"I know you."
"The Red Flash!"
Might Guy caught his breath, slowly straightened, and stared at Roy with blazing eyes.
"Legend says your swordsmanship is incredible. Anyone who's seen it couldn't withstand even one slash from you."
"I didn't expect that aside from being fast, you were good at space-time ninjutsu too..."
Might Guy looked Roy up and down as though he were staring at some kind of monster. Once his straightforward nature kicked in, he spilled everything he knew about Roy's minor achievements like beans from a bamboo tube.
Roy hadn't expected the boy to know so much about him. Then, after a moment's thought, he understood.
Guy and Kakashi were close friends. He also had decent relationships with Obito, Rin, Asuma, Kurenai, and the others. They were either classmates, students from the same class year, or schoolmates only two or three years apart.
Roy smiled in understanding.
"Just empty reputation. Other people exaggerate. It's not worth mentioning."
Two years ago, when he followed Uchiha Fugaku to the front as reinforcements, Roy had indeed shown his Breathing techniques.
At the time, he had only wanted to harvest Life Energy and had killed a little too quickly. He hadn't expected people to give him the title "Red Lightning." Some also called him "Konoha's Swift Blade," saying he never needed a second slash to kill.
If Guy hadn't brought it up now, Roy would have forgotten about it himself.
"That's not exaggeration," Might Duy said, his gaze bright as he looked at Roy.
The boy's face was three parts like Fugaku and seven parts like Mikoto. He did somewhat resemble the Uchiha clan head, now head of the Police Force, whom Duy had once seen from a distance.
But unlike most Uchiha...
the boy had a gentle face and smiled as brightly as sunlight. He was nothing like the other Uchiha, who always seemed cold, proud, and impossible to approach.
It was hard to dislike him at all.
Roy smiled and looked deeply at Might Duy in return.
"If Uncle Might truly fought seriously, you wouldn't look like a genin either."
Might Duy laughed heartily, planted his hands on his hips, and said with open ease, "I can't use ninjutsu. It's only natural I can't become a chūnin."
"But Uncle can use taijutsu," Roy said seriously. "I don't agree with the village's standards for selecting ninja."
"An excellent taijutsu specialist like you should be awarded the title of elite jōnin."
Not mocked as an "eternal genin."
Even if, in Konoha, the title of genin was not always a strictly derogatory one. In some ways, it even carried its own special meaning.
"Exactly!"
"Uchiha Ren really gets me!"
Might Guy's eyes shone as he looked at Roy.
"In my heart, Dad is the strongest taijutsu ninja!"
Might Duy waved both hands repeatedly. After being praised by two juniors at once, two red clouds immediately climbed onto his old face. Luckily, after wandering the ninja world for more than twenty years, he still knew proper limits. He only praised Roy in return.
"The Uchiha truly are one of Konoha's great clans. Compared to you, my little bit of skill is the one not worth mentioning."
But was someone capable of developing the Eight Gates truly not worth mentioning?
In the original story, Guy opened all Eight Gates and nearly kicked Uchiha Madara—who had already begun controlling the power of the Six Paths—to death with Night Guy. In that state, Guy absolutely deserved to be called Super Kage-level.
"I'm only using a trick," Roy said, gently shaking his head. "I'm merely borrowing a little convenience from Breathing."
Breathing?
Might Guy and Might Duy both instantly caught the key word.
The young Guy was straightforward, hot-blooded, and blunt. He immediately blurted out, "What kind of Breathing? Could you explain it?"
That speed—even opening three gates, he hadn't been able to catch up to it. For any taijutsu ninja who worshiped physical arts, that kind of speed was an irresistible temptation.
Might Duy was no exception.
But as a civilian-born ninja, Might Duy could still control himself.
He knew very well that great clans like this guarded their own techniques more tightly than anything. If you weren't a clan member, or even a blood relative, they would absolutely never teach it to outsiders.
Just like Shadow techniques for the Nara, Expansion for the Akimichi, and Mind Transfer for the Yamanaka.
Those were their clan secret techniques.
They were also taboos that had to be protected to the death.
"Guy!"
Might Duy suddenly shouted and clapped a hand over Might Guy's mouth.
Then he gave Roy an apologetic smile.
"I'm sorry. My son doesn't know better and offended you. Please forgive him."
As soon as he finished speaking, Might Duy pressed down on Guy's head.
Father and son bowed to Roy together, apologizing sincerely. Their directness, their pure hearts, shone like gold. It was impossible to be angry with them.
Roy quietly looked at the two watermelon heads, one big and one small, then raised a hand.
A strand of aura split off, slowly turning into two gentle spirals of wind through Wind Breathing and lifting Might Duy and Might Guy upright.
Only then did he smile at them.
"No need to apologize. I said it was just a trick, and it is. It isn't anything amazing."
His aura emerged, carrying two clusters of memory.
Roy caught them in his hand, then tapped each of their foreheads.
While father and son were still stunned, Roy stretched his body, instantly turned into points of light, and merged into the glow. Riding the dawn light, he left the southern forest and headed toward a residence near Konoha's commercial district.
Only one sentence drifted back from afar:
"Uncle, Guy, just call me Ren."
Might Duy and Might Guy looked up at the lush forest in front of them, but Roy's figure was already gone.
When they came back to themselves, they exchanged a bewildered look.
"Dad... it feels like something appeared in my head just now..."
The aura-memory began silently unfolding in Might Guy's mind after Roy left.
The boy quietly glanced at Might Duy.
The man frowned and said nothing. Only after checking the light cluster of memory in his own mind did he realize it was a technique called—
Wind Breathing.
Might Duy's heart stirred. He looked more closely, and the memory unfolded before his eyes. A humanoid figure of light began to dance.
Whoosh—
A faint wind rose, sweeping up countless tiny currents...
In the next moment, several forms appeared one after another.
Wind Breathing, First Form: Dust Whirlwind Cutter.
Second Form: Claws-Purifying Wind.
Third Form: Clean Storm Wind Tree.
Fourth Form: Rising Dust Storm.
Amid flashes of blade-light, Might Duy's consciousness and gaze were pulled in completely.
In an instant, he sank deep into it, staring in a daze.
"Dad... Dad?"
"Should I open mine too?"
Seeing Might Duy's strange state, Guy could no longer hold back his own wild curiosity while standing guard over the memory cluster. The boy with the watermelon cut furrowed his thick brows, sank his consciousness inward, and focused on the memory light.
Wind Breathing unfolded.
Just as it had in Might Duy's mind, it broke itself down in fine detail inside Guy's mind, immediately capturing his full attention too.
Chirp... chirp...
In midsummer, cicadas clung to the treetops and screamed with all their might.
Might Duy and Might Guy stood in the depths of the southern forest like wooden stakes, carefully savoring the Wind Breathing in their minds.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
Until...
the aura dispersed.
With no support left, the memories faded too.
Pop.
Might Duy and Might Guy, having only just tasted it, came back to themselves as if waking from a dream, both feeling dazed and unsatisfied.
"Wind Breathing... blend into the wind, become the wind, be one with the wind, breathe with the wind..."
As Might Duy murmured to himself, his black-and-white pupils filled with tiny wind blades. He looked toward the direction Roy had left and said quietly to Guy,
"Guy, we owe Ren a huge favor."
What "trick"?
What "not worth mentioning"?
A technique that could alter breathing rhythm and breathing method to deeply stimulate the body's potential was absolutely forbidden-technique level!
In Might Duy's view, Wind Breathing alone was in no way inferior to the Eight Gates he had developed.
Both stimulated potential and helped the user explode with power and speed far beyond their normal limits.
Wind Breathing simply walked a different road from the Eight Gates—
the path of breath.
That was something he had never encountered.
Never even imagined.
Guy deeply agreed. In terms of taijutsu talent, whatever Might Duy could see, he could naturally see too.
After all, as the man once acknowledged by Madara, when it came to taijutsu throughout history, only he stood at that summit.
Blade-lights still flashed in the boy's pupils, as if he had yet to fully pull himself out of the Wind Breathing demonstration. At one point, as a leaf drifted down above his head, Might Guy suddenly raised his hand and chopped with a hand blade, splitting it cleanly along its veins.
Might Guy froze.
Then he took a deep breath and said solemnly, "You're right, Dad. We owe him a huge favor."
"So?"
"If you owe a favor, you have to repay it."
"With what?"
Father and son looked at each other and smiled. They already had the answer in their hearts.
Might Duy patted Guy on the shoulder with satisfaction.
"Whether others care or not, we must care. That's what a man should be like!"
Might Guy nodded.
Then he glanced in the direction Roy had left and asked tentatively, "Dad, then should I train?"
"Train," Might Duy said, moving his arms and legs as he walked toward the training ground first. "I'll train too!"
While the afterimage still lingered in their minds, they had to practice Wind Breathing firmly and remember it.
Otherwise, that would be disrespectful and unworthy of the giver—
Uchiha Ren.
That was something neither Might Duy nor Might Guy could accept.
"Hah!"
Using their palms as blades, they stirred up gusts of wind.
Soon, in a training ground deep in the southern forest, flashes of blade-light began shining.
And the very moment father and son threw themselves into Wind Breathing, two notification sounds followed Roy's retreating figure and appeared in his mind.
[Notice: When you gift roses to others, fragrance lingers on your hand...]
[Detected: "pending followers" Might Duy & Might Guy feel gratitude for your teaching of Wind Breathing. Loyalty +50...]
[Note: 20 more points required before they become official followers.]
As expected of straightforward people...
One gift had increased their loyalty by fifty points.
Roy had to admit that whether in the bizarre world of Hunters or the conspiracy-ridden Naruto world, Might Duy and Might Guy were among the few truly honest, righteous people he had ever met.
And that—
perhaps that was youth.
Roy smiled freely. As he moved through the morning glow, his mood was as bright as the sky. Even Light Release felt smoother than usual.
In no time, he arrived at Hiruzen Sarutobi's residence, a typical Japanese-style courtyard house.
Buzz...
The red sun rose fully, and the last strand of dawn light faded.
As the sky brightened, Roy caught the tail end of the morning glow and stepped out, landing in front of the courtyard gate. He raised his hand and knocked.
Knock, knock, knock.
After three light knocks—
creak.
The door opened, and a lazy, careless face poked out through the gap.
"Huh? Uchiha?"
"When did the old man get so friendly with the Uchiha?"
Sarutobi Asuma had a cigarette in his mouth. He glanced sideways at Roy. After a brief moment of surprise, he quickly lost interest and brushed past Roy's shoulder, heading toward the busiest part of Konoha's commercial district.
"The old man's inside. Go find him yourself."
Kurenai's birthday was coming soon. He absolutely could not afford to delay picking her gift.
The boy was already trying to grow a beard to make himself look more mature. He seemed to hate being treated like a child, and that rebellious teenage need to show his individuality was, in some ways, rather similar to Roy himself.
The difference was that some "blond delinquents" sank downward, while others refused to fall and insisted on proving themselves through results.
The gap between people seemed to become despairingly vast the moment their personalities took shape.
Roy watched Asuma leave.
He remembered that, in the original story, Asuma died tragically at Hidan's hands, leaving behind Kurenai and a son he would never even meet.
Then Roy withdrew his gaze and pushed open the half-closed door, stepping inside.
Step... step...
One entered the courtyard, one left it.
One guarded the gold mine that was the Scroll of Seals but refused to study.
The other had fought hard to earn recognition and had been invited here.
Roy's black hair swayed in the breeze as he walked away from Asuma, the two of them heading in opposite directions as if separated by different worlds.
Before long,
after a few breaths,
Roy saw the study Asuma had mentioned, the one "inside," with papered windows.
The window was propped open by a small wooden stick, and through it he could faintly see the corners of two figures' clothing.
One belonged to someone around fifty, not yet particularly old.
The other had blond hair, blue eyes, fair skin, and the vigor of youth.
Roy slowly stopped three meters before the study door.
At just the right moment, Hiruzen Sarutobi's old face poked out by the window, looking at the boy with a teasing smile.
"Since you're here, why not come in?"
Roy did not answer.
He simply looked calmly at Hiruzen, and at Minato Namikaze, who had appeared beside him after hearing the movement.
Then he pointed at the ground beneath his feet and said flatly,
"Do you want me to break this barrier and come in, or are you going to remove it yourself?"