Pretending Not to Care

"You're eating a lot today, Naruto."

"Yeah, Uncle Teuchi. Your ramen is the best. I've missed it so much."

Ichiraku Ramen.

After wolfing down five bowls of Ichiraku Ramen, Naruto leaned back in his chair, utterly satisfied. Behind the counter, Uncle Teuchi smiled and said:

"It's not that good, is it? You were just here the day before yesterday."

"Hehe, because it really is delicious."

Naruto grinned and looked up. He handed the money to the owner, clasped his hands together, and said, "Thanks for the meal!" Then he sauntered out of the shop.

The owner tucked the money into the drawer without counting it. Watching Naruto's figure gradually disappear, he wore a thoughtful expression.

"What's wrong, Father? Why are you just standing there?"

Teuchi's daughter, Ayame, came over to clear away the bowls and chopsticks Naruto had left behind. Teuchi scratched his cheek. "Oh, nothing. I just suddenly realized Naruto-kun seems to have become more polite."

"What kind of thing is that to say?" Ayame laughed. "Naruto-kun has always been a good kid."

"Of course I know that. That's not what I meant. I just have this feeling... Well, you'll understand when you become a parent someday."

"Father? What are you hinting at? I've told you before! I don't want to get married this young!"

"No, that's not what I meant... Sigh, I'm sorry. I was wrong." Teuchi wore a troubled expression and gave up trying to explain himself to a woman. It was something he'd learned after getting married.

Don't ask why he hadn't learned it while dating. The answer was that he'd been played.

Unlike the other people in Konoha, this father and daughter hadn't joined in ostracizing Naruto just because everyone else did. Without any prejudice, the two of them had naturally come to see that Naruto had a kind heart.

Now that Naruto had returned from the movie theater, he realized just how precious such seemingly simple kindness was. In fact, during his time at the movie theater, whenever he thought back on Konoha, this little shop had been one of the few warm memories he had.

With his hands behind his head, Naruto strolled down the streets of Konoha, which he hadn't seen in so long. Naturally, memories came flooding back.

How nostalgic. That little convenience store gave you one cup of instant ramen free when you bought five. Such a great deal.

And Yakiniku Q—every time he walked past, it smelled incredible. Once he had some money, he'd definitely come here for a meal.

Oh, and the cold stares and whispers from passersby. So classic.

Like the Red Sea parting before Moses, crowds automatically made way wherever Naruto went. They looked at him as if he were some kind of pest, while speaking in "hushed" voices loud enough for him to hear. "That child... the demon fox." "Why does the Third Hokage let him stay in Konoha?" and things like that.

Naruto couldn't be bothered with their incessant chatter anymore, but to maintain his persona, he made an exaggerated face at the passersby, then dashed off toward home.

That's right, maintain his persona.

His tone of voice, the way he swaggered along with his hands behind his head, even the faces he made at passersby—and even the goggles on his head, which he thought were ugly but had never taken off—all of it was a disguise to keep up the persona he'd had before.

As the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki, he was a strategic deterrent on the level of a nuclear weapon to Konoha. There were bound to be Anbu watching over him and keeping him under surveillance. It was an obvious deduction.

So even though he wasn't the same Naruto he'd been before, he couldn't suddenly reveal that. After all, what had happened in the movie theater was something he didn't want to explain and couldn't explain.

If he foolishly made a big show of how different he was as soon as he returned, such an abrupt transformation, as if he were a different person, would be no different from treating the Anbu watching him and Konoha High Command like idiots—and dancing on their most sensitive nerves. A Jinchuriki must never become uncontrollable. That was the consensus among all the ninja villages.

In that case, their first thought would probably be that some kind of jutsu had brainwashed him, followed by even tighter surveillance, or even imprisonment.

Naruto could no longer naively regard the Third Hokage as merely a "kind old grandfather" who would trust and accept him unconditionally. No matter how amiable the Third Hokage seemed, he was still a political creature who had spanned two generations and controlled Konoha for decades. How could someone like that have such a simple mind?

What's more, Danzo was still around in Konoha's leadership, stirring up trouble at every turn...

Therefore.

His "change" needed to be preceded by a plausible "turning point."

Naruto's gaze was profound. He already had a rough idea.

But before that, to be on the safe side, he needed to run a test.

"Creak."

When he returned home and pushed open the iron gate, the room before him felt both familiar and strange.

The last rays of the setting sun slanted through the window. In the empty room, the refrigerator's soft hum was the only sound.

Empty instant ramen cups were piled in the sink. In the corner, an unwashed futon lay crumpled up, with a torn-off calendar page trapped beneath it. A certain date had been marked with a large circle and an X.

Naruto sniffed. Besides the familiar lingering smell of instant ramen, there was a faint chill in the air. After so many years, some details about this room had grown hazy in his memory.

He walked straight to the futon and picked up the calendar page. Only then did he notice that the date marked with a circle and an X was October 10.

It was a date someone had deliberately marked, but one that was destined to go unnoticed.

"..."

His original plan was thrown off. The calm he'd maintained for so many years suddenly rippled in that instant.

Naruto stood quietly in the room, gripping the calendar page without moving. The sunset had faded, and night descended like a curtain, enveloping him. He'd thought he had changed, that he was no longer the person he used to be. Now he was strong enough, and knew enough. But when sadness and loneliness caught up with him like a dog, he realized that some things had always been there, unchanged. Those wounds had never healed, and he was still the same person he'd always been.

Even after growing up, that dead-last kid was still crying inside.

He hadn't gotten used to being alone after all. He'd only been pretending not to care.

"Is he crying?"

"No. His shoulders aren't moving. He's just standing there, spacing out."

"No, he's crying."

In the shadows of a distant rooftop, two masked Anbu spoke in hushed voices.

"Let's make a note of it first. The Jinchuriki is emotionally unstable. We should report it to Lord Hokage..."

A hand stopped the Anbu who was speaking. The other Anbu calmly said:

"He isn't crying. He isn't emotionally unstable. He's just spacing out."

"Yugao, you..."

"Use codenames while we're on a mission." Uzuki Yugao's tone remained steady. "The light's off, and neither of us is a Hyuga, so we can't be completely certain of the Jinchuriki's current state, can we? For the sake of accurate reports, don't write down baseless assumptions."

"..."

"He's a Jinchuriki, but he's also a child."

"...All right."

Naruto didn't stand there for long. After calming down, he took a shower in the bathroom, then lay down on the bed and closed his eyes.

Everything was back on track. That moment of sadness only made him more certain of what he was about to do.

Naruto focused his attention on his lower abdomen. Before long, it was as if he'd popped an invisible bubble. His consciousness discovered a space there, one he could enter with just a thought.

"Surprisingly smooth..." Naruto thought.

He had some ideas about why it had gone so smoothly.

Ever since returning to the Ninja World and sensing chakra again, he'd had the vague feeling that his spiritual energy had grown considerably.

Chakra was a combination of physical and spiritual energy. In the past, when Naruto trained by molding chakra, his mind would often give out before his body grew tired. Now, it seemed as if his spiritual energy had caught up with his physical energy.

If Naruto's guess was right, that was an astonishing thing.

After all, he not only had the blood of the Uzumaki Clan flowing through him, but in a certain sense, as Asura's reincarnation, Naruto was also the only [Sage Body] in the Ninja World today.

And if his spiritual energy had caught up with his physical energy, that meant the total amount of his chakra had increased considerably...

So, how many times Kakashi's chakra did he have now?