White Fang of the Leaf's Countdown to Death!

"My name is Obito. I never imagined I'd still come first in the class."

At the podium, Gang Ziyun held a sheet of paper that was almost completely black, his expression a magnificent mix of emotions.

"Obito, you really are your teacher's lucky star."

The next second, his tone rose as he roared at the entire class, "Obito Uchiha, zero points! Dead last in the class!"

[Ding, Obito Uchiha's Guard-Break Points +999!]

By the window in the back row, Ye rested his cheek on one hand. Hearing that crisp "+999" in his mind, the corners of his mouth rose uncontrollably.

He'd hit the jackpot.

With Obito's massive contribution, plus the steady harvest from the entire class spending the past year grinding themselves to the brink of collapse,

the number on the System Panel had finally crossed a milestone.

Balance: 1,003,770.

Seven digits. One million!

Ye stared at that dazzling string of numbers, secretly thrilled to the extreme.

Final exams were practically the perfect tool for harvesting Guard-Break Points. The results were absurdly good.

He even rubbed his chin and considered writing an anonymous thousand-word proposal to the Ninja Academy principal later.

He would strongly urge Konoha to promote the advanced educational philosophy of "small tests every week, big tests every month." The kids couldn't be allowed to sit around idle.

As laughter at Obito's expense erupted throughout the classroom, Ye closed his eyes and sank his consciousness into the System Space.

The Advanced Prize Pool interface blazed with golden light, flashy as hell.

The large red words at the bottom were especially eye-catching:

[Million Advanced Ten-Pull: Costs 1,000,000 points. A legendary-grade item guaranteed.]

"All in."

With a thought from Ye, a million points vanished instantly.

Golden light exploded across the system interface, and notification chimes flooded the entire screen!

[Obtained: Uzumaki physique (permanently bound; greatly enhances vitality and recovery speed)]

[Obtained: Two-Tomoe Sharingan (painlessly advances from the original one-tomoe state)]

[Obtained: Mastery-Level Three-Body Technique (Transformation Technique/Clone Technique/Substitution Technique)]

[Obtained: Mind-Reading Card (one-time conceptual item; touch a target to read all of their current true thoughts; destroyed after use)]

[Obtained: Ten-Tails Chakra Fragment—Three-Tails (cannot be used until all fragments are collected)]

[Obtained: Ninja boots that automatically tie shoelaces into dead knots ×10]

[Obtained: Short Swords that will be caught barehanded with 100% certainty ×10]

[Obtained: Whistles that only produce suona sounds no matter how hard they are blown ×10]

[Obtained: Writing brushes that automatically correct writing into honorific speech ×10]

[Obtained: Voice changers that make people think you are barking like a dog the moment you speak ×10]

Ye froze for a moment when he saw the Short Swords. Those were conceptual-level items.

Still, his attention was mainly focused on the first five top-tier rewards.

"Fuse!"

As soon as he spoke, a warm current surged from his heart and instantly flowed through his entire body.

His bones crackled densely like popping beans, as though a gentle yet tyrannical force had smashed and reconstructed them.

Every inch of muscle and every nerve was reborn beneath the cleansing of that life energy.

Then, an extreme coolness spread through his eyes.

Within his black pupils, a second tomoe appeared out of thin air. It reflected the first as they slowly rotated into place.

The entire world was instantly dissected, slowed down, and rendered incomparably clear in his eyes.

All the hand seals and muscle memory of the mastery-level Three-Body Technique were also branded deep into his mind like instinct.

Ye clenched his fist, feeling the earth-shaking changes within himself. He slowly exhaled a breath of stale air, feeling refreshed all over.

At that moment, he was no longer some new Ninja Academy student.

As for that final Ten-Tails Chakra Fragment, Ye gave it a glance and rolled his eyes inwardly.

What a scummy system. A collectible card game, huh?

You had to collect all nine before you could use it. How was that any different from supermarkets in his previous life dangling grand prizes for collecting cards?

Ding ding ding!

The dismissal bell rang, announcing the arrival of summer vacation.

Before the bell had even fully faded, Might Guy kicked his chair away and strode over to Ye's seat.

He clenched both fists, his eyes seeming to burn with blazing flames as he roared passionately.

"Ye! Final exams are over! Does that mean we'll immediately begin our youthful summer vacation hell training?! Training volume must at least be doubled!"

Facing this tireless grinding maniac, Ye calmly raised a hand and pressed it down.

"Of course. But I have some personal matters to handle first. When the time comes, I'll come find you at the Training Ground."

Guy nodded heavily, utterly obedient, his eyes beginning to moisten again.

"This is the bond of youth! I'll wait for you at the Training Ground while doing handstands!"

Just as Guy turned and ran out of the classroom, Asuma came around from the side while pinching his nose.

His gaze locked onto the zero-point test paper in Obito's hand, still carrying a lingering odor, and he took a disgusted step back.

"Damn, Obito, hurry up and throw that thing away!"

"It smells fucking awful!"

"I seriously don't know how Teacher Gang managed to grade it with that smell. He was lucky it didn't send him off on the spot."

Obito's already shattered resolve suffered a second devastating blow.

[Ding!]

[Guard-Break Points from Obito Uchiha +666!]

Obito bit his lip, but in the end, he still couldn't hold back his tears. They slid down his cheeks.

He shouted hoarsely, his voice choked with sobs, "Stop scolding me... Please stop scolding me..."

Then he turned around and stared unblinkingly at Ye with eyes filled with grievance and accusation.

Those eyes clearly said: What kind of pen did you give me?!

But he had begged shamelessly for that damn pen himself, so there was no way he could shift the blame.

Obito felt a hundred times worse than if he had eaten a fly.

Ye ignored Obito without changing expression and looked toward Kakashi, who was walking over with his backpack.

Throughout their entire year at the Ninja Academy, no matter how crazily Kakashi pushed himself in training,

as long as he faced Ye in practical combat class, the result was always Ye pinning him into the mud with one hand.

Once, Ye had even done it blindfolded.

Over time, Kakashi completely came to terms with reality and chose to slack off.

As long as he didn't use Uchiha Ye as a standard for human beings, he was still unquestionably the number one genius in the class.

After letting himself off the hook, the deadly hostility between the two of them gradually disappeared.

Sometimes, Ye would casually toss him a sweet cake he had swindled out of Obito, and Kakashi would silently catch it and eat it. Their relationship was surprisingly normal.

"Kakashi."

Ye called out to him naturally.

"Has your dad been home these past few days? I've hit a bit of a bottleneck lately. I want to ask Uncle Sakumo for some guidance on practical swordsmanship."

Kakashi stopped and turned around, looking at Ye for two seconds with his signature dead-fish eyes.

After thinking for a moment, he said, "The next few days probably won't work. My father told me yesterday that he accepted a mission and seems to be leaving sometime soon."

Kakashi's voice was as flat as ever.

"He's making his final Ninja Tools preparations. It may be some time before he returns."

A mission.

The moment those words entered Ye's ears, his heart skipped a beat.

The timeline... matched.

In the original story, White Fang of the Leaf, Hatake Sakumo, accepted an S-Rank top-secret mission concerning Konoha's future at this exact point in time.

And it was precisely because he failed that mission to save his companions that he was ultimately driven to draw his blade and kill himself amid the entire village's accusations and curses.

The main storyline he had endured for an entire year had finally arrived.

The gears of fate began to turn.