What followed was of little consequence. Perhaps Itachi Uchiha and Uchiha Shisui felt too uncomfortable staying there, so they left.
After leaving, neither of them showed much emotional fluctuation. Only after heading to Konoha's ANBU to complete their duties did they return together to the Uchiha Clan Grounds.
Seeing the state they were in when they returned, Uchiha Yato and Sparkle, who had been playing a variant of chess, reacted differently.
"Looks like neither of you got the answers you wanted~"
"Anyone who didn't know better would think something happened to Fugaku Uchiha and Mikoto Uchiha~"
Sparkle could hardly be blamed for teasing him like that. Itachi Uchiha's expression was truly awful.
It felt as though the things he had always believed in were being peeled away layer by layer, exposing something even uglier beneath.
"Enough. Stop needling him."
"He probably didn't get the answer he wanted this time, so he's not feeling great."
"Let him rest for a while first."
Uchiha Yato spoke steadily, as though everything was under his control.
"What do they take Konoha for?"
"A toy, a game, or a tool to be squeezed dry?!"
Itachi Uchiha voiced his question.
Itachi Uchiha was intelligent by nature. He would never directly ask whether his family's rewards had been useful, nor would he confront Konoha's higher-ups about the Uchiha Clan.
Instead, he asked the second-place winner, the third-place winner, and those ranked after them whether they had received their bonuses and rewards.
The prizes and rewards the Uchiha Clan knew of were completely unequal to those received by some civilian ninja.
The simplest example was the seventh-place winner, a civilian ninja named Furukawa Shokai.
Yet on another ranking list—the notice board viewed by civilian ninja—that ninja had not been listed at all.
The seventh-place winner had instead become