Leaving

The first time Aoba sensed Natural Energy, his journey through this world had nearly ended on the spot.

For some reason, this world's Natural Energy was extremely hostile toward humans. Ninety-nine percent of people who came into contact with this power would turn directly into stone statues.

Aoba had originally been one of that ninety-nine percent. But whether because of his Mental Power or the strength of his soul, he had somehow gained a degree of resistance to the erosion of Natural Energy.

That resistance was weak, but the amount of Natural Energy he had encountered for the first time had also been very limited.

At the time, his entire body had stiffened, but he had not completely petrified. After struggling with it for a day, he had finally returned to normal.

The experience left Aoba deeply shaken. For a long time afterward, he had not dared to touch Natural Energy carelessly. But he had ultimately been unwilling to give up.

After a long period of training, although he had failed to find a way to train his Mental Power or soul, he had achieved an exceptionally precise level of control over his existing Mental Power.

After making a series of preparations, the unwilling Aoba had made his first deliberate attempt to come into contact with Natural Energy.

Just as expected, his body had stiffened once more. A day later, he had returned to normal.

The situation had been just as dangerous, but Aoba had been overjoyed. Since it could be reproduced, it meant his hypothesis was correct.

Aoba had no method for cultivating Sage Mode. Nor could he possibly have a summoning contract with the Three Great Sage Regions. Therefore, he needed another method for his Sage Mode.

Every so often, he would actively absorb some Natural Energy. Then he would wait quietly for his body to recover before repeating the process.

Again and again, he wanted his body to gradually adapt to Natural Energy through this constant repetition, until he could ultimately absorb and use this power.

It was a genuinely foolish method, but to Aoba, it was his hope of taking part in the world's main storyline.

After all, this world was exceedingly dangerous. Even though the Sage of Six Paths had left contingencies behind, the entire plan was no different from walking a tightrope. More importantly, during the two saviors' efforts to save the world, no one knew how many cannon fodder had been sacrificed.

First, Aoba did not like being cannon fodder. Second, he did not like having his fate in someone else's hands. That was why he had undertaken that slow and painful cultivation.

At this point, it had already been the third year since Aoba began training this way.

After three years, he could already absorb a considerable amount of Natural Energy into his body without being turned to stone.

However, he still could not reach the point where it had no effect on him at all.

After absorbing Natural Energy, he would still feel a certain numbness in his body.

Ninjas were assassin-type fighters with extraordinary agility. Such numbness was fatal in actual combat.

Therefore, he had yet to complete his own Sage Mode.

However, according to Aoba's calculations, he was close. At this rate, in about another half year, he would more or less complete his Sage Mode cultivation.

At that time, he would finally have another trump card that would allow him to gain a foothold in this world.

After Natural Energy circulated through his body, Aoba felt a faint numbness begin to spread through him and immediately stopped training.

In truth, he could have cultivated much faster. This world was simply too dangerous. Even though this was Konoha, in Aoba's eyes, it was even more dangerous than outside.

Therefore, he had never dared to train without restraint. Each time, he could only carefully control his progress and ensure that he retained a certain degree of combat ability at all times.

After finishing a day's training, Aoba finally lay down to rest.

The next day, Aoba went to Otsutsuki Ichiraku's ramen shop and ate a bowl of deluxe ramen. Then he headed toward the place outside the village where he had agreed to meet Naruto.

Though it was called outside the village, it was actually still within Konoha's barrier. After all, the village could not truly let Naruto run outside. Strictly speaking, this was merely a stretch of countryside far from the residential district.

After more than half a day of training, the two ate grilled fish and chatted.

"Big Brother Aoba, this is my secret base. I secretly train here every day after school. Once I get stronger, I'll definitely give that stuck-up Sasuke a good beating."

At this point, Naruto had already locked horns with Sasuke. After all, Sakura, the girl of Naruto's dreams, spent all day swooning over Sasuke.

The key was that Sasuke acted as though he could not care less. Naruto simply could not stand it. But he could not beat Sasuke, so after school each day, he could only secretly train on his own and hope that one day he would defeat Sasuke.

"Did that Sasuke Uchiha bully you?"

"Ah... not really."

"Then why do you want to beat him up?"

"Because he bullied Sakura. Sakura is so pretty, but when she talks to him, he ignores her. That's incredibly rude. Even for Sakura's sake, I have to teach him a good lesson."

He really did have a child's temper.

"Then do you know why Sasuke Uchiha doesn't like talking to people?"

"Huh?"

The Uchiha clan's extermination was an absolute major event in Konoha. To be honest, most of the village already knew about it. It was just that no one dared to openly discuss it.

Naruto, meanwhile, had no source of information in the village. The few people he could speak with were Shikamaru, Choji, and the others.

Those guys were all lazy to the bone. They probably would not explain the matter to him in detail. So even now, Naruto was still confused. He knew something had happened to Sasuke's family, but he did not know exactly what.

As time passed, he would naturally learn. But the incident had happened only recently, and he truly did not know the details.

"Seems like something happened to his family, right? But no matter what happened, he shouldn't..."

"Everyone in his family died. Every single person named Uchiha died."

"...This..." Naruto was instantly speechless.

"How is that possible? How could something like that happen? Who did it? How could something like that happen inside the village?"

At that moment, Aoba suddenly turned his head and looked toward the woods not far away. He did not continue answering Naruto's first two questions. Instead, he directly answered the last one.

"That only proves one thing: this village is not as safe as you think. All right, Naruto, we'll stop here for today. I'm leaving on a mission tomorrow, so I need to go back and make some preparations."

After saying that, Aoba did not wait for Naruto's response this time and vanished right before his eyes.

"Hey... you're leaving already? I still wanted to properly thank you, Big Brother Aoba!"