[Host: Uchiha Yoru] [Chakra Reserves: Chūnin] [Chakra Nature: Fire (Level 3), Lightning (Level 3)] [Gold Coins: 30,000]
After parting ways with Shisui, Uchiha Yoru headed into the village, silently shaking his head as he looked at the scene visible only in his mind.
His Golden Finger was a pure Pay-to-Win System. It accepted nothing but gold. He had worked himself to the bone for years and had only managed to scrape together enough coins last month. He had even deliberately waited until Nine-Tails Night to pay for awakening his Sharingan. After all, he could not just awaken it out of nowhere. Nine-Tails Night was both reasonable and believable.
[One-Tomoe Sharingan: 500,000 Gold Coins]
Looking at the One-Tomoe Sharingan he had redeemed, Uchiha Yoru immediately grimaced in pain. Damn it, his talent was too limited. He had been on the battlefield and faced life-and-death situations, yet the damned Sharingan simply refused to awaken.
Fortunately, he was a member of the Uchiha Clan, so he did not need to redeem the Uchiha bloodline. Not bad! The prerequisite for redeeming a bloodline was possessing the corresponding bloodline first. With the bloodline, a One-Tomoe Sharingan cost 500,000 gold coins. A Two-Tomoe cost twice as much—one million. But a Three-Tomoe skyrocketed straight to ten million. A Mangekyo cost one hundred million!
Forget the Mangekyo. Just talking about it brought tears to his eyes.
Seeing those redemption prices, Uchiha Yoru could not help twitching at the corner of his eye. Given the Shinobi World's ten-to-one gold conversion rate, he would need to earn more than ten suns' worth just to afford a Mangekyo. For now, his goal was to earn one damned small target first.
Outside a secluded little courtyard, Kurenai Yuhi stood in a black ninja outfit, her long legs wrapped in fishnet stockings. Her agate-red eyes held a complicated emotion as she looked at Uchiha Yoru, who seemed to have been waiting for her.
"Yoru, I heard your Sharingan awakened. Congratulations."
Only Uchihas who had awakened their Sharingan were true Uchiha elites. Those who had not awakened it stood at an entirely different level.
Seeing Kurenai Yuhi offer her congratulations with a faint sadness in her eyes, Uchiha Yoru scratched his head awkwardly. "Kurenai, um... my condolences."
One was a congratulations, while the other was condolences.
Kurenai Yuhi's father had still died. Even with him, a little butterfly, flapping his wings, nothing had changed in the end.
"By the way, Kurenai, this is the Shuriken Technique you needed."
He felt no guilt whatsoever about taking some techniques from the Uchiha Clan to give away. The other Great Clans had plenty of this sort of thing too, and it was not some top-secret Uchiha technique.
Uchiha Shuriken techniques were unparalleled in the Shinobi World, but that depended on the Sharingan. Without it, they could only be called decent.
Seeing that he had actually dared to steal an Uchiha Clan Shuriken Technique scroll, Kurenai Yuhi was dumbfounded. She looked up at her classmate, who wore a somewhat shy smile, and an unfamiliar feeling seemed to rise within her.
But his next sentence instantly wiped out that tiny trace of strange emotion in her heart, leaving behind only frustration!
"Kurenai, you know, I took the risk of being punished by my clan for this. You understand."
Uchiha Yoru rubbed his thumb, middle finger, and index finger together in the universal gesture for money, instantly making Kurenai Yuhi grit her teeth.
"How much do you want this time?"
Greedy for money! That was the label all their classmates had given Uchiha Yoru. He was a complete money-grubber without the slightest bearing of a Noble House.
Seeing that Kurenai Yuhi had gotten down to business, Uchiha Yoru immediately perked up. "Kurenai, we may be classmates, but even brothers settle accounts clearly. Back then, for you... and this time..."
After he went on and on, painstakingly calculating every last debt, Kurenai Yuhi was utterly speechless. She looked like she was grinding her teeth, but their bickering had dispelled the faint sorrow lingering in the house.
"Shut up, Yoru!"
Kurenai Yuhi's head was about to explode from listening to him. The man across from her was clearly handsome, yet he was such a shameless money-grubber. Back when they were at the Ninja Academy, her innocent younger self had been fooled by him. Over all these years, he had swindled away much of her pocket money under the excuse of being her shield.
She had been young and naive back then, but she had never needed him to be her shield! Yet he had scammed her out of pocket money for years.
Annoyed, Kurenai Yuhi got up and went back inside. When she emerged again, she directly tossed a scroll from her hand.
With a smack, Uchiha Yoru looked at the scroll in his palm with suspicion. A single character was written on it: "Sword."
"These are the Konoha-Style Swordsmanship insights my father compiled. That should be enough to cover the cost, right?"
With an irritated snort, Kurenai Yuhi shot him a glare. Uchiha Yoru immediately smiled. He had gotten a tremendous bargain.
Kurenai Yuhi's father was an Elite Jonin of Konoha. Although he was famous for genjutsu, his swordsmanship—or rather, blade techniques—were also quite impressive. Otherwise, he would not have carried a Japanese Greatsword on his back at all times.
He had truly gotten a bargain this time. Looking at the scroll in his hand, Uchiha Yoru smiled and tucked it into his Tool Pouch. Kurenai Yuhi could not help laughing at the sight.
He truly was her sugar daddy. After all these years, their relationship was somewhere beyond friendship but short of lovers.
But Uchiha Yoru's eyes shifted as he muttered to himself. No ninja was foolish, because analysis was what ninjas did best. Of course, there were exceptions, such as protagonists with cheats.
Female Ninjas were even rarer, and Kurenai Yuhi was the calm, analytical sort. She was no simple person. This time, he had clearly gotten the better deal.
At that thought, Uchiha Yoru put on a grave expression. "Kurenai, you know what happened during the Nine-Tails' Rampage. The Uchiha Clan is already sitting over a fire. Even if I can no longer be your shield in the future, you can use this incident."
"If anyone investigates your contact with the Uchiha, then you can—"
Before Uchiha Yoru could finish, Kurenai Yuhi sneered. "Say that I was deceived by you, a scumbag, that you started swindling my pocket money back at the Ninja Academy, and that in the end, you even conned my father's swordsmanship scroll out of me. How about that?"
Seeing Kurenai Yuhi answer for him, Uchiha Yoru was briefly stunned before smiling. "Kurenai, it has to be you. But if I have to take such a huge blame, you'll need to pay more."
With a bang, a sofa cushion came flying at him. Uchiha Yoru hurriedly caught it as Kurenai Yuhi glared at him through clenched teeth, her beautiful ruby eyes burning with anger at his shamelessness.
"Uchiha Yoru!"
At Kurenai Yuhi's shout, Uchiha Yoru fled the house in a sorry state, as though he were a scumbag caught deceiving a girl's feelings.
"Kurenai, ow! We can talk this out!"
Uchiha Yoru dodged frantically as he fled, but when he saw that Kurenai Yuhi no longer looked so lifeless, the corners of his mouth slowly curled upward.
Kurenai Yuhi naturally noticed that faint smile on his lips. The lifelessness in her heart was stirred back to life by anger, and she shot him an annoyed glare.
"Uchiha Yoru, I became a Chūnin a whole year before you did!"
The original work made Kurenai Yuhi's information very clear. She became a genin at nine and a Chūnin at thirteen. That had not changed. Only the timing of her promotion to Jōnin was unclear, but it could be inferred from the conversations among the Leading Jonin during the Chunin Exam in the original work.
Kurenai Yuhi became a Jōnin not long before the story began. She was now fourteen, and there were still twelve full years before the plot started. In other words, it took her at least twelve years to advance to Jōnin, meaning she only became one at around twenty-six.
After all, intelligence analysis was what ninjas did best. Having known each other for so many years, the two of them acted with perfect tacit understanding, putting on a scene of a scumbag breaking up with his girl.
During such a sensitive period, having too many ties with the Uchiha Clan was not a good thing. Especially for Kurenai Yuhi, who had lost her father's protection and was only a Chūnin. Though it would only bring minor trouble, neither of them wanted that trouble clinging to her.
Watching his departing figure, Kurenai Yuhi let out a soft sigh. "You really are a heartless sugar daddy."
Returning to the house and looking at the photograph of father and daughter, Kurenai Yuhi smiled happily and murmured, "Father, your daughter will not disappoint you. I will definitely become Konoha's Elite Jonin."
The sorrow in Kurenai Yuhi's eyes gradually transformed into fighting spirit. She could not let her father down. She had to become a Jōnin daughter he could be proud of.
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