"Let me ask you something. Your wife... is she my variant?"
Kushina stared intently at Minato with blazing eyes. Her sharp gaze seemed capable of piercing straight through his soul.
Minato felt extremely uncomfortable under that scorching stare. He instinctively turned his head away, not daring to meet Kushina's eyes.
Although the woman standing before him was indeed a variant of his wife, she was ultimately not truly his beloved.
Moreover, her husband was standing right beside her, watching him like a tiger eyeing its prey. The pressure made it difficult for Minato to breathe.
And the hostility and possessiveness in the Kushina before him made her look like a hungry wolf that had spotted its prey, as if she might tear him apart and swallow him whole at any moment.
Minato secretly wailed in his heart. That look in her eyes, as if she wants to eat me... It's terrifying!
At that moment, Minato put on a calm front and replied, "That's right. Her name is Kushina, and she's a very gentle woman."
However, the moment the words left his mouth, he immediately realized that he had made a grave mistake.
A vein visibly bulged on Kushina's forehead. She clenched her teeth and forced out a few words through the gaps between them. "Are you saying... that I'm not gentle?"
Upon hearing this, Minato stood rooted to the spot as if struck by lightning, completely stunned.
He had never expected that a casually spoken sentence would make Kushina so furious.
For a moment, he felt utterly embarrassed and fumbled for an explanation. "No... that's not what I meant..."
But no matter how hard he racked his brains, he still couldn't come up with a suitable way to defuse the crisis.
"What I mean is... Ah, forget it, forget it.