Uchiha Life

After bidding farewell to Shisui, Baiyu headed home alone.

He lived with the Uchiha clansmen, most of his neighbors being orphans of the war.

Due to the Nine-Tails chaos four years ago, the Uchiha clan had fallen under the suspicion of Konoha's upper echelons.

The radical faction, led by Danzo, had forced the Uchiha to relocate from the corner of the village to its outer periphery.

Back then, Baiyu was still in school, and he clearly remembered that the journey to the Ninja Academy took a full half-hour.

The work of the Uchiha clan at the Konoha Military Police Force was also deeply affected.

Baiyu had been focusing on practicing his sword-drawing technique and didn't know much about the specifics.

However, every time he entered Konoha, he could feel waves of malice directed at him.

Baiyu was not so naive as to believe that he could win over those prejudiced villagers with love.

No one likes to be resented.

Baiyu was no exception, so after becoming a ninja, he rarely went into the village unless he was turning in a mission.

The Uchiha clansmen had established their own marketplace within the clan compound.

The market was small, but it had everything one could need.

Just after returning home, Baiyu grabbed some money and headed toward the food market.

Living alone builds self-reliance, especially when one is also poor.

Five years is enough time for a lazy college student to grow into a competent cook.

Baiyu had tested this personally and found it effective.

Cooking delicious food had become Baiyu's favorite activity outside of practicing swordsmanship.

Training satisfied the body, while good food satisfied the soul.

Physical training and stamina building required the consumption of large amounts of meat.

Meat dishes were his specialty.

Baiyu basically cooked for himself, having tried his hand at all the major dishes from the memories of his past life.

Baiyu didn't know the exact number of people in the Uchiha clan, but he could get a rough idea from the market.

"Boss, give me two jin of pork belly."

Baiyu arrived at a meat stall and spoke to the owner.

"Oh, Baiyu-kun, you're back! I hope the mission went well."

The butcher's name was Aizawa, a middle-aged man with no talent for being a ninja.

Of course, his surname was also Uchiha.

Baiyu had concluded that ordinary people like him made up nearly half of the Uchiha clan.

This was because, in the market, the ratio of ordinary people to ninjas with chakra was roughly fifty-fifty.

Of course, this might also be because many clan ninjas were out executing missions.

Among the older generation, however, there were quite a few who possessed chakra.

"Uncle, my mission pay hasn't risen as fast as your meat prices!"

Baiyu laughed. He was very familiar with Uncle Aizawa, having bought meat from him for over four years. The uncle always praised him for earning money, though he hadn't exactly struck it rich yet.

Uncle Aizawa's meat was considered the freshest in the market.

"Congratulations, congratulations! It's truly great to be a ninja. I once wanted to be one too, but my father wouldn't allow it, and in the end, he just taught me how to slaughter pigs, sigh..."

Uncle Aizawa praised him, then shifted the topic to his own lost dreams.

Baiyu responded with a smile.

Only when interacting with people he knew well did Baiyu show a smile.

It was a classic Uchiha personality: cold on the outside, warm on the inside.

This uncle would chat with him every time he bought meat, and Baiyu had long since grown accustomed to it.

"Hurry up, Uncle, I haven't had lunch yet."

Baiyu urged him; once this uncle got comfortable, he could talk forever.

"Alright, alright, here you go. That will be fifty-three ryo!"

"Another price hike?"

Baiyu said speechlessly, pulling out a gray wallet with a sword pattern with a pained expression.

In the Naruto world, the ryo is the unit of currency; one ryo is roughly equivalent to the purchasing power of ten Japanese yen from his past life.

With the yen-to-RMB exchange rate being about fifteen to one.

Converted, the pork here had actually risen to thirty-five yuan.

It's only been a few days, and the price has already jumped several times!

A few days ago it was fifteen, then it went to twenty-five, and now it's actually thirty-five yuan!

"Nothing I can do about it. The village says the Daimyo's court had their supply lines cut off by a group of bandits."

Aizawa waved his hand dismissively; he sourced all his pork directly from the village.

"..."

Baiyu had nothing to say. That kind of excuse might fool the commoners.

A group of bandits daring to cut off the world's most powerful armed organization?

They must be tired of living.

If the resource supply was being cut, it was certainly the work of other major ninja villages.

Or... was it Konoha itself?

"How much are they selling it for inside the village?"

Baiyu asked curiously. If the Konoha higher-ups were trying to drive a wedge between the Uchiha and the village, doing something like this was certainly possible.

"I'm not sure. You know how some people in the village feel about the Uchiha; I haven't been to the market in a long time. You can ask my little sister when she gets back."

Uncle Aizawa shrugged.

The little sister he referred to was named Hitomi. She was ten years old and currently attending the Ninja Academy.

Like Baiyu, she was a war orphan taken in by the clan and raised with the help of the clansmen.

Uchiha Hitomi had average talent, and it was a struggle for her to even become a ninja.

It should be noted that in the eyes of the Uchiha, any ninja who couldn't graduate early was considered to have average talent.

When Hitomi's parents died in battle, she was only a few months old. She had no memories of them, let alone the ability to trigger the Sharingan through emotional trauma.

Baiyu's talent was about the same as hers. The only reason he managed to graduate from the Ninja Academy in three years was because his predecessor had awakened a pair of Sharingan right before dying.

Otherwise, with his eight-year-old body and his nature as a poor student, the chances of him relearning chakra, ninjutsu, and all the various ninja knowledge to graduate in three years would have been extremely low.

"Forget it, then."

Baiyu waved his hand.

They had once lived together in public housing provided by the clan. His predecessor had been very close to her; two lonely souls clinging to each other for survival easily developed a sense of dependency.

After Baiyu transmigrated, he spent a long time with her, but after becoming a ninja, he had little time, no common ground, and rarely kept in touch, so their relationship gradually faded.

Since graduating from the Ninja Academy, they could count the number of times they had met on one hand.

Even now, the image in Baiyu's mind was still that little girl with a ponytail, stubbornly demanding he teach her how to awaken her eyes.

So annoying!

The moment Baiyu thought of that face, he lost all interest in continuing his stroll.

"Heaven knows why anyone would like little girls! Aren't mature women better?"

Baiyu muttered to himself.

"What was that?"

Uncle Aizawa asked, confused.

"Nothing, Uncle. I'm heading back now."

Baiyu waved his hand and turned to leave.

Watching Baiyu's retreating back, Aizawa lit a cigarette and smiled. "This kid is getting stronger and stronger!"

Baiyu had forgotten to change out of his Chunin vest. It was his first time walking through the Uchiha streets wearing it, and there were no whispers or gossip to be heard.

Baiyu mocked himself for being "cannon fodder" as a Chunin, but in reality, the status was quite high.

Under normal circumstances, a Chunin was considered the backbone of the village.

They could serve as squad leaders or teachers at the Ninja Academy.

These positions were the village's "iron rice bowls"—stable, official appointments.

As for other situations, like the Nine-Tails incident, that was just cannon fodder.

Aizawa didn't point this out, instead continuing to chat with Baiyu as he always did.

He had started paying attention to Baiyu back when he was known as a genius, watching his rise, his fall, and now his promotion to Chunin.

He had never seen Baiyu's emotions fluctuate; he had always maintained a calm, steady heart in his training.

In all his years of selling pork, he had seen countless people who couldn't handle the setbacks and faded into obscurity, or those who chose reckless missions due to clan gossip and died young on the battlefield.

The clan had gone from being the heart of the village—the number one clan in Konoha—to being suspected by the village, with Anbu lurking everywhere.

Too many people had lost their composure, and a sense of restlessness had permeated the entire clan.

The more this happened, the more precious Baiyu's temperament became.

Aizawa looked around and sighed:

"The clan needs ninjas. Two more families have stopped selling pork today; tomorrow, the price could hit thirty-five ryo per catty. Sigh, maintaining a mindset like Baiyu-kun's... that really is difficult!"