Are Right and Wrong Really That Important?

"Woohoo! This feels amazing!"

Night had fallen. Inside Room 1303 of the residential district.

Yahiko threw himself onto the brand-new wooden bed, letting out a blissful sound.

"Yahiko!"

Konan's complaining voice came from the top bunk as she softly reminded him, "It's late. Everyone should be asleep already, so don't be so loud!"

"Mm." Yahiko covered his mouth, then scratched his head and muttered, "Got it, got it."

Then, as if he had suddenly remembered something, he happily patted the ladder beside the bed and suppressed a laugh. "Hey, Konan, can we really live here forever from now on?"

"...Didn't Yun Chuan say so already? He's only letting us stay here temporarily. If we want to settle down, we have to rent a place ourselves, or buy one once we have money. Don't think about getting something for nothing."

Sitting cross-legged on the upper bunk, Konan felt somewhat helpless. At the same time, an inexplicable irritation suddenly rose in her heart.

Why had she never noticed that Yahiko was this noisy before? He had clearly always been this loud and restless.

If they had already gotten their residency papers and saved enough money, she really wanted to experience the peace and quiet of having a room to herself.

Thinking of that, Konan lowered her head somewhat listlessly and began folding a sheet of white paper.

When she was little, before her parents died, they had taught her how to fold paper. They had also told her that paper folding represented blessings and good fortune.

Although flowers could not bloom in the Land of Rain, Konan wanted to fold a paper flower and give it to Yun Chuan as thanks.

Even though she knew that such gratitude was a trivial thing to him.

And this was the only thing weak and frail her could do for now.

"..."

Yahiko did not say anything else either, seemingly lost in thoughts of his own.

The room fell into a long silence, leaving only the faint rustling of paper folding.

Click.

Only after Konan reached out to turn off the light did the room sink completely into darkness. She silently lay down on the bed and went to sleep in her clothes.

Specks of moonlight filtered sparsely through the gaps in the curtains. Yahiko lay with his hands behind his head, silently staring at the faint moon outside the window.

Though the feeling did not seem real, he suddenly realized that he now...

Seemed to have a home?

He no longer needed to wander from place to place, drifting through hardship. He no longer needed to dig through garbage for a bite of food, no longer needed to wake suddenly from nightmares, and no longer needed to worry about dying in some forgotten corner.

And now, all of this...

Was because of that person.

As he thought about it, Yahiko suddenly understood how those residents felt.

"Home." Such a simple word, yet for the people of this country, it was something beyond their reach.

Compared to them, he really had been greedy, asking for far too much.

"Konan." Yahiko suddenly broke the silence, his tone confused. "Do you think Yun Chuan is a good person?"

His question received no response. It merely echoed through the empty room, while Konan seemed to have already fallen asleep.

Until, at last, the air grew so still that Yahiko began to feel uncomfortable.

"I don't understand why you're agonizing over this."

Yahiko heard Konan sigh before she softly said, "Good and bad, right and wrong... are they really that important to us?"

"Whether Yun Chuan is a good person or a bad one, he is still the one who saved our lives. That is an undeniable fact, isn't it?"

According to the original story.

She should have founded Akatsuki with Nagato and Yahiko, running about for Yahiko's dream as a mere girl.

Even after Yahiko died, she should have remained by Nagato's side. Even when Akatsuki's ideals were gradually twisted by him, Konan should have stood behind Nagato from beginning to end.

Not for Yahiko's so-called dream, nor for the "peace" Nagato spoke of, but because they were Yahiko and Nagato.

From beginning to end, Konan had never had ideas of her own, nor did she understand grand questions of right and wrong.

She was only a girl, a girl with little strength and no dream of her own.

Right and wrong, good and evil, did not matter to her.

Because Nagato and Yahiko wanted to do it, she was willing to run herself ragged for it.

Now, she only knew that Yun Chuan had saved her. So whether Yun Chuan was good or bad did not matter either.

"Yahiko, I know you may think Yun Chuan's actions are wrong to other people." Konan seemed to hesitate for a moment. "But I think forcing your kindness onto others is no different from what he does."

If Yahiko's values were used to explain his actions.

Then to Yun Chuan, Yahiko's kindness was also malice.

"..."

Hearing Konan's answer, Yahiko fell silent.

After a long while, Konan felt the bed shake, creaking softly.

Under the dim moonlight, she could vaguely see a figure suddenly stand up.

"Yahiko?" Konan pushed herself up and instinctively asked, "What are you trying to do?"

This idiot was not about to get hotheaded and go make trouble for Yun Chuan, was he?

"I just think you're right."

Yahiko took a breath. The confusion in his eyes faded as he said quietly, "I have no right to question Yun Chuan's decisions. I'm going to apologize to him for my arrogance."

"And I also hope to use my own strength to make some changes in this country."

He wanted to do something too.

Perhaps Yun Chuan, admired by others and protecting a whole region, was the person he had always imagined himself becoming.

That was why, when he saw the darkness hidden beneath that polished exterior, he instinctively felt repulsed by it.

Now that he thought about it...

The tangled emotions of admiration and jealousy had turned him into someone unrecognizable back then.

"To me, right and wrong are still important. Since I was wrong, I'll admit it!"

After giving Konan's astonished expression one last look, Yahiko tossed his head in a deliberately carefree manner and laughed. "But I still hate that red-haired brat. Sooner or later, I'll grab him and tell him he was wrong!"

With that, he strode out of the room with his head held high.

"Wait..."

Konan stretched out an arm behind him, but before she could finish, Yahiko had already hurried outside.

Seeing that, a vein bulged on Konan's forehead.

That scatterbrained idiot, it was the middle of the night!

He had gotten hotheaded again and stopped caring about anything else!

Meanwhile, in the corridor outside.

Yun Chuan's room was next door to theirs. But after reaching that door, Yahiko's determined steps slowed, and he became like a deflated balloon, gradually looking limp and listless.

He was probably asleep by now, right?

Then... maybe he should come back tomorrow?

"..."

He had acted carefree in front of Konan, but when it actually came time to admit his mistake, he chickened out.

A hot-blooded idiot who always had to be strong.

"What are you standing outside for?"

But just as he turned around, a familiar voice came from the other side of the door.

"Come in."

At those words, Yahiko froze, then pushed the door open and entered the room.

Click.

"Sorry to disturb you."

He lowered his head and said it quietly.

Then he heard a crisp, faint sound from in front of him.

Clank! Clank!

Yahiko instinctively looked up, shock appearing on his face.

If he remembered correctly, the initial furnishings of these rooms were supposed to be standardized.

But all of those things were gone.

What Yahiko saw now was a pile of unfamiliar equipment.

And on the pull-up bar in the living room, a figure slowly rising and falling.

"...Am I under a genjutsu?"

Yahiko's expression turned horrified, his eyes looking at Yun Chuan as though he were a monster.

Iron chains as thick as arms were wrapped around Yun Chuan's legs, with three enormous iron plates hanging from them.

The strange sound Yahiko had heard was the noise of those iron plates striking the floor as Yun Chuan rose and fell on the pull-up bar.

Whenever he slowly straightened his arms and descended, the plates landed with incredible precision, touching the ground only once before being lifted again.

As Yahiko stood there dumbfounded, another voice rang out.

"Yahiko! What are you doing standing at the door? Are you..."

Konan poked her head out from behind him with a frown. She was about to say something, but froze in place upon seeing Yun Chuan.

"Huh? Huhhhh?!"

Then, a blush gradually crept across her small face.

Moonlight from outside fell across Yun Chuan's back, casting shadows over his well-proportioned back muscles and making their contours and lines more defined and beautiful, joining together in the shape of wings...

Then, perhaps sensing the two pairs of equally burning yet differently meaningful gazes, Yun Chuan paused slightly as he pulled himself upward.

Bang!!

The heavy iron plates crashed to the ground, jolting the two stunned children awake.

At the same time, it very cleverly covered the booming sound coming from outside.

"You two..."

Yun Chuan picked up a towel from the side and wiped away nonexistent sweat. He gave them a deep look and asked, "Is there something you need?"

In the darkness, a glimmer of light was reflected in his deep blue eyes, while the flashing explosions from the distant administrative building were clearly visible.