Ye! You Really Are My Brother from Another Mother!

The timeline rewound to last night.

In the backyard of the Hatake Residence, the thick wooden training dummy had already been split in two, wood chips scattered all over the ground.

Kakashi gripped the White Light Short Sword with both hands, breathing heavily as sweat slid down his silver hair and dripped into the dirt beneath his feet.

After Ye had crushed all his pride with a single flower rope during the day, he did the unthinkable. Instead of practicing his sword swings alone, he stood outside his father Hatake Sakumo's door.

"Please... teach me real combat."

Kakashi kept a straight face, but those dead-fish eyes held a stubbornness no child his age should have possessed.

Hatake Sakumo stood beneath the eaves, looking at that small figure. So many gentle words lodged in his throat, yet he could not say a single one.

Other children his age were still running around and playing, but Kakashi was like a little adult, carrying every victory and defeat on his thin shoulders.

If possible, Sakumo wished Kakashi did not have to bear so much pressure.

Sakumo silently drew the short sword from his back, descended the steps, and walked to the center of the courtyard. The ringing clash of steel soon carried far beyond the residence.

"Again!"

As Sakumo blocked Kakashi's noticeably stronger attack, his heart filled with shock.

Just what method had that little Uchiha Ye used to push his proud and arrogant son to this point?

If he had the chance, he definitely had to meet this Uchiha genius.

The scene returned to the classroom.

The scene returned to the classroom, where time flew by amid an unhealthy atmosphere of relentless competition.

Spurred on by the two maniacs, Ye and Might Guy, Class One of the first year fell into a collective, irreversible frenzy.

No one dared pass notes during class, and the bell after class became the call to train.

Everyone was either practicing hand seals at their desks or doing weighted squats by the windows.

There were even stacks of textbooks borrowed from upperclassmen piled on the windowsills.

Even Obito had changed.

In order to surpass Kakashi in the final exams, he obsessed over theory during the day, then went home at night to practice horse stances while memorizing the principles of Chakra extraction.

After a few weeks, his academic grades had improved by leaps and bounds. Whenever the teacher called on him, he could answer smoothly.

He raised his hand even more often than Guy shouted "youth," and even Gang Ziyun began to see him in a new light.

Sitting in the back row, Ye watched the entire class go insane and wore a faint smile.

All he had to do was show up at the Training Ground on time every day and undergo hellish sparring sessions with Guy. The rest of the anxiety would take care of itself for him.

The balance on the System Panel also steadily grew by two or three thousand points a day.

Soon, the final exams arrived.

A grim air of impending battle filled the classroom.

Obito sat at his desk, brimming with confidence.

With the sheer amount of practice questions he had done lately, he could have copied out last year's test paper from memory three times without any trouble.

As long as he beat Kakashi on the written exam, he would finally be able to hold his head high in front of the entire class!

Obito took a deep breath, opened his Ninja Tools pouch, and prepared to take out his stationery.

His fingers rummaged through the bag. Kunai, shuriken, Explosive Tags, bandages...

His face gradually turned pale.

Because the one thing he could not find was the brush he was supposed to have brought.

Obito froze, and cold sweat instantly broke out on his forehead.

He simply turned the entire Ninja Tools pouch upside down. Metal tools clattered across the desk, but there was still no sign of a brush.

"Fuck, I forgot my brush!"

"It's over! Everything's over!"

The beads of sweat on his forehead grew larger and larger. Obito was so anxious he nearly messed up his own hair.

He turned his head and called to Ye for help in a lowered voice.

"Ye, save me. Do you have an extra brush? I forgot mine. Lend me one."

Ye did not know whether to laugh or cry. He still remembered how this guy had mocked him at the beginning of the school year for coming to class without Ninja Tools.

And now, karma had come around this quickly.

Ye slowly turned his head, looked at Obito's near-tearful face, and broke into a broad smile.

With a thought, he tapped the top-tier piece of junk that had been sitting in the corner of the System Space for ages. At last, it had its moment to shine.

[Imperial Brush Guaranteed to Leak Ink · Gilded Limited Edition: The ink comes with a durian stench that lingers for ten days.]

"Yes."

Ye answered and casually reached into his desk drawer, pretending to rummage around.

When he withdrew his hand, there was a fully gilded, rather ornate brush between his fingers.

Its handle was carved with intricate patterns that reflected a soft golden glow in the sunlight.

"The last one. I'll lend it to you."

Ye handed over the brush.

Obito's gaze locked firmly onto it.

He carefully accepted the gilded brush with both hands. Looking at its exquisite body, his nose suddenly stung, and his eyes even grew hot.

At such a fate-deciding moment, Ye was actually willing to lend him such an expensive brush.

This was fucking brotherhood from another mother!

Obito gripped the brush handle tightly and nodded heavily, his face full of solemnity.

"Ye! Thank you so much! To do justice to this brush of yours, I definitely won't mess up today's exam!"

Ye withdrew his hand, then turned and sat down in the corner of the classroom.

At that moment, the proctor walked onto the podium carrying a stack of test papers sealed with tape, his voice steady.

"This is the last exam. Summer break begins after it's over. I hope everyone answers carefully. Now, I'll hand out the papers."

The seals were torn open, and the white test papers, carrying the scent of fresh ink, were passed back one by one from the front row.

Obito received his paper and swept his gaze across the first five multiple-choice questions. Every one of them was within the outline he had memorized last night.

The recent hellish grind in the abandoned wilderness had not only tempered his body, but also dramatically improved his memory for theoretical knowledge.

Obito felt his thoughts become extraordinarily clear, and the corners of his mouth rose on their own.

First major question: the basic distribution map of Chakra pathways—he had copied it out seven times.

Second major question: the historical development of Konoha and the First Hokage's philosophy behind founding the village—he had memorized it right before bed last night.

Third major question: the differences between the three basic nature transformations and their applications—Guy had quizzed him on it during a break from handstand training, and he remembered every word.

He knew it all.

He fucking knew it all!

Obito simply closed his eyes.

Not because he did not know how to write.

But because he knew it too well.

The answers poured automatically from his mind. Relying purely on muscle memory, he filled in the answers, writing blindly even faster than he could with his eyes open.

The image in his mind had already shifted to the day of the final awards ceremony.

Hiruzen Sarutobi stood on the high stage and called out his name.

First in the entire grade, Obito Uchiha.

The teachers and students of the whole school all turned to look at him. Rin Nohara stood at the front of the crowd, holding the report card, her eyes filled with stars.

She ran over to him, clasped her hands together, and looked at him with pure admiration.

"Obito! You're amazing!"

And all he had to do was tilt his head slightly and casually reply...

"Not bad. I didn't really study that much."

Behind him, that pretentious bastard Kakashi could only curl up in some dark corner, gritting his teeth in helpless rage.

Perfect!

Obito kept his eyes closed, unable to hide the smile on his face!

Just as Obito began composing the second part of his acceptance speech, a smell entered his nostrils.

Something was wrong.

It was not "a smell."

It was a heavy artillery blast.

A rich, sharp, disgustingly layered stench, carrying hints of cloying sweetness and pungency, shot straight through his nostrils and slammed into the top of his skull.

Obito sniffed twice in confusion. Rather than fading, the stench only grew stronger.

He reflexively snapped his eyes open.

The answer area that had been pristine white now had a pool of pitch-black ink spreading across its center.

The multiple-choice answers and the first three written responses he had just completed had already been completely swallowed up. Even the outlines of the handwriting were no longer visible.

"..." Obito's brain crashed for a full two seconds.

He abruptly raised his right hand.

A huge bead of ink hung from the tip of the gilded brush, trembling as if ready to fall at any moment.

"No... no, no, no, no, no!"

Obito panicked, cold sweat pouring down his face.

Instinctively, he tried to lift the brush away from the paper.

But because he was too nervous, his arm muscles stiffened, and his wrist exerted force in the exact opposite direction.

Not only did the brush tip fail to leave the test paper, it jabbed heavily back down.

That jab completely activated the gilded brush's hidden trait and opened the gates of hell.