Cliff Fall!

For the next few days, I intentionally or unintentionally avoided Uchiha Itachi.

I still didn't know how to face him.

It felt as if there was a heavy stone in my heart, pressing down on me.

"Hey, you bumped into me!" Walking through the school, I had been lost in thought and accidentally collided with someone. I whispered an apology and was about to walk away when he blocked my path.

"What? Is that the only apology I get!" He reached out to grab my collar, which I dodged with ease, but he managed to snatch my scarf in his grip.

I looked at him with icy eyes.

Oh, it was an acquaintance after all.

"It's you, Kusama Shigeo," I said impatiently. "If you don't want trouble, let go."

A few children had already gathered around, watching the scene with strange expressions.

"Uchiha Akatsuki! You escaped a disaster yesterday, but this afternoon, in the woods on the east side of the school!" He ignored my expression entirely, his pupils shining with a resolute light as he declared his challenge.

"I want to challenge you! I want to have a fair and square fight with you!"

"Wow, it's a duel!!" The surrounding children burst into laughter, creating a chaotic, annoying din.

I furrowed my brows, feeling confused by his behavior for the umpteenth time.

It had been over half a year since enrollment, and ever since I had beaten Kusama Shigeo up, he hadn't given up on challenging me. He would come at me almost every few days; he was truly a man of repeated failures and relentless persistence.

I looked at the scar I had left on his face, feeling no ripples in my heart, perhaps even wanting to laugh.

He was weak, troublesome, and annoying.

However... he was also worthy of praise.

I scanned my surroundings and noticed the crowd growing larger. To avoid further attention, I casually promised, "I know. I'll be there after school."

Kusama Shigeo's eyes lit up, and he instantly perked up. He wanted to say something else, but I silenced him with a sharp reprimand.

"Get lost!"

He recoiled in fear and let go. I walked forward without looking back, and the crowd automatically parted to make way.

After school, the forest on the east side of the school was packed with a large group of children.

I stood quietly in place, facing the poised Kusama Shigeo with indifference.

"Take this, Uchiha brat!" He initiated the attack, slamming his hands onto the ground and shouting, "Grass Style: Micro Sprout!"

The next moment, green sprouts rose from the ground, winding around my calves and anchoring me in place.

"Heh, can't move now, can you!" Kusama Shigeo laughed loudly and clapped his hands together to form seals: "Grass Style: Flower Snatch!"

In the next instant, the green sprouts bloomed into bright red flowers. Terrifyingly, the open blossoms were filled with sharp thorns, biting toward me aggressively!

"Ah! Akatsuki!" This was Kuixing's anxious cry.

My expression remained unchanged. The moment they bit down, a puff of white smoke erupted, and the flowers crunched into a log, breaking their teeth in the process.

"Substitution Technique? Where... where is he?" Kusama Shigeo looked around in astonishment, completely failing to notice the shadow rapidly descending from above—

With a scream, he was pinned firmly beneath me, his hands twisted behind his back, unable to move or form seals.

"You lost." My expression remained blank.

"Hmph, that's not necessarily true!" Kusama Shigeo, bruised and battered, took a deep breath and suddenly spat out a large cloud of gray mist—

"Grass Style: Poison Devour!"

My pupils contracted. I kicked him away and leaped backward.

The poisonous mist instantly filled the entire forest, and screams erupted wherever it touched. I grabbed Kuixing to shield her behind me, my hands moving in a continuous string of seals—

"Wind Style: Breakthrough!"

A hurricane swept through the woods, instantly blowing all the mist back. It revealed the children coughing incessantly, and finally, Kusama Shigeo, who lay limp on the ground, nearly knocked out by his own secret technique.

"Hmph, you reap what you sow! Let's tie him up!" Kuixing wouldn't miss such a good opportunity.

We worked efficiently. Kusama Shigeo was jolted awake by the pain, and his pig-like screams echoed through the small woods, startling flocks of ravens into flight.

"Ahhh!! I'm going to tear you into pieces! I'll mince you into a thousand fragments! You damn Uchiha brat—ahhhhhhh!!" He was bound to a tree by my wire locks, with only his mouth free to move, wriggling like a giant green caterpillar.

"Not bad, you've learned some idioms." Looking at his comical appearance, I managed a rare smile.

I believed this injury would be enough to keep him from bothering me for a full week.

After resolving the trouble, I walked away holding hands with Kuixing, followed by a crowd of younger students, leaving only Kusama Shigeo behind, wailing incessantly—

"Hey, if you've got the guts, don't run! Fight me for eight hundred rounds, you coward! You damn Uchiha brat!!"

"Uchiha Akatsuki—!!!"

"Akatsuki, I want to go see Itachi, is that okay?" At the ramen shop, Kuixing made the request cautiously, stars shining in her eyes.

I hesitated for a moment, then refused.

"He's a bit shy. Once he grows a little older, I'll bring him over for you to see."

"Ooh... alright then..." Kuixing the puppy-dog blinked.

I offered a strained smile, comforting the dejected Kuixing. Standing up, I said, "I still have training today, so I'll be heading off."

"Hey! Akatsuki—" Watching the boy run off in a hurry, Uchiha Kuixing pouted, turning her sadness into appetite. She slapped the table and shouted, "Uncle! Another bowl of ramen!"

A thin, small figure leaped along the edge of the cliff.

He had black hair and wore black clothes; the setting sun gilded his silhouette, giving his outline a soft, warm glow, yet the expression on his face was unnaturally cold, revealing a maturity that did not belong to his age.

The abyss yawned right beside his feet, with a waterfall cascading down, yet I felt not a shred of fear.

Every rock here was scarred, etched with the marks of kunai, shuriken, wind-shuriken, and the ravages of Fire Style, and they continued to accumulate new wounds with every movement I made.

This was the training ground for Shisui, Obito, and me. Whenever I felt stifled, I would come here to vent to my heart's content.

A stone was kicked into the air, only to be shattered by a shuriken with a thunderous crack. The debris rained down, only to be pulverized into even smaller fragments by countless tiny darts, pouring down like rain.

I leaped among the rocks, my movements growing faster and faster, constantly dodging and attacking imaginary enemies. Fire Style shattered one boulder after another—

Slowly, the face of Uchiha Itachi appeared in my mind.

His techniques, his genjutsu, his ninjutsu, his methods. His ruthless slaughter, his blood-stained cheeks, his indifferent eyes... the way he looked as he swung his blade during the clan's annihilation, as if he were merely butchering chickens and dogs—

An enemy like a god of slaughter!

My expression hardened, my hands never ceasing their seals. A massive amount of chakra gathered in my chest, and a Great Fireball roared forth!

But the next moment, the tender face of an infant appeared.

His small face was round and adorable, those dark, liquid eyes misty, staring at me with complete, ignorant innocence, even reaching out with a chubby little hand toward me.

I was startled, and just as I moved to pull back, the child's face exploded in the firelight, instantly extinguished.

My chakra spiraled into chaos, the scorching heat burning my windpipe and forcing me into a painful fit of coughing.

I braced myself against my knees, gasping for air, feeling as though the guilt in my heart could never dissipate, torturing me without a moment's rest, the coughing almost bringing tears to my eyes.

After a moment of calm, I slowly stood up, my gaze vacant, and walked slowly to the edge of the cliff.

Listening to the howling wind, I turned around, back to the setting sun, and slowly took a step back... then two...

The moment my heels hung over the void, I relaxed my entire body and leaned backward. In an instant, I plummeted straight down from the cliff!

I listened to the rushing sound of the water, felt the wind tearing through the gaps in my body, and never had my mind been so clear about the sensations of my own body as it was now—

Mid-air, I suddenly opened my eyes and fired a volley of shuriken. Thud, thud, thud—a row of them embedded into the cliff face. The steel wires attached to the shuriken pulled taut instantly, and my falling speed slowed abruptly!

Clang!

A crisp snapping sound pierced my eardrums, making my heart tighten.

Because the load was too heavy, three shuriken snapped instantly! A broken blade grazed my cheek, leaving a scratch.

I didn't panic in the slightest, using my strength to adjust my body in mid-air, and slammed my kunai into the rock wall! In an instant, a sharp pain shot through my right arm, a sensation like bone cracking and snapping, which quickly turned into numbness and soreness.

As my speed slowed slightly, my left hand threw out another string of shuriken. Thwack, thwack, thwack—they nailed into the rock, hitting a spot already riddled with countless holes, dense as a honeycomb, representing countless punctures—

Amidst the harsh screeching of steel wires pulling taut, the shuriken jammed into the final crevices of the rock and came to a halt.

Smoke rose from the cliff face, scattering and then slowly settling, finally revealing me hanging in the air, wrapped in layers of steel wire like a broken marionette.

I didn't even need to look to know that my hands must be cut, my arm so sore it had lost all feeling, twitching uncontrollably.

Yet, I felt much better in my heart.

I hung quietly halfway up the mountain, not even wanting to move a muscle, letting the extreme exhaustion wash over me.

On the opposite side of the mountain stream, a young figure stood, taking it all in. His brows were tightly furrowed, his lips pressed thin beneath his mask, the look in his eyes unreadable.

Today was his mountain-climbing practice, but he hadn't expected to witness such a scene...

Hatake Kakashi stared intently at the child in the air. He was hanging a hundred meters up, supported only by a few steel wires, his small body swaying back and forth with the valley winds, a sight that was truly shocking—

What was he doing? Why would he do this?

Kakashi squinted to look closer and soon recognized him as the friend Obito was always talking about.

"Uchiha Akatsuki... is it."

Creeeeak—

Suddenly, the sound of steel wires grating harshly caught Kakashi's attention.

The crevice that had been pierced countless times finally reached its limit, and it began to crumble away with a rustling sound!

"Damn it!"

Kakashi panicked. Just as he realized what was happening, he saw the wires in the child's hand go slack, and the small body plummeted straight toward the bottom of the mountain!

There was at least a hundred-meter drop below, but there was no cliff wall left! Only the cascading waterfall! There was nothing left to grab onto!

What to do?

Kakashi suddenly burst from the thicket, darting downward like a bolt of lightning. His eyes were locked onto the figure plummeting through the air at high speed—damn it, he wasn't going to make it in time!

At the very last moment before tragedy could strike, the small figure flipped in mid-air, and a massive fireball erupted, slamming violently into the ground. The immense thrust slowed his descent; Uchiha Akatsuki fell into the wake of the flames, then emerged from the heat waves covered in a layer of black smoke, landing in an exceptionally wretched state and rolling several times before coming to a stop in the dust, no longer moving.

Kakashi came to a halt, watching as the child lay among the stream and rocks like a corpse, motionless, the setting sun draped over him like blood.

By now, the sky had darkened, and flocks of ravens gathered in the valley; some had already landed not far from the child, and a few bold ones even hopped onto his body, beginning to peck gently.

Had he passed out?

Kakashi sprinted downward, but the child still showed no signs of movement.

Just as he was about to cross the river, another agile figure swung down from the cliff face. The youth was dressed in black with black hair, short-cropped and carrying a blade; the familiar features made Kakashi recognize him instantly—

It was the genius ninja from his own generation, Uchiha Shisui.

"Yo, who might this be?"

I woke up in a daze, and the moment I opened my eyes, I saw a pair of upturned outer corners of eyes. Uchiha Shisui was cradling my face and pulling me into his embrace, his movements gentle yet firm, brooking no refusal.

I didn't even want to move a muscle, only humming wearily and rubbing the dust off against his palm before letting him hoist me onto his back to head toward home.

This wasn't the first time Shisui had carried me back.

I didn't know when it had started, but I had already become somewhat dependent on him.