Time, Funds, and Training Plans

After school, Uchiha Hara did not play and roughhouse in the streets like the other children, nor did he head straight home.

It was foreseeable that he would be living in Konoha for a long time, so he needed to understand all aspects of the village.

Especially price information, since his funds were far from ample.

Konoha Commercial Street.

He wandered around casually. He appeared aimless, but his "Rat-Eyed Myopia" was efficiently scanning every shop on both sides of the street, memorizing the price tags of all kinds of goods.

Though the name of this trait did not sound very pleasant and even carried a somewhat derogatory meaning, it was undeniably useful.

"Ichiraku Ramen... A bowl of regular ramen costs thirty ryo. Adding chashu or miso costs another five ryo. Special seafood ramen costs forty ryo. It seems much cheaper than in later generations."

Uchiha Hara remembered that in later generations, even the cheapest Ichiraku Ramen cost fifty ryo. Inflation must have happened later.

He paused briefly in front of the ramen shop and did some calculations.

"Fifteen hundred ryo in monthly pension payments. If I ate ramen every day, I could only afford fifty bowls. Even two bowls a day would be a stretch, and that wouldn't fill me up at all."

He continued onward, his gaze passing over a butcher shop.

"Grilled meat, three hundred ryo per catty... That's expensive." The price left him clicking his tongue.

He was a little envious of Akimichi Tanji. The snacks he brought were actually dried meat cubes. How could an ordinary family afford that?

Next came grain stores and vegetable stalls.

"Flour, twenty-five ryo per catty."

Uchiha Hara had been from the Central Plains in his previous life, and noodles had been his staple food. But seeing that price, he felt he needed to switch to rice.

More importantly, making flour-based food was troublesome and wasted time.

"Rice, ten ryo per catty."

That was rather affordable. Fortunately, he was not a picky eater.

"Pork, one hundred fifty ryo per catty."

"Chinese cabbage, forty-five ryo per catty?!"

Seeing that price, Uchiha Hara nearly lost his composure.

He knew supplies in the Ninja World might be scarce, but wasn't this cabbage price absurd?

Even more absurdly, cabbage was among the cheaper vegetables. The only vegetable cheaper than cabbage was radish, but Uchiha Hara did not like radishes.

"Tofu, ten ryo per catty. That's not bad."

After making a full round, Uchiha Hara had gained a clear understanding of Konoha's prices, and a plan quickly formed in his mind.

"Eating at restaurants is definitely out of the question. I have to cook for myself!"

Chinese cabbage and tofu were quite nutritious. Calcium, protein, vitamin C, dietary fiber—paired with rice, they could fill him up without leaving him malnourished, and they were not too expensive.

Cabbage was a little pricey, but if he used less each time, one catty could still last two or three meals.

He entered a grain store and said to the owner in a childish but clear voice, "Boss, I want twenty catties of rice."

Then he bought ten catties of relatively cheap soybean oil, one head of cabbage worth a painfully expensive forty-five ryo, and one catty of tofu.

Carrying these "strategic supplies," which had cost him 20 * 10 + 10 * 15 + 45 + 10 = 200 + 150 + 45 + 10 = 405 ryo in total, Uchiha Hara returned to his drafty little house.

After putting everything away, he washed the rice and used the small clay pot to cook a full pot of rice. Then he sliced off a small piece of cabbage and lightly stir-fried it with tofu in just a little oil.

Thus, a bowl of rice topped with cabbage and tofu was born.

There was no meat, but honestly, the meal tasted quite good.

Cabbage was just that kind of ingredient. As long as one added some salt, it tasted decent even when simply stir-fried.

He enjoyed this meal immensely.

Since transmigrating, this was the first time he had eaten a hot, filling meal.

Feeling the solid warmth in his stomach, Uchiha Hara was quite satisfied. He would cook for himself from now on.

"Fifteen hundred ryo in pension payments. If I spent it all on rice, I could buy one hundred fifty catties. People in the Ninja World have unusual physiques and big appetites. Even if I eat one and a half catties per meal, three catties a day, one hundred fifty catties will last fifty days—almost two months."

"Of course, I can't live on rice alone. I need vegetables and fats too. Like today, buying enough staple food and oil to last for a while costs less than five hundred ryo. The remaining thousand-plus ryo can be used to occasionally improve my meals or buy other necessities. Meat... I can't afford to buy it. Maybe I can hunt it myself?"

Uchiha Hara remembered that many fanfics had plots where the protagonist went fishing in the river for food.

Well, they were usually stories about transmigrating into Naruto. It was indeed rare for someone who transmigrated into an Uchiha to still need to fish to survive.

"Wait, that's not right. Naruto needed to fish because Sarutobi Hiruzen skimmed off his pension payments. Why am I only getting fifteen hundred ryo too?" Uchiha Hara sensed that something was off. Could someone in the Uchiha clan be skimming his pension payments as well?

Honestly, it was very possible, but he did not dare ask anyone.

He was only a frail five-year-old child. Even if he suddenly died one day, others would probably think it perfectly normal.

So he could not ask. He had to pretend he knew nothing.

"Damn it, don't let me find out who it is. If I do, I'll kill you!" Uchiha Hara gritted his teeth in fury. Skimming an orphan's pension payments was utterly inhuman!

He set aside the matter of the pension payments for now. There was no point rushing something like this.

After filling his stomach, Uchiha Hara spread out a sheet of rough paper and began using a pencil he had picked up to plan his time.

"The Ninja Academy starts at nine in the morning and ends at three in the afternoon. The round trip takes half an hour, plus the time needed to cook and eat. That means I have sixteen hours of free time every day, from four in the afternoon until eight the next morning."

"I'll ensure eight full hours of sleep. That leaves eight hours of actual free time!"

"Eight hours is a little absurd!"

If students from his previous life, whose days had been packed with homework, knew about so much free time, they would probably die of envy.

But Uchiha Hara had been a grinder since his student days. Seeing all that time, he naturally could not let it go to waste.

"From after school until nightfall, roughly two hours, I can go to the woods at the edge of the village to dig up wild vegetables, hunt, or fish in the Naka River. Not only can I supplement protein and vegetables and save money, I can also gather animal corpses for refinement."

Of course, he could not refine anything in the forest. Sarutobi Hiruzen's crystal ball could see the forest. Blocking it with his body would not work either; that thing had a 360-degree view. He would have to bring them home before refining them.

Uchiha Hara did not believe the Telescope Technique could see into the Uchiha compound. What ninja clan would allow Sarutobi Hiruzen to peep on them like that?

"From nightfall until midnight, after dinner, when I need to digest, is the golden period for training. I can use it to read the textbooks issued by the Ninja Academy and study theoretical knowledge. I can practice hand seals. I wonder whether Konoha has a library. If it does, I can borrow books to read. More importantly, I can train in taijutsu and chakra control."

"As for ninjutsu..." Uchiha Hara's pencil paused as he recalled his understanding of chakra's nature.

"Chakra is the fusion of physical energy and spiritual energy. At its core, it is a manifestation of vitality. So excessive chakra use is overdrawing one's lifespan!"

This was basically the shared belief of all fanfic authors, though it seemed to be nothing more than speculation.

But Senju Hashirama had strength unmatched in the Ninja World, yet he died young. In contrast, Sarutobi Hiruzen and Ōnoki were also powerful, but they remained in the rear for most of their lives and fought comparatively few times, so they lived far longer.

Could that really be a coincidence?

With matters like this, it was better to believe than not.

"Then my training path is clear: I'll focus on combat abilities built upon physical fundamentals, such as taijutsu and swordsmanship. The Three-Body Technique can serve as support. As for chakra-consuming offensive ninjutsu, I'll avoid using it whenever possible!"

"As for practice, I'll focus on taijutsu and swordsmanship. For ninjutsu-related matters, I'll only train hand seals and chakra control."

He was not worried that being unable to use ninjutsu would prevent him from becoming strong.

First, he had the Sharingan. Once he awakened it in the future, copying ninjutsu would be effortless.

That was also why he needed to train his chakra control. As long as his chakra control was precise enough, he could use copied ninjutsu immediately.

Second, techniques mattered in quality, not quantity.

His classmate Hayama Shirakumo would become an Elite Jonin in the future with nothing more than the Body Flicker Technique combined with his family's Vacuum Sword style.

Then there was Might Duy, who nearly kicked the Seven Ninja Swordsmen into a cheerful trio through sheer taijutsu outburst.

Having more ninjutsu only meant having more ways to deal with enemies. It did not raise a person's upper limit of strength. Kakashi was the typical example.

A person's upper limit still had to be driven by breakthroughs in their basic physical qualities.

Furthermore, focusing on taijutsu had another hidden benefit—it fit the image of a dead last and would not draw excessive attention from Sarutobi Hiruzen.

There was also a hierarchy of contempt toward techniques in the Ninja World. Ninjutsu and Genjutsu might be on roughly equal footing, but taijutsu was absolutely at the very bottom.

The typical examples were Might Duy and Might Guy. One could only use taijutsu and could not advance to Chunin, while the other could not even get into the Ninja Academy.

Oh, right. There should also be a Might Guy in this year's cohort. He probably had not entered the Ninja Academy yet.

Actually, this sort of contempt made no logical sense. Even in battles between Jonin, or even Kage, taijutsu carried considerable weight.

Yet this contempt existed, to the point that Tsunade was clearly extremely strong in taijutsu but still called herself a medical ninja.

Perhaps someone had already demonstrated the upper limit of ninjutsu, while no one had shown the upper limit of taijutsu yet?

Thinking of taijutsu, Uchiha Hara frowned again.

He did not lack swordsmanship. The Uchiha clan had its own.

But Konoha's systematic and powerful taijutsu seemed to consist only of the Eight Gates.

And that was a forbidden technique that burned life force. Even without opening the Eighth Gate, the first seven gates would consume one's life potential!

Did anyone really think the chakra gained after opening the gates came from nowhere?

It was all converted from your vitality!

Uchiha Hara was unwilling to use even ninjutsu, so how could he possibly train in the Eight Gates?

"Then it seems the only remaining choice is..."

His gaze deepened as memories from his previous life resurfaced once more.

"Chinese Martial Arts..."

If the Ninja World's taijutsu would not do, then naturally he had to try the martial arts from his previous life.

He believed that the cell activity and density of people in the Ninja World generally surpassed those of humans in his previous life. That in itself represented exceptional talent for cultivating Chinese Martial Arts.

What was more, he had the Demon Refining Pot, this bug-like cheat. He could continuously absorb the life essence of various creatures to strengthen himself, and could even obtain their racial traits to make up for the qualities required by taijutsu—strength, agility, reaction speed, perception...

"Others train martial arts by challenging the limits of the human body. I'm leveling up with an official cheat. Maybe the Bright Force, Hidden Force, Transforming Force, Elixir Force, Hard Force, Breaking the Void, and Seeing God Undying that existed only in theory in my previous life can truly be achieved in my hands?"

Thinking of that, even with his steady temperament, his heart could not help but surge with excitement.

Do not assume Chinese Martial Arts were weaker than ninjutsu. At the Transforming Force realm, one could dodge bullets. If one could dodge bullets, one could evade the vast majority of kunai, shuriken, and even ninjutsu used by ninja.

With the cell density of Ninja World people being three times that of Earth's humans, a Transforming Force expert in the Ninja World would only be more terrifying than one from Earth.

When that time came, it might not be impossible to punch Uchiha Madara to death with his bare fists.

And if a Transforming Force expert were given chakra...

Uchiha Hara could not imagine how powerful such a person would be.

At the very least, his fists could not be weaker than Tsunade's!

"Then it's decided!"

After carefully committing his planned schedule and training priorities to memory, Uchiha Hara took a deep breath, his gaze becoming firm and restrained once more.