The first step in turning a killing tool steeped in darkness for ten years into a rational companion was not teaching him how to fight, but teaching him how to live like a person.
"I understand." Lu stepped forward, picked up the envelope, and slipped it into his pocket.
He walked up to Hei Lingqi without showing any hostility and pointed toward the door as naturally as could be.
"Let's go.
The sunshine outside is lovely today.
Ultraviolet light helps your skin synthesize vitamin D."
Hei Lingqi did not move.
He looked at Lu and rasped, "Is this a trap? The Anbu don't need sunlight.
Exposure in open terrain increases the probability of being picked off."
"This is the very center of Konoha, not a battlefield." Emi came over as well. Noticing the unnatural trembling in Hei Lingqi's left hand, she deliberately stood to his right, outside his safety perimeter. "Teacher Chisen said today was for treatment.
You're a patient now, and patients have to listen to their doctors."
Hei Lingqi turned toward Chisen, seemingly waiting for some kind of compulsory order.
"Go." Chisen turned away and looked through the microscope again. "If you haven't spent all the money in that envelope before dark, all of you will run twenty laps around the Forest of Death tomorrow."
At that punishment, Lu and Emi shuddered simultaneously.
"Come on, hurry!" Lu grabbed the door. "Hei Lingqi, follow us!"
Hei Lingqi hesitated for a moment.
The faint stinging in his left hand seemed to urge him to take a step.
He drew a deep breath and followed Lu and Emi out of the laboratory as though stepping into an unknown minefield.
Going from the cold, gloomy second basement level to the sunlit street left Hei Lingqi briefly blinded.
In Konoha's early autumn, the