Sasuke's steps halted. The coldness, impatience, and arrogance on his perpetually frozen face melted away the instant he saw Naruto, like spring snow beneath a blazing sun!
In their place was a mix of awe, conviction, and even... a trace of awkward submission that he himself had not noticed.
"Hmph, you came to buy flowers too?"
It was an ordinary question, yet it exploded through the tiny flower shop like a bomb!
Ino Yamanaka, Shikamaru Nara, and Choji Akimichi stood as though they had been hit by a paralysis jutsu, their expressions perfectly embodying the phrase "a masterpiece of world art."
Naruto internally mocked, Look at that. That's the kind of presence a big brother has!
Sasuke was really getting the hang of things.
Leaning lazily against the doorframe, Naruto ignored Sasuke's tsundere face practically screaming for praise. He merely reached out and patted Sasuke's shoulder, neither too hard nor too lightly, like an old leader caring for a dim-witted subordinate.
"Mm."
Naruto's voice was calm, yet it carried an unquestionable sense of command. "Go train. Don't slack off."
His tone was like he was dismissing an errand-running underling.
Yet a scene that nearly made Ino and the others' eyes pop out appeared!
Sasuke Uchiha, the man whose pride was carved into his bones, actually... actually nodded with utter obedience like a well-behaved lackey!
"Okay."
One word, crisp and decisive.
Then Sasuke turned and left, his stride steady and without the slightest hesitation. He did not even spare an extra glance for those former companions in the flower shop who had already turned to stone.
As if, to him, a single word from Naruto was an imperial decree.
The entire flower shop was so quiet that a pin drop could be heard.
Only Choji, overwhelmed by the shock, let out a chip-scented belch. "Hic."
Naruto admired the expressions of the group collectively suffering a CPU meltdown, and inwardly burst with delight.
The highest realm of showing off was not boasting about yourself. It was making the person best at showing off willingly become your backdrop!
He stepped forward, ignoring Shikamaru and Choji's ghostlike stares, and walked straight up to Ino Yamanaka, who was still standing there in a daze.
The girl still held that lost and broken posture, two tears lingering in her beautiful eyes before they could fall, looking utterly pitiful.
Naruto looked down at her, a teasing curve appearing at the corner of his lips.
"Crying over that expressionless blockhead who doesn't understand romance... don't you think that's beneath you, Miss Ino?"
His voice was not loud, but it carried a lazy hint of mockery, like a feather lightly scratching the sensitive nerve in Ino called "pride."
"Huh?"
Ino suddenly snapped back to her senses. Like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, she instantly bristled!
The heartbreak of her shattered feelings, the shock of Sasuke's submission, and the embarrassment of Naruto's teasing—all her emotions erupted at once!
"What's it to you!"
Her eyes were red as she glared viciously at Naruto, her voice taking on a tearful edge. "Y-you eternal dead last! What right do you have to talk about Sasuke?"
Heh, she was still calling him "dead last"?
Apparently, she had not been shocked enough.
Naruto did not get angry. He simply grinned, revealing a mouthful of gleaming white teeth, filled with a wild, aggressive air.
He could not even be bothered to look at Ino's tear-streaked face. He directly reached into his pocket and pulled out all the spoils he had "confiscated" from those hooligans earlier—a stack of cash as thick as a brick!
Then, before everyone's stunned eyes, he swung his arm with an exceptionally dashing motion!
Smack!!!
A deafening, heavy thud rang out!
Naruto viciously slapped the stack of cash onto the flower shop's delicate wooden counter. The sound did not resemble money hitting wood at all; it was more like someone had thrown a brick onto it!
The entire counter shook three times!
This simple, crude attack of "cash power" was as mighty as an S-rank ninjutsu, brutally smashing every insult Ino had wanted to say back down her throat!
"Y-you..." Ino's tongue tied itself in knots.
Naruto extended a finger and tapped twice on the brick of cash. "Tap, tap." Raising his chin slightly, he proclaimed grandly in a tone that looked down upon the world:
"The most expensive and most beautiful flowers in your shop. I'm buying them all."
"..."
"..."
For the first time, a downright horrified expression appeared on Shikamaru's perpetually "what a drag" deadpan face.
He scratched his pineapple-shaped hair and unconsciously muttered. His voice was not loud, yet it clearly carried through the entire flower shop.
"This guy... did he rob the Land of Fire Daimyo's treasury? How did he suddenly get so rich?"
Choji had completely given up on eating chips. His tiny eyes darted back and forth between the stack of cash and Naruto, with only one thought in his mind: How many pounds of grilled meat could all that money buy...?
As for Ino, the person directly involved, she was completely dumbfounded.
She stared blankly at that absurdly thick stack of cash. The smell of ink mixed with the sweat of several hooligans, giving off a sinful yet charming scent of money.
Then her gaze uncontrollably fell upon Naruto's face again.
She did not know when it had begun, but the face of the boy before her—once plain and even somewhat foolish in her impression—had become sharply defined, filled with a masculine vigor she had never seen before.
Especially those azure eyes. They no longer held the old ingratiating, flattering look. Instead, they were filled with dominance, confidence, and a kind of... heart-pounding aggression.
Dead last?
No...
At this moment, that term seemed utterly ridiculous.
"What are you spacing out for?"
Just as Ino's mind drifted away, Naruto's almost excessively handsome face suddenly moved a step closer.
A scorching masculine scent, as radiant and forceful as the sun, instantly rushed toward her and wrapped around her without mercy.
Ino's heart inexplicably skipped a beat!
"Hurry up and wrap the flowers."
There was a trace of impatient urging in Naruto's voice. "Is this how you treat a major customer?"
"I..."
Ino was nearly unable to breathe beneath his powerful aura. Her cheeks flushed scarlet in an instant, as red as a ripe apple.
She even felt her legs going a little weak.
Sasuke's coldness was an iceberg that kept people a thousand miles away, breaking their hearts.
But the dominance of the man before her was lava with scorching heat—impossible to refuse, ready to melt a person completely!
She hastily looked away, not daring to meet Naruto's eyes that seemed capable of seeing through people's hearts. Turning around, she went to take the most expensive bouquet from the flower stand, still stubbornly muttering under her breath.
"F-fine, I'll wrap them! Why are you being so fierce? So what if you have money!"
Yet her voice was as soft as cotton candy. There was not a trace left of the fierce little wildcat who had bristled moments ago.
Watching the girl's flustered, bashful back, the amusement in Naruto's smile deepened.
That was more like it.
Empty concern was no match for a huge transfer of money.
To deal with this kind of tsundere young lady, he had to use the simplest, crudest method: first shatter her cheap pride, then redefine what she thought a "man" was!
Before you continue