The Question of Who to Transform Into

"If you could practice the Transformation Technique later, who would you want to become?"

As Kiyo asked this, he was turning a bucket upside down on the ground to dry. A faint ring of water marked the bottom, and sunlight fell on it like a slightly misshapen seal. Saori sat by the door sewing the hem of a doll's clothes, the bell she had temporarily removed resting beside her on her lap.

Che was shaving wooden sticks and paused when he heard the question.

"Why ask that all of a sudden?"

"Teacher Mine said the Transformation Technique means knowing how other people stand and talk," Kiyo said. "So if I turn into Aunt Nao, does that mean she won't have to wake me up?"

Nao happened to come out of the house just then.

Kiyo immediately sat up straight.

Che said quietly, "Your strategy got exposed way too fast."

Nao set a basket of clothes by the door. "You'd still have to get up even if you turned into me."

Kiyo looked deeply disappointed.

"I don't want to turn into someone else," Saori said softly.

Che looked at her.

Saori lowered her head and continued sewing the doll. "If I change, the bell won't know who to follow."

That answer was very Saori.

Kiyo thought about it seriously. "Then I won't change for too long either."

Nao did not interrupt them. Perhaps, in her eyes, children discussing a technique they could not yet practice was better than discussing patrols and clan meetings.

But Che did not answer right away.

He had considered the uses of the Transformation Technique. He had considered how important it could be in the future, when escaping, infiltrating, or avoiding Root and the Anbu. But Kiyo's question had pulled it back from tactics to identity: if he could become someone, who did he want to become?

The Fourth Hokage? Too outrageous.

Itachi? Dangerous.

Fugaku? Even more dangerous.

An ordinary Konoha child? That might be useful.

His past-life self?

The instant that thought surfaced, the wooden stick in Che's hand snapped.

Kiyo jumped. "Who do you want to turn into that's so scary?"

Che looked at the broken stick and smiled. "I was wondering whether you'd eat me if I turned into a rice ball."

Kiyo said solemnly, "If it was delicious, maybe."

Nao glanced at Che.

She did not press him, but Che knew she had seen that momentary wrongness.

His past-life self no longer had a name he could use in this world. He remembered phones, computers, streets, night markets, exams, webnovels, anime, and he remembered things about Naruto too. But that face was growing blurry in his memories. The name Uchiha Che was becoming heavier and heavier, so heavy that sometimes he forgot how he used to talk, how he used to walk, how he used to live in a world without chakra.

If the Transformation Technique could recreate that face, what would it feel like?

Comfort, or a deeper loneliness?

He set the broken stick aside, his fingers unconsciously tapping his knee twice. It was a small habit from his past life. Whenever he faced a difficult problem, he would tap the edge of his desk until the people around him found it annoying. Since coming to Konoha, he had rarely done it. There were no familiar desks here, and no one who made him relaxed enough to let himself forget.

But Kiyo stared at his hand. "What secret signal were you tapping just now?"

Che pulled his hand back. "Telling the rice ball to retreat."

"Why does the rice ball need to retreat?"

"Because you're too dangerous."

Kiyo was appeased by that assessment and puffed out his chest. "That's true."

Nao did not laugh. She crouched down and picked up the broken stick, her thumb brushing over the fracture as though examining a small wound. "You don't need to use so much force when shaving wooden sticks," she said.

"My hand slipped."

"When your hand slips, your face looks more like an adult's."

Che froze for a moment.

Nao put the stick back beside him. "You don't have to talk about it. But don't always cover yourself with jokes. If you keep yourself covered too long, you'll suffocate too."

Her words were so soft, yet something seemed to press down on Che's chest. He wanted to say he wasn't doing that, that it was just a casual joke, that a modern person's sense of humor simply did not suit the ninja world. But none of those words came out. Because he knew Nao did not want an answer. She had merely seen the emptiness in him when he broke that stick.

Saori picked up the bell again and gave it a gentle shake. "If you turn into someone else, does your voice change too?"

Nao looked at her. "The technique can change your appearance. Your voice has to be learned. Skilled people can imitate one very closely."

Saori thought about it. "Then I won't learn anyone else's bell sound."

Che said quietly, "That's good. There should be some things you don't lend to ninjutsu."

Nao looked at him but said nothing. She only pushed the bucket farther into the sunlight. The water mark on its bottom slowly dried away, like a question taken by the sun without being answered.

In the afternoon preparatory class, Mine had the children observe one another's walking.

Each person walked from the board to the door and back. The others had to name one trait. Kiyo walked with hurried steps, as though he was always afraid of falling behind. Saori walked lightly, making almost no sound when her bell was absent. The older children walked with tense shoulders, as though they were always prepared to prove themselves.

When it was Che's turn, he deliberately slowed his pace.

After watching him, Mine said, "You're pretending to be slow today."

The classroom fell quiet again.

Che sighed inwardly.

Teacher Mine, sometimes you really do not cooperate with my survival plan.

"Why are you pretending to be slow?" Mine asked.

Che lowered his head. "I'm practicing waiting for my feet."

That answer made Mine pause.

Sosuke's explanation had clearly reached her ears, or perhaps Nao had mentioned it. Mine did not ask further. She only said, "Waiting for your feet is not the same as dragging them. Walk again."

Che walked through it again.

This time, he neither deliberately slowed down nor rushed ahead. His steps were steadier than an ordinary child's, but still within an explainable range. When he reached the door, wind blew in from outside and stirred the hem of his clothes. He did not immediately adjust himself. Instead, he let his body adapt naturally.

Mine nodded. "This is what you look like."

What I look like.

As Che returned to his seat, his feelings became a little complicated. So people were already beginning to know what he looked like. Transformation class taught them to observe others, but it also made him realize that others were observing him too.

The observation lesson did not end there. Mine took out three short strips of cloth and tied them around the wrists of three children. She had them walk from one end of the classroom to the other, then asked the people beside them to imitate them. The imitators could not transform. They could only copy the walking, pauses, and turns of the head. The exercise looked like play, but it was difficult in practice.

When Kiyo imitated Saori, he tried hard to make his footsteps lighter. His face turned red from holding himself back. The bell did not ring, but his knee nearly crashed into a wooden stool. Saori watched him and said softly, "I'm not that nervous."

Kiyo steadied himself against the stool. "Walking like this all the time must take a lot of effort."

"It doesn't," Saori said. "I just listen first."

Those four words made Che turn to look at her. Listen first, then walk. No wonder her steps were so light, as if she did not want to interrupt anything.

When it was Kohei's turn to imitate Che, he stood at the starting point, frowned first, then lowered his shoulders. Finally, he deliberately put on a very serious expression.

Kiyo loudly commented, "Not like him! Che isn't this serious. Even when he's serious, he looks like he's about to say something weird."

Someone in the classroom laughed.

Kohei looked a little embarrassed, but Che did not laugh too exaggeratedly. He saw Kohei's right hand move to rub at his sleeve again, then quickly stop. That earlier observation still had left its mark. Che suddenly realized that every time he said he had "seen" something, it might become a new burden on someone else.

He raised his hand. "Teacher, can I walk it myself once?"

Mine nodded.

Che stood at the starting point. This time, he did not pretend to be slow or deliberately hide his speed. He kept his usual rhythm. At the midpoint, he tilted his head to glance out the window, then paused for half a beat at the door, as if confirming there had been no sudden change outside. On his way back, there was a hint of ease at the corner of his mouth, but his shoulders never completely relaxed.

After watching, Mine said, "This is what you look like now."

What he looked like now.

Not his past life, not his future self after defecting, nor the shadow who might survive the night of the Uchiha massacre. Just at this moment, a child in a temporary classroom after the disaster, trying to learn how to slow down.

Che returned to his seat and suddenly felt that the question of "who to transform into" was not so urgent anymore.

After class, Mine kept him behind.

"You don't have to change every reaction you have," she said. "The Transformation Technique teaches you to resemble others, but a ninja must also know what they themselves resemble. If you forget how you originally walked, then no matter who you become in the future, you'll give yourself away."

Che remained silent.

"Do you understand?"

"A little."

"Then go home."

After returning to East Row 2, No. 7, Che wrote in his notes:

"Before deciding who to transform into, don't lose yourself first."

He did not write down the face from his past life.

For now, he kept that face in his heart and let no page see it.

Outside the window, Kiyo was still studying whether turning into Nao could let him sleep in. Nao proved through facts that it could not. Saori sewed the bell back onto the doll's clothes and gave it a gentle shake.

Listening to the ringing, Che suddenly felt that his footsteps might not yet have caught up with the future.

But at least, he had already left a sound in this world.