto does not give up on Sasuke, however, and he leaves Konoha to train for two-and-a-half years under Jiraiya's tutelage in order to prepare himself for the next time he encounters Sasuke.
After the training period, a mysterious organization called Akatsuki attempts to capture the nine powerful tailed beasts including the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox sealed inside of Naruto. Several ninjas from Konohagakure, including Team 7, fight against the Akatsuki members and search for their teammate Sasuke. Although they manage to save Gaara the host of the One-Tailed beast, Akatsuki is successful in capturing seven of the creatures. In the meantime, Sasuke betrays Orochimaru and faces Itachi to take revenge. Although Itachi dies in battle, Sasuke is later told by the Akatsuki founder Madara Uchiha that Itachi was ordered by Konohagakure's leadership to destroy his clan. Saddened with this revelation, Sasuke joins forces with Akatsuki to destroy Konohagakure. Meanwhile, as several Akatsuki members are defeated by the Konohagakure ninja, their leader, Pain, invades the village to capture Naruto. However, Naruto defeats Pain's multiple bodies and convinces the real one to leave Akatsuki.
With Pain leaving, Madara announces that he wants to obtain the all nine of the tailed beasts in order to perform an illusion powerful enough to control humanity. All of the leaders of the five ninja villages refuse to aid him, and instead, join forces to confront him.
Personality and characteristics
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 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. 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 Naruto 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.
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. However, 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.
