"Brother Fucheng, what should we do with this person who looks exactly like me?" Mikoto asked uneasily, glancing at the hooded girl beside them.
She edged a little closer to Uchiha Fucheng, looking rather nervous.
Uchiha Fucheng smiled. "Don't worry. She's a clone who's been assimilated by you, and she'll obey you completely.
"She's now been fully assimilated, taking on your appearance and abilities. She'll have some of your memories and skills, too. Her overall combat strength should be a lot lower than yours.
"Although she can think for herself, she'll follow your will completely. You can treat them like Shadow Clones that don't need to be controlled."
Mikoto was usually carefree and as straightforward as a boy, but seeing Misaka Sister, who looked exactly like her, still felt strange.
Fortunately, Clone 0001 from the Misaka Network could also use the Ninja Art of Three Body Techniques. As long as she used the Transformation Technique to look different from Mikoto, things wouldn't feel so awkward.
On the way back to the clan compound.
Two people shopping by the roadside caught Uchiha Fucheng's attention.
A male ninja with diamond-shaped face paint was supporting a heavily pregnant woman as he cheerfully picked out fruit.
"The Nohara Clan?" Two names suddenly came to Uchiha Fucheng's mind.
Nohara Hiroshi and Nohara Misae.
The first time he'd heard those names, they'd given Uchiha Fucheng quite a scare.
But once he discovered they simply shared names with those people, he'd relaxed.
Nohara Hiroshi was an active Konoha ninja, an elite Chunin.
The Nohara Clan was also a peripheral clan of the Senju Clan. It had produced quite a few well-known ninjas, though not many powerful ones.
The reason Fucheng was paying attention to this Nohara Hiroshi was that the Chunin Hiroshi could wield a double-headed polearm with flames blazing at both ends.
Though Nohara Hiroshi was only a Chunin, he was one of the most skilled Taijutsu fighters among his peers.
Fucheng had even sent people to investigate the Nohara family.
He was almost certain that the baby Nohara Misae was carrying was likely Kakashi and Obito's "moonlight," the protagonist of "Obito Uchiha"—the Fourth Hokage Minato's student, Nohara Rin.
Perhaps seeing Nohara Rin's parents had made Uchiha Fucheng involuntarily think of a few characters he'd almost forgotten.
Kakashi, Nohara Rin, and Obito had all been born in the same year!
Since Obito was older than Nohara Rin and Kakashi, hadn't he already been born?
Fucheng checked, and sure enough, he had.
Quite a few members of the Uchiha Clan had been born this year.
Uchiha Tekka had just been born this month. With a mole between his eyebrows, Uchiha Tekka would become a prominent elite Jonin in the original story.
Though he'd later die in the Uchiha Clan Massacre, he'd still become one of the clan's notable pillars of strength.
Adding in Uchiha Obito, Uchiha Hayate, and the others born earlier in the year, the number of new members in the Uchiha Clan this year was actually far higher than in previous years, despite the war.
Uchiha Obito's parents were both still alive, too.
Considering the upcoming battles in the Land of Rain and the dangerous missions the clan would be assigned, Uchiha Fucheng strongly suspected that Obito's parents had likely died during the special incident involving the suppression of the Ketsuryūgan Clan.
The dangerous mission involving the Ketsuryūgan Clan was so ridiculous that Uchiha Fucheng couldn't even be bothered to complain about it.
It was pure stupidity, the kind of idiotic move the Uchiha higher-ups would make.
What did the petty political grudges in the Land of Lightning have to do with the Uchiha?
They'd actually come up with the idea of hiring the Uchiha, who also had scarlet eyes, to suppress the Chinoike Clan with its Kekkei Genkai.
And the Uchiha Clan Head and elders at the time had eagerly agreed.
In Fucheng's eyes, "The risks and rewards of this mission clearly don't match!"
The Uchiha Clan might really have sacrificed the entire clan's intelligence for the sake of their Kekkei Genkai.
The elders had been willing to let the Uchiha Clan lose so many young ninjas just to earn a little money from this miserable mission.
According to the clan's secret records, the Chinoike Clan would erupt in rebellion every few years, after gathering strength.
Yet previous Uchiha Clan Heads had actually chosen not to wipe out the Ketsuryūgan Clan, just because the mission paid well and only required suppressing them, not destroying them.
Fucheng wanted to curse.
To Fucheng, a coal boss who'd worked his way up from nothing, the Uchiha elders' thinking was utterly incomprehensible—like a bunch of complete idiots.
It was all so absurd!
Any Chinese kid who'd gone through nine years of compulsory education could tell this was a brain-dead decision.
In Uchiha Fucheng's view, they should either have crushed the Chinoike Clan completely, beaten them into submission, and taken them in as their dogs,
or concentrated everything into one mission and squeezed the nobles who hired the Uchiha for every last coin.
They could have threatened and bribed them on the spot: refuse to pay more, and the Uchiha would release the Chinoike Clan to wipe out the nobles. Once the money was collected, they could find a way to finish the job for good.
Instead, the Uchiha Clan's decision-makers had chosen the worst possible option.
Every few years, they collected some hiring fees and carried out another half-hearted suppression.
They'd made bitter enemies, then kept the Ketsuryūgan ninjas around like a dungeon to farm. They really didn't take the lives of ninjas seriously.
Were they trying to keep themselves important by nurturing an enemy?
That wasn't how you did it.
The Uchiha who died because of the Ketsuryūgan might not have held high positions in the clan, but they were still promising young ninjas with families to support.
If Obito's parents hadn't died young, perhaps the Uchiha Clan Massacre wouldn't have been triggered by that troublesome bastard Uchiha Obito, driven to hatred by love.
"Ah, best not to think too deeply about it," Uchiha Fucheng sighed. "The Uchiha Clan seems to have a bug in its logic.
"Though the Kaguya Kimimaro Clan isn't the only one full of brainless brutes, the Uchiha aren't much better.
"No wonder even a wishy-washy guy like Fugaku can count as a politically capable leader in the clan."
Now that Uchiha Fucheng had become the clan head, he naturally couldn't just give up.
He was counting on the Uchiha Clan to grow stronger and achieve new glory, and he was counting on the whole Uchiha family for his Recognition Points.
Fucheng felt as though he'd returned to the days when he'd clawed his way up in the mining district.
He'd put nearly every useful method from his rise to success into practice.
The first stage was to build up the clan's own strength, support the training of Kekkei Genkai users, and expand the number of allied clans under the Uchiha's influence.
Then he expanded the clan's industries and increased investment in certain fields, such as publicity.
The first thing he did internally was establish the [Uchiha Escape Pavilion].
The [Escape Pavilion] was essentially a vault of ninjutsu for the Uchiha Clan.
Fucheng brought together the clan's three best Uchiha Jonin at copying ninjutsu and had them compile all the common Wind, Fire, Lightning, and Water Release techniques they knew from across the Shinobi World.
On top of that, Fucheng opened the clan's secret vault and made knowledge of Sharingan Genjutsu, Sharingan secret techniques, and Sharingan training available to the clan's Three-Tomoe Jonin.
Of course, access to this knowledge and the establishment of the Escape Pavilion came with conditions.
The key to reforming the Uchiha Clan was the [Uchiha Contribution Points].
"The system evaluates Recognition Points for me, so I'll evaluate [Contribution Points] for the Uchiha Clan. Delegating this kind of KPI performance review should make things a lot easier for everyone."
Besides rewards for regular missions and clan duties, [Uchiha Contribution Points] could be earned by completing village missions, war missions, and duties with the Konoha Military Police Force.
In addition, civilian Uchiha who weren't ninjas could earn Contribution Points for their contributions to economic activity and clan affairs.
The biggest reward of all was an enormous bonus for having children.
That sent the Uchiha clan members into a frenzy of joy!
Before you continue