With the Ninja Academy entrance exam over, the relaxing holiday students loved most finally came to a complete end. Some children reluctantly enjoyed their final burst of vacation fun, while others scratched their heads and stayed up all night desperately making up their homework.
Under all kinds of circumstances, the first official day of Ninja Academy quietly arrived. They could only rein in their desire to play and obediently return to school, continuing the day-after-day student life of going from home to school and then from school back home.
But most children probably never would have imagined what Uzumaki Naruto was doing that day.
While they were wholeheartedly thinking about what they should do when they arrived at school on the first day of the new term, Naruto had also officially become one of the Ninja Academy's students.
Yet he was smiling cheerfully, humming a tune, and packing his luggage, ready to go on a trip at a moment's notice.
...
Uchiha Clan territory, clan head's residence.
Because of the unexpected Hidden Cloud invasion incident on the day of the exam, Fugaku had failed to keep his promise and leave early. As a result, over the past three days, he had suffered greatly under Little Uchiha Fan's resentful gaze.
On top of that, even though he had already assigned clan members to guard key routes, the enemy had still managed to infiltrate the Ninja Academy. In Fugaku's eyes, this was an embarrassing disgrace he instinctively did not want Little Uchiha Fan to learn about.
Therefore, Fugaku could only raise both hands in surrender and make three agreements with him as compensation.
One of those agreements was that every morning and afternoon, Fugaku would squeeze out a little time from his busy schedule to personally take Little Uchiha Fan to and from the Ninja Academy.
Of course, Fugaku agreed so readily to this condition and carried it out seriously for several reasons. In the past, the request would have been rather unreasonable. But as captain of the Hidden Leaf Military Police Force, he had a certain "willful" right to arrange his own work hours.
And because of Naruto, he no longer had to worry about being feared by Konoha's higher-ups. The other, more fundamental reason was that Fugaku had been affected by Hinata's second kidnapping.
It was said that enemies understood each other best. As the head of the Uchiha Clan, Fugaku understood eighty or ninety percent of the intelligence surrounding Hiashi—his former rival and now a relationship gradually easing into friendship—and the Hyuga Clan under him.
Precisely because of this, Fugaku clearly knew what the status of main family heir represented to the Hyuga Clan.
Yet even the Hyuga Clan, which had established a strict hierarchy that could easily trigger internal strife by designating the main family as masters and the branch family as servants in order to better protect the main family's bloodline, still had Hinata, the next main family head, kidnapped. Twice.
This had perfectly demonstrated the meaning of the saying that an open spear is easy to dodge, but a hidden arrow is hard to guard against.
If someone set their sights on a child, then no matter how strict the protective measures were, there would still inevitably be a moment when a hundred precautions missed one gap.
No matter how excellent the previous guards' results were, once an accident happened and the enemy truly succeeded, the unimaginable consequences would overturn everything that had been done before.
In other words, although both incidents now seemed to have ended without real danger, and in terms of the truth, Konoha had even gained quite a lot, the accidents happening to Hinata one after another had still sounded an alarm in the hearts of every clan in the Hidden Leaf Village, and even every parent.
For a time, everyone felt a sense of danger and quietly took precautionary measures. Many people, regardless of the trouble, personally took on the job of escorting their children to and from school each day.
Invisibly, this caused the personal safety level of Konoha's new generation to surge by leaps and bounds.
'We're also a dōjutsu clan of Konoha... If some blind fool really sets their sights on Sasuke... Tsk. I should put work aside for now and focus on sending Sasuke to school.'
As his thoughts wandered, Fugaku stood straight with his arms crossed and his chest lifted. His brows were faintly furrowed, making his image seem even more stern and rigid.
After a brief pause, he adjusted his gaze slightly and looked toward the entrance, where Sasuke and Naruto were putting on their ninja sandals.
Remembering that he had later heard Sasuke had taken first place in this year's Ninja Academy exam, the corner of his mouth could not help rising in a faint, satisfied smile. But his words were still a calm reminder.
"Did you bring everything, Sasuke? It's your first day of school. Get along well with your classmates... and don't disgrace the Uchiha Clan's name. Understand?"
"Mm! Okay!"
Perhaps because he had not expected his father to truly agree to pick him up and drop him off from school every day, Little Uchiha Fan had been smiling so much these past days that his mouth could hardly close.
So when he heard Fugaku's words, he curved his eyes and grinned happily before he could even process the meaning, obediently nodding in agreement.
'Tsk. So distracted... Who knows if this brat heard anything I said...'
Little Uchiha Fan's unconcealed smile of dependence and satisfaction made Fugaku complain under his breath as if dissatisfied, but in his heart, he was floating.
"Disgrace? Our Sasuke took first place in this year's Ninja Academy exam! And you, as his father, not only don't praise the child, you keep picking at his faults? Hm?"
Fugaku's casual attempt to recover his image as a strict father drew Mikoto's dissatisfaction. She had been bent over, busy helping Sasuke and Naruto organize their things. Her beautiful brows furrowed as she handed the carefully prepared bento to the two children.
Then she straightened up, reached out, and pinched Fugaku's fleshy earlobe, twisting it with a "kind" smile that did not quite reach her eyes.
"Or will you only be satisfied if you crush the child's confidence until he loses motivation to do anything? Hm?"
Hearing his wife's complaints beside his ear, Fugaku first pulled the corner of his mouth into a disdainful smile. Then he calmly raised his hands... so he could immediately lift both in surrender.
"Ow, ow... hurts, hurts, hurts! My ear! Let go, let go! It's going to fall off!"
Fugaku cried out with exaggerated acting, but he was also sensible enough to go with the flow. In his heart, he sighed that the dignity he once had as head of the family was gone, yet his face was full of doting affection, like Zhou Yu beating Huang Gai: one willing to hit, the other willing to be hit.
After all, since Naruto's arrival had brought so many changes, the family atmosphere had visibly become warmer and more relaxed. Fugaku was no longer as stubbornly attached as before to maintaining his cold image as a strict father and family head.
On the contrary, he was quite satisfied with his current life.
Quietly, Mikoto had changed from her old image of someone who existed almost as Fugaku's dependent, silently standing beside him in support, into someone who now stood on equal footing with him and even faintly held the upper hand under Fugaku's deliberate indulgence.
In other words, aside from public matters where Fugaku still held absolute authority, in a certain sense, the title of head of Fugaku's household had slowly begun to shift owners.
Mm... if someone were to summarize the obvious changes over the past year or so and write them into a book, the most suitable title would probably be: On How a Wife Slave Is Raised.
"Hmph. That's more like it... Let's see if you dare next time!"
Seeing her husband pitifully beg for mercy, even though Mikoto knew very well this was his usual act of pretending to be pitiful, she still had no way to deal with Fugaku when he showed this side.
While pretending to warn him fiercely, the force of her fingers on his reddening earlobe quietly changed. Unable to bear seeing it hurt, her pinching and twisting slowly turned into a gentle massage.
"...Does it really hurt?"
"Mm, mm, mm! It hurts. It really hurts! Look, my ear is already red!"
Noticing signs that his wife had softened and was stopping, Fugaku no longer cared about his old face. He forced down his laughter and nodded with an aggrieved expression. Then he raised a hand to cover the back of his wife's hand. Stroking it, he grinned and said with complete confidence,
"Hehe. But with you rubbing it like this, it doesn't hurt anymore."
"...Ahh, here they go again... I say, Father, Mother, can't you pay a little attention to your surroundings? Naruto and I are still children, you know."
Having had his worldview shattered and reforged by reality over the past year or so, Little Uchiha Fan was long used to his parents occasionally stuffing dog food into his mouth with their interactions.
While eating that dog food by the mouthful, he was no longer timid and cautious like when he had just met Naruto. Instead, he grinned and teased them.
"Doing this will easily corrupt pure little kids like us, you know~"
"Shoo, shoo. You two, pure? If you two count as pure, I'd rather believe the end of the world is coming!"
Thinking of Naruto's various black-bellied actions and then of his youngest son, who was gradually learning from Naruto like one is influenced by the company one keeps, Fugaku scolded him with an exasperated laugh.
The strict-father image he had finally picked back up vanished once more amid the teasing. Though he deliberately wore a troubled, helpless look on his face, he had no intention of hiding the smile filling his eyes.
After confirming that the two little fellows before him were fully prepared and that it was indeed getting late, he lightly patted his wife's shoulder, signaling it was time for them to leave and begin the day's schedule.
Then he lifted his foot and gave Little Uchiha Fan's backside a light kick that looked fierce but carried almost no force.
"Go, go. Stop being an eyesore here... It's already this late. If you're late on your first day of school, I'll beat your bratty backside until it blooms!"
"Eek! Clearly Father was with Mother... Uh, Naruto, what was that phrase again?"
"Showing affection and scattering dog food."
"Right! Showing affection and scattering dog food! If I'm late, that would clearly be Father's responsibility! How can you blame me?!"
"Hey! You brat, you've gotten bold enough to talk back? You, you, you... Come here. Father will let you feel what fatherly love is!"
"Wah! Help! Father is murdering his own son! Save me!"
"Hah?! What nonsense are you spouting?! Stop right there. I promise I won't beat your little butt until flowers bloom!"
"Hey, hey, wait for me, Sasuke! Uh, almost forgot... Auntie, goodbye. We're going to school!"
"Ah, honestly. He's already this old, yet now he acts more like a child instead... Mm, be careful on the road, Naruto. I'll leave Sasuke in your care at school."
Seeing the father and son rapidly disappear as one chased and the other fled, with Naruto seeming to chase after them as well, Mikoto sighed helplessly with a hand to her forehead. Yet her face was filled with happiness she could not hide. After a brief pause, she waved while loudly reminding them out of maternal instinct.
"Slow down, Sasuke! Be careful, don't fall!"
...
"This should be far enough..."
After leaving the Uchiha Clan territory, Naruto had seemed to be following Fugaku and Sasuke to school, but he quietly stopped. Looking around, he confirmed there was no one nearby and that Fugaku and Sasuke had already run out of sight. Muttering quietly to himself, he raised both hands.
With a faint smile on his lips, he formed his usual hand seal for the Shadow Clone Technique.
"Shadow Clone Technique!"
"Ugh... Every time there's hard work, you remember to use a shadow clone... Shadow clones have it so rough. Shadow clones have no rights. Can I file a complaint?"
With a burst of white smoke, an identical "Naruto" appeared beside him. After loosening his body a little, the clone teased the original with a smile in his eyes.
"Heh. What? After thinking about it for so long, you're still planning to leave?"
"Shoo, shoo. Don't start with that, as if I'm mistreating you. You and I are fundamentally the same person, and afterward, the fatigue still stacks back onto me. I'm not getting any real advantage... Sasuke and the others are in your hands for now."
While answering with a light laugh, Naruto looked the shadow clone up and down. After confirming the clone's outfit matched his perfectly with no flaws at all, he nodded in satisfaction. Then, under the clone's gaze, he turned around and strode off in the opposite direction from the Ninja Academy.
"Well, no helping it... Logically speaking, to avoid twisting history too much and creating more unexpected events, I should try to follow the original plot and interfere with the timeline as little as possible...
But you know, if I don't use this chance to go see those future companions in advance and do something for them, even if I can make up for it later, I'll still leave myself with regrets, won't I?"
"So you're planning to leave the village and go on a trip just like that? Well, you get to be carefree, but poor Pervy Sage has to carry a huge black pot for no reason... When he returns to the village and learns about this, he'll probably be angry enough to spank you hard, right?"
Seeing the original body walk farther away, the clone thought of the reason the Third Hokage, who valued Naruto like his own grandson, had agreed to let him leave the village.
Naruto had claimed Jiraiya was taking him out of the village both to search for Tsunade and continue personally teaching him. A smile of helpless amusement appeared on the clone's face. After a short pause, he watched the original leave and spoke again in a light tone.
"Hey, when you find that kid, remember to go easy... Don't make a perfectly good little angel black-bellied like Sasuke is now after all your training."
"Hm? Ah, I'll try. I'll try... Hehehe~"
"...Eek! Good heavens... Fine, forget I said anything. Hearing that tone, I already know another little angel is about to fall..."
"Come on, it isn't that exaggerated... Don't worry. If everything goes smoothly, maybe besides avoiding that tragedy, we'll get an extra harvest too. There's a very good chance we won't be the only Uzumaki Clan descendants in the village anymore~"