Awakening

Was this what the world after death was like?

A soul in the form of a sphere of light drifted through pitch-black space. It could barely observe the outside world and still retained the ability to think.

The fact that it could think in its state was remarkable, but it was not a good thing.

In an environment of absolute darkness and silence, there was no frame of reference. It had no way to judge the passage of time and did not even know whether it was moving or still.

This was the most terrifying torment. If an ordinary person stayed in a completely dark room for six hours, they would feel as though seven or eight days had passed. After three days, they would completely lose their sense of time and suffer severe mental damage.

It was not alive. Not only could it not die, it could not go mad either. The endlessly accumulating pain gradually wore down the vitality of its will.

The first thing to go was its memories. It slowly forgot many things, until it could no longer remember its own name. That finally jolted it awake.

This could not continue.

It began desperately searching for stimulation and amusement.

It recalled movies, novels, and comics it had seen, digging more and more details out from the depths of its memories—even such pointless details as the creases on the pages of a particular comic book.

Revisiting those memories of entertainment after so long made it happy. If it could excavate so many details from its memories, then there was hope. Perhaps it could recover its own name as well.

Time continued to pass, and entertainment gradually stopped bringing it either pleasure or stimulation.

It found a new source of stimulation: studying.

Astronomy, geography, biology, chemistry—it recalled every textbook it had ever read, down to every symbol on every page, the little doodled figures it had drawn while zoning out in class, and even every sentence its teachers had spoken.

Studying, researching—every sudden moment of understanding brought an ultimate rush of pleasure. It finally understood. So this was the joy of being a top student.

If I'd been able to feel this kind of joy back then, maybe I would have become a scientist too.

Every time it learned something new, it lamented resentfully.

Fine. If I weren't so bored, how could I focus on studying? The path of a top student just doesn't suit my personality. Lying flat, rotting away, drinking soda, eating chips, and scrolling short videos—that's my greatest joy.

How long has it been since I last ate or drank?

Based on my experience, if you lock naughty children in solitary confinement and only let them read textbooks and watch lecture videos, they can become top students.

What did cola's sweetness taste like again?

This seems even crueler than the Thunderbolt Dharma King.

Chips... What made chips so delicious?

What title would I get for being locked in a little black room? Demon King of Confinement?

!!!!

It suddenly snapped awake and hastily reined in its wandering thoughts. Too dangerous. I almost went mad again.

Study, study. I have to study properly.

Once it had learned everything in all the textbooks and understood all that knowledge completely, studying lost its appeal. Boredom returned to torment it.

It had no choice but to pick up the final, most frightening subject: mathematics.

They said that when people were pushed to the brink, they could do anything—except mathematics.

Learning mathematics was exceptionally painful, but pain was easier to bear than boredom.

Unfortunately, it had only one core of thought. There was no communication, no verification. Thinking alone always had its limits. Eventually, all learning and thought reached a dead end and fell into repetition.

Repetition was boredom, and boredom was the beginning of mental fragmentation. Its thoughts finally began to scatter uncontrollably, splitting into countless ideas amid endless divergence. Slowly, those thoughts withered, and its will gradually fell silent.

Just before it was about to be extinguished, a sea of light appeared.

Stimulated by the light, its will quickly became active again. Though it could do nothing, it discovered that it was moving toward the sea of light. It was so lucky.

It stared intently at the sea of light. As it drew closer, it discovered that the sea was made up of countless light spheres of various sizes—light spheres much like itself.

The spheres in the sea of light varied in size. Most were roughly the same size, and light spheres constantly went out while new ones were constantly born.

The spheres gathered and scattered unpredictably, frequently colliding. It discovered that collisions could also cause a light sphere to go out.

More than a dozen absurdly large light spheres existed within the sea. They were tens of thousands of times larger than ordinary spheres. These giant spheres loomed above the sea of light, each occupying its own territory. Around several of them orbited spheres a hundred times the usual size.

As it watched the changes in the sea of light, it gradually began to discern a great deal from them. It was quite interesting.

Suddenly, two even larger light spheres burst into the sea of light, throwing the entire sea into violent turmoil. Fierce collisions erupted between the giant spheres.

As time passed, the conflict ended, and the sea of light calmed once again.

Only three of the original giant spheres remained. Of the invading giant spheres, only one was left, but it had expanded to an unprecedented size. Its diameter was nearly half that of the entire sea of light, and the whole sea revolved around it.

The three surviving giant spheres scattered to the edge of the sea, their radiance dim.

The peace lasted a long time, until the central sphere split off two new giant spheres. Before long, a new conflict erupted.

In the end, the central giant sphere lost its vitality and radiance and was driven to the edge of the sea.

The sea of light then returned to an active state, but it was getting closer and closer to it. It could no longer see the overall situation.

Its speed continued to increase. Soon, it entered the sea of light and continued rapidly toward the center. Light spheres began brushing past it.

As its speed kept increasing, its light sphere stretched out and began trembling unstably.

Then a newly born light sphere approached its trajectory. The two spheres drew close, entwined with each other, moved ever nearer, and spun faster and faster.

The inevitable collision occurred.

It hurts!

Oh, I can feel pain.

Hahaha, I get it. I'm alive again.

Hiss, it hurts. What a long-missed feeling. This is wonderful.

Dawn broke. The transmigrator, who had stayed up all night pondering life, barely woke from his brief sleep. He got out of bed, walked to the window, and pushed it open. The fresh air invigorated him.

The sunlight outside was painfully dazzling to someone who had stayed up all night. It took the transmigrator quite a while to adapt to the brightness before he saw a familiar yet unfamiliar landmark.

It was a cliff face carved with two giant heads. It was familiar because he had looked at it for several years. Yet it was unfamiliar because, since his consciousness as a transmigrator had awakened, this was the first time he had seen the most famous landmark from a comic in his previous life: Hokage Rock.

Though it had only two heads, that was enough for the transmigrator to confirm that he was in Konoha.

Today was not the transmigrator's first day in this world, but it was still a special day.

The amount of information contained within the transmigrator's soul was far too vast for an undeveloped newborn brain to bear. It was like suddenly inserting a Windows 10 operating system package loaded with data into an ancient computer with only a 10G hard drive. The system simply could not unfold it, so it could only compress, compress, and compress again, waiting for the hardware to be upgraded.

For the next three years, the newborn transmigrator was like an ordinary baby, a child with delayed development.

Dragged down by his dormant soul, the transmigrator named Aburame Tetsumaru had spoken late in infancy due to interference from his native language, reacted slowly because compressed files occupied most of his brain capacity, loved spacing out because certain sights triggered decompression of some files, and often ran inexplicable fevers due to overload during decompression.

Yesterday, Aburame Tetsumaru's memories, including his core of thought, had fully unfolded. That was why he had developed a high fever, muscle pain, headaches, numb limbs, and every sort of discomfort. Tormented by such intense pain that he could neither sleep nor pass out, the transmigrator had been forced to stay awake all night, pondering life and sorting through the chaotic memories of his two lives.

His name was Aburame Tetsumaru. He was a boy.

That was truly cause for celebration.

He was currently three years old, plus forty-two years, had a father and mother, and had been born into the Aburame Ninja Clan.

I'm not an orphan!!

His father was Aburame Kazekazu, a Konoha Chunin currently away on a mission.

His mother was Aburame Aiko, a Konoha Genin and medical ninja who worked at the newly established hospital.

The Aburame Kazekazu household had two ninjas, giving them a considerable income. They were a well-off family in good financial condition, living in their own large home with an even larger courtyard.

The neighbors were all relatives from the Aburame Clan.

"Breakfast is ready~~"

Aburame Tetsumaru froze for a moment before understanding that his mother downstairs was calling him to eat. Yesterday's awakening had greatly strengthened his memories of his native language, causing a significant impact on his understanding of this new language.

But it was not a problem. The effects would last only a day or two at most, since he was no longer in an environment where his native language was spoken.

Breakfast was rice, pickled radish, tofu, and miso kelp soup. In Konoha, that was quite a lavish breakfast.

Compared to ordinary villages in the Land of Fire... forget it. Aburame Tetsumaru had absolutely no idea what ordinary villages were like. Members of ninja clans rarely had the chance to leave the village.

When Aburame Aiko saw her son start eating breakfast, she hurriedly hung the washed clothes out in the courtyard, then put on her clothes for going out.

"Tetsumaru, once you finish eating, go to Aunt Sachiko's by yourself. Be good today too, all right?" As she spoke, she put on her shoes and hurried out the door.

"Tetsumaru, go once you're done eating. Leave the dishes there, and Mom will clean them up when she gets home tonight..." Her final instructions came from outside the door.

Aburame Tetsumaru silently watched his young mother until she left the house, but he never called her "Mom."

Then Aburame Tetsumaru picked up his bowl and slowly ate his rice while also slowly savoring these entirely new feelings.

These were his parents in this new life. They had given him new life and taken good care of him during his ignorant early years. So he did not reject his parents in this life, including the father who was away from the village. There was no way he could reject them.

He simply could not bring himself to call them that. After all, in the memories of his previous life, he had been at least forty years old—nearly twice the age of his new mother.

After finishing breakfast, Aburame Tetsumaru cleared the table, moved a stool over, and stood on tiptoe to put the dishes in the sink. After trying, he found that his arms and legs were too short to reach the faucet handle.

Tetsumaru gave up on washing the dishes and headed outside.

Aburame Tetsumaru skipped toward the large house where "Aunt Sachiko" lived, according to his memories.

Ah, skipping?

Huh?

How could I do that?

He walked properly for only a few steps before he started bouncing along again, then turned back into skipping.

No, this is too embarrassing. I have to walk properly.

Skipping...

The transmigrator Aburame Tetsumaru squatted on the ground and covered his face in despair. It was too embarrassing. He could not control himself at all.

The first thing humans truly had to tame was indeed themselves.

The Aburame Clan had established the Nest House in a large residence at the center of their settlement. Functionally, it was a kindergarten and daycare.

At present, six orphans or children whose immediate relatives were completely unable to care for them lived directly in the Nest House, where retired kunoichi Aburame Sachiko was responsible for looking after them.

Besides those six orphans, children like Aburame Tetsumaru came to the Nest House during the day for activities and returned home at night. For families where both parents were ninjas, the Nest House was an enormous benefit.

Aburame Tetsumaru spent ten uneventful days fighting against his childish instincts, with utterly disastrous results.

Aside from his failures, he also achieved quite a bit. For example, he adapted to the new language and got to know a whole group of relatives.

At noon that day, Aburame Tetsumaru once again marveled at how tough people in the Shinobi World were. Then he lifted a bowl twice the size of his head and noisily slurped down noodles.

The bowl was so huge that it held a full three jin of noodles. With the soup and bowl included, it weighed at least four jin. Aburame Tetsumaru lifted it one-handed without any effort, happily eating while complaining inwardly.

I'm three years old. When my son from my previous life was three, he definitely didn't have the strength to lift a bowl. Even at five, he would sometimes drop a small plastic-steel bowl while holding it with both hands, spilling it onto the table or floor.

Children in the Shinobi World were completely different. Even his two-and-a-half-year-old granduncle in the cafeteria could lift a large bowl with both hands and drink soup, holding it steadily above his head.

All right, they say humans in the Shinobi World have four or five times as many cells as humans on Earth. I believe it. That's pretty convincing.

While they were eating, a ninja came in and spoke to Sachiko for a few moments.

The kunoichi saw the ninja off, then turned back and called, "Masao, come out for a moment."

Aburame Tetsumaru frowned. He could hear the sorrow in the kunoichi's voice and already understood what had happened.

Aburame Masao was a typical four-year-old little monkey. He chattered away and refused to get up, then received a slap from the kunoichi and was dragged out by the scruff of his neck.

"Masao, your father died in battle."

In the courtyard, the kunoichi in her forties gently informed the child of the death.

Aburame Masao did not understand what had happened. He was dazed, then slowly began to cry. Before long, the other four children in the room began crying as well.

No one came to comfort the children. The Shinobi World was a cruel place, where partings and deaths were nearly everyday occurrences.

Naturally, Aburame Tetsumaru did not cry. A faintly sorrowful atmosphere was not enough to move a transmigrator. Fortunately, he had always been a slow and somewhat indifferent child, or else he would have needed to find a way to force out a few tears today.

The four children who did not understand why they were crying soon stopped. Masao, however, continued crying until he wore himself out and cried himself to sleep.

The kunoichi sent the newly orphaned child home, bringing the sorrowful day to an end.

Over the next seven days, the Aburame Clan handled the funeral, but Aburame Masao was not sent to an orphanage.

Konoha had a population of one hundred thousand, far too large for its rudimentary administrative system. It was large enough for darkness to fester. Orphanages were the places where darkness most easily grew and the ugliest aspects of human nature were most exposed.

Children of three or four were simply too young. Without their parents' selfless and attentive care, they were far too fragile. Rotten food caused by greed, accidents caused by carelessness, corporal punishment inflicted in anger—there were far too many possibilities that could lead to a young child's death.

On top of that, the previous ruler, the Second Hokage, had been an iron-blooded, cold-hearted Politician, a master of Forbidden Techniques, and a pioneer of biochemical research. He had started the trend of human experimentation, so orphanages were truly not good places to be.

The Aburame Clan provided basic protection for its own orphans, allowing Aburame Masao's life to remain as it had been before.

But even with the clan's protection, he was not completely safe.

Not long afterward, Aburame Masao disappeared.