The Eve of Enrollment

March 31, Year 60 of Konoha.

Tomorrow was the Ninja Academy entrance ceremony. The entire orphanage buzzed with restless energy. Little Fatty had been unable to sit still since morning, pulling his admission notice from beneath his pillow and checking it at least a dozen times. Every time, he had to make sure the name on it was really his. A Zhu looked calm on the surface, but at breakfast, she mistook salt for sugar and sprinkled it into her porridge. Only after the matron rapped her with chopsticks did she blush and get herself another bowl. Little Flower was not yet old enough to enroll, but she had already started worrying in advance, chasing after Shinichi to ask, "Once you start school, will you stop playing with me?"

Shinichi spent the morning beneath the old locust tree in the backyard.

Not training. Organizing.

He reviewed everything he had gained over the past seven months. When his memories and system had awakened last September, he had been a rookie whose chakra was barely enough for tree climbing. He could not even throw a shuriken accurately, and his only combat experience had been bug-catching contests in the orphanage backyard. Now, the chakra within him was several times that of children his age—his Wind nature was refined to jonin level, his Water nature development was complete, his Earth nature had naturally opened up after the awakening of Wood Release, the Senju Clan bloodline had officially activated, and his Wood Release had advanced from sprouting seeds to producing finger-length vines in his palm. As for skills: he could hit moving targets with shuriken in succession; Shadow Clones could reliably maintain three bodies conducting different training at once; the two jonin-level ninjutsu, Wind Release: Vacuum Blade and Gale Body Flicker, had been completely mastered; Seal-less Self-Healing operated steadily; and he could freely activate and deactivate his two-tomoe Sharingan.

There was also intelligence. He opened his notebook and looked at the hand-drawn nighttime deployment map of Leaf Village. The locations of Root's hidden sentries in the southeastern district, the shift-change times of ANBU patrol teams, the surveillance habits of the Third Hokage's direct ANBU—all of it was marked clearly. He had obtained this map through countless nighttime operations, countless hours spent lying on rooftops and counting patrol footsteps. Its value was immeasurable. But it would soon become outdated. Because after tomorrow, his main battlefield would no longer be midnight forests and warehouses, but daytime classrooms and training grounds. Enrollment meant a change in identity, from "overlooked orphan" to "noticed ninja candidate." His freedom of movement would shrink, but his influence would grow.

"Build strength first, draw the sword later"—that had been the principle he had written in his notebook last winter. The period of lying low officially ended today. Starting tomorrow, he would draw the sword.

He turned to a fresh page in his notebook and wrote the title for the next stage: "Post-Enrollment Action Plan." Then his pen stopped. After thinking for a long time, he wrote only one line.

"First step: attend school normally, make friends normally."

He laughed after writing it himself. A transmigrator with jonin-level combat strength, and the headline of his new-stage plan was actually "attend school normally." But it was no joke. Going to school normally was the hardest part. He had to pretend to be an ordinary six-year-old, listening in class, doing homework, saying, "Let me think," when called on—while simultaneously deducing changes along the Land of Fire's border in his mind. He had to interact normally with his classmates and not let them think he was unfathomable or out of place. Especially Naruto Uzumaki—this kid already regarded him as his most trusted friend and mentor, but at school, he had to find a balance between "mentor" and "classmate." He could not let others think Naruto could do nothing without him, nor could he let Naruto think he was deliberately keeping his distance.

After lunch, Naruto came over.

This time, he did not come through the window. He used the front door. He carried two paper bags in his hands, stuffed full, with a large patch at the bottom soaked through with oil. He stood at the orphanage entrance, his hair much neater than usual—though a few strands behind his ears still stuck up and refused to stay down. When Shinichi came downstairs, his first reaction was, "Did you get a haircut?"

"How could you tell?!" Naruto touched the back of his head, the tips of his ears slightly red. "Just a little trim! Grandpa Third said I had to look neat for the entrance ceremony, so he sent someone to cut it for me—that guy was heavy-handed! The clippers hurt my scalp so much it still hurts! But he said my hair was too thick, so he had to thin it out—"

"It looks good," Shinichi interrupted his rambling.

Naruto closed his mouth, his expression caught somewhere between being delighted at the compliment and not wanting anyone to notice how delighted he was. Then he suddenly raised the paper bags in his hands, nearly shoving them into Shinichi's face. "Red bean buns! I bought them from the school shop! Enrollment's tomorrow, and yesterday I washed dishes for Uncle Ichiraku for three hours. He paid me, so I bought these—two are for you! Starting tomorrow, we'll be classmates!"

Shinichi took the paper bag and opened it for a look. The red bean buns were ordinary, standard convenience-store size. The dough had not risen evenly, leaving a few fine cracks on the surface, and some red bean paste had leaked from the side and stuck to the inside of the bag. But as a gift Naruto had earned by washing dishes for three hours, its value far surpassed that of a bun. He took one out, but did not hurry to eat it. Instead, he reached into his pocket and handed Naruto something.

A forehead protector.

It was not the standard one issued by the academy. It was custom-made. The cloth was a deeper navy blue than the standard version, while the Leaf Village emblem on the metal plate was more finely engraved. A thin recessed line ran along the edge of the leaf—something one would never notice without looking carefully. The whole forehead protector looked much like the academy-issued kind, but it was lighter to the touch, and the fabric weave was denser as well.

Naruto took it and turned it over several times. Then he lowered his head and tied it around his forehead. He tried several times—the straps were too long, and even after wrapping them twice, they remained loose. Shinichi reached out to adjust them to the right length, then tucked the few strands of Naruto's hair sticking up at the side beneath the cloth band.

"There."

Naruto raised a hand and touched the metal plate on his forehead without saying anything. He pressed his lips together, staring at the worn ninja shoes on his feet, which were also a size too large. His throat bobbed twice. Then he suddenly turned and ran several steps outside before sharply spinning back around, lifting his head to reveal that trademark grin.

"Don't be late tomorrow!"

"I should be saying that to you." Shinichi shook the paper bag in his hand. "I'll wait for you at the school gate tomorrow. Whoever's late buys ramen."

"Then you're definitely paying! I wake up at five every morning!"

"Who was it that slept through the matron knocking on the door this morning?"

"That was yesterday! Yesterday doesn't count!" Naruto's voice had already reached the alley entrance, his trailing words drifting back with the scent of red bean buns scattered by the spring breeze.

Shinichi stood at the orphanage entrance and watched that golden head disappear around the bend in the alley. The paper bag had grown faintly hot in the sunlight, and the warmth of the bun seeped through it into his palm. Everything was normal.

That evening, he helped the matron make one final dinner. She knew that from tomorrow onward, he would be attending the Ninja Academy. Once the children of the orphanage enrolled, they were no longer hers—meals, training, missions, all their time would be arranged by the academy. They would only return late each day to sleep. She was much quieter than usual in the kitchen, barely nagging while she chopped vegetables. Only when Shinichi carried out the final dish did she say, "Don't cause trouble at school." After a pause, she added, "And don't let anyone bully you."

Shinichi stopped walking. The matron continued chopping with her back to him. The rhythm of her cleaver against the cutting board was far slower than usual, every chop heavy. This woman, who had been cooking at the orphanage ever since he could remember, had never spared anyone with her words. But the extra rice in his porridge, the extra egg when he was sick, and the kitchen's back window always left slightly ajar when he accidentally returned in the middle of the night—those were all her unspoken arrangements.

"I know," Shinichi said. This time, he added no hidden meaning in his heart.

Late at night, moonlight streamed through the hole in the window, casting the same silvery patch of light across the floor. Shinichi checked all the things he needed for enrollment tomorrow one last time—his student uniform hung at the head of the bed, his forehead protector was folded neatly on top of it, and the academy-issued ninja tool pouch contained only two basic kunai and two shuriken. His own kunai was hidden beneath the bedboard. The academy-issued tools were for others to see; his own was what would save his life. Beneath his pillow lay two things: the direct Hokage badge given by the Third Hokage, and the red bean bun Naruto had given him. Two paper bags—one represented power, the other a bond—both rested beneath the same pillow.

He lay down and stared at the cracks in the ceiling. He had looked at that crack stretching from the corner of the wall to the side of the light fixture for seven whole months. He could draw its pattern with his eyes closed. Starting tomorrow, he would no longer have so much time to stare blankly at it. Starting tomorrow, he would look up at the blackboard from a seat in the classroom, practice shuriken with his classmates on the training field, and attend lessons in the same classroom as Naruto, Sasuke, Hinata, Ino, and the others. The Konoha Twelve—characters he had watched countless times through a screen in his previous life—would no longer be characters tomorrow, but living, breathing classmates.

He closed his eyes and heard the calls of night birds from near Hokage Rock in the distance. Everything was ready.