By three in the afternoon, Tsunade had returned to the hospital. The moment she saw Uchiha Dan, she looked eager for praise.
"Why the look on your face?" Uchiha Dan asked curiously. "Where have you been?"
"I went to the Pharmaceutical Department!" Tsunade said proudly.
"What?" Uchiha Dan cried, springing to his feet. A terrible feeling rose in his chest. "What did you go to the Pharmaceutical Department for?"
"To help you!" Tsunade didn't understand his reaction. "Why are you making such a fuss?"
"No, why would you go to the Pharmaceutical Department? Did Utatane Koharu ask you to help?"
At that moment, Uchiha Dan wished he were dead.
No, the plan had gone terribly off course. Maybe he really was going to die—maybe he didn't have much time left.
What the hell was this?
He'd meant to take a risky gamble, but somehow he'd completely screwed it up instead?
"No, I contacted her myself!" Tsunade hadn't realized how serious this was at all. "I heard you nearly exploded with anger every time you went to the Pharmaceutical Department, so I didn't want you to suffer anymore."
"You... contacted... her yourself..." Uchiha Dan's expression had become indescribably grim.
"Hahahaha! You contacted her yourself! Hahahaha!"
Uchiha Dan suddenly went mad, laughing out loud without stopping. Even after Tsunade called out to him again and again, he kept on laughing.
"This is killing me! Hahaha! You contacted her yourself!"
"Hahahaha!"
"Dan, that's enough! What's wrong with you?" Tsunade was frightened by Uchiha Dan. She practically shouted as she cut off his laughter.
"Tsunade, Tsunade... When the time comes, don't you dare attend my funeral. Otherwise, I won't let you off even as a ghost." Uchiha Dan's gaze turned vicious in an instant, and he spoke coldly.
After that, Uchiha Dan seemed as if his soul had been torn from his body. He was utterly despondent, yet still walked out of the hospital laughing wildly. Like a madman, he headed for an empty corner of the village.
By the river, Uchiha Dan picked up the stones beside him and tossed them into the water one by one. Once in a while, he startled a little fish into leaping above the surface, only for it to quickly fall back in.
Uchiha Dan felt like that little fish. No matter how he struggled to leap out of the water, in the end, the river always swallowed him up.
Tsunade had followed him all the way there. Seeing that Uchiha Dan seemed to have regained his senses, she slowly approached him.
"Dan, are you all right?" Tsunade asked anxiously.
"Go away. I don't want to see you!" Uchiha Dan said coldly, as if he felt nothing at all.
"What do you mean?" Tsunade grew frantic. Everything that had just happened had left her utterly at a loss. She had no idea why Uchiha Dan had suddenly gone mad.
She had thought about it all the way there, but she couldn't make sense of it.
It had all happened after Uchiha Dan learned that she had gone to the Pharmaceutical Department to help.
Could there be some terrible secret behind this?
"Go!" From start to finish, those were the only words Uchiha Dan said.
"Do you really not want to see me that badly?"
"Hahaha!" Uchiha Dan suddenly laughed again, though his voice was cold. "What do you think, when you've been doing everything you can to get me killed?"
"Explain yourself! When have I ever tried to get you killed?" Tsunade was even more confused, but she desperately wanted an answer.
"You really want to hear?" Uchiha Dan asked with heavy sarcasm.
"Of course!" Tsunade was angry now, too. She had no idea how any of this had happened, but Uchiha Dan's treatment of her had broken her heart.
"You can hear it if you want," Uchiha Dan said bitterly. "But once I've finished telling you, you and I will have nothing more to do with each other. Deal?"
"You said it, so don't you dare regret it!" Tsunade gripped the hem of her clothes tightly, fighting back her tears as she replied through clenched teeth.
"Hatake Sakumo, get your ass out here!"
Tsunade never got an explanation from Uchiha Dan. Instead, she got a furious roar.
Three seconds later, a figure appeared behind Uchiha Dan and Tsunade.
"Hatake Sakumo, I'm about to tell Tsunade something in private." Uchiha Dan stared coldly at Hatake Sakumo and smiled. "Want to listen in?"
"Uh..." Hatake Sakumo looked troubled. He turned to Tsunade, unsure what to do.
"Senpai, please give us ten minutes," Tsunade said to Hatake Sakumo, suppressing her anger.
"Understood!" Hatake Sakumo nodded, then vanished with the Body Flicker Technique.
"Now, can you talk?" Tsunade asked coldly, looking ready to tear someone apart.
She swore that after today, no matter how much Uchiha Dan begged her, she would never pay any attention to that bastard again.
She hadn't done anything wrong, yet she had suddenly been treated this way. No matter what his reason was, she would never accept it.
Uchiha Dan knew exactly what Tsunade was thinking, but he didn't care.
To stay alive, Uchiha Dan didn't need love. What he needed was Tsunade's guilt.
Only overwhelming guilt would make Tsunade willing to help him.
He had been laying the groundwork for this day for a very, very long time.
As for whether he would break Tsunade's heart?
Who cared!
No one had cared that my heart had been broken for seven years. Why should I care about yours, Tsunade?
Drawing a deep breath, Uchiha Dan seemed to sink into his memories. Without a trace of emotion, he began, "Twelve years ago, my parents died in the war!"
"I became an orphan overnight, and I didn't know what to do."
"I had no money and no other family. I had no idea how to get by."
"But Konoha's welfare was decent. The village gave me compensation for my parents' deaths. It wasn't much, but if I was careful, the compensation for both of them would be enough to support me until I became a Chunin."
"Gradually, I accepted what had happened and began learning how to survive. With no family and no one to look after me, I struggled to keep going."
Tsunade furrowed her brows and asked unhappily, "Why are you telling me all this?"
"Heh. If you don't want to listen, leave." Uchiha Dan's voice was perfectly calm, as if he were talking about something that had nothing to do with him.
Seeing that Tsunade didn't leave, Uchiha Dan simply acted as if she weren't there and continued, "It wasn't easy for a five-year-old to survive, but my parents had told me that as long as I stayed alive, there was hope."
"Five years passed like that, and I finally overcame the effects of losing both my parents."
"Back then, I naively thought that in two more years, I'd graduate. Then I'd become a ninja and follow the same path my parents had taken."
"But instead of graduating, I was expelled."
"I didn't understand why, but reality gave me no time to figure it out. Right after that, I was cast out of the Uchiha Clan and forced to move out of the clan compound."
"After that, Anbu Ninja kept me under surveillance day and night."
"Of course, none of this had anything to do with you. Just think of it as me venting."
"Being watched didn't matter. I was in the hospital, after all. I could support myself with my own hands."
"But when I was twelve, I suddenly noticed that something was off about the chakra of the Anbu Ninja keeping watch on me."
"I forgot to tell you: I wasn't just a Medical Ninja. I was a Sensory Ninja, too, and my sensory abilities were extremely powerful."
"So powerful that, at close range, I could detect even the faintest changes in someone's Chakra."
"When I sensed a trace of cold killing intent in the Chakra of the ninja watching me, I realized that the orders the Anbu Ninja had received might have changed."
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