Integrating Shikotsumyaku!

He woke up again.

It was now afternoon. Uchiha Hui glanced at the clock on the wall. A full four or five hours had passed since he had returned home.

He forced himself upright. Sweat covered the floor, with faint traces of blood mixed into it.

He clenched his fists.

Uchiha Hui discovered that his physical strength had improved by far more than a little. Even casually exerting himself filled him with immense satisfaction.

Then...

He grinned and looked at his palm, then sensed the power hidden deep within his body.

Shing!

A bone sword instantly shot out of his palm. It was pure white, gleaming like jade, yet that luster carried an icy menace that made people hesitate to touch it, just like a fine blade!

Just as I thought. This is Shikotsumyaku!

Uchiha Hui was exhilarated. Back when he had watched the anime in his previous life, he had been obsessed with Shikotsumyaku. The ability to pull bones from his body at will and use them in combat was outrageously powerful—the perfect tool for murder and plunder, catching enemies completely off guard!

And now, he possessed that power himself.

Even if it was still relatively weak!

As Uchiha Hui felt the power of Shikotsumyaku, he gained a rough understanding of it. If Kimimaro's Shikotsumyaku in the anime he remembered represented its pinnacle, then he had barely crossed the threshold. Both the strength of his bones and the development of his bloodline remained far from what he envisioned, let alone anything comparable to the All-Killing Ash Bones Kaguya used.

I wonder whether Kimimaro's illness had anything to do with Shikotsumyaku. I'll have to study that more later.

Uchiha Hui thought of Kimimaro's "bloodline disease." Back when he browsed forums, quite a few people suspected it had been caused by retracting bones covered in other people's blood into his body after every battle. That theory had garnered plenty of support.

But no one knew what the truth actually was.

Like Kimimaro, another person who had suffered a serious illness and died young because of a powerful kekkei genkai was Uchiha Itachi.

Yes, the boy who was now Uchiha Hui's nephew.

That famously "filial" son.

He, too, had risen to fame young and possessed tremendous strength, only to be shackled by the so-called "bloodline disease."

Uchiha Hui's thoughts quickly wandered, but eventually returned to himself. He lowered his head to examine the bone sword protruding from his palm, then retracted it.

Rather than extracting the bones from his body, Shikotsumyaku seemed to instantly form bones using his bloodline power and chakra. At any rate, when he used it, he had not felt his arm lose its support from having its bones removed.

"I'm starving!"

Only after confirming that he had truly integrated Shikotsumyaku did Uchiha Hui realize he was ravenously hungry. He hurried into the kitchen and rummaged through the refrigerator for food that had been sitting there for who knew how long.

It took nearly an hour. Uchiha Hui polished off every dumpling-like item in the refrigerator, then ate more than a dozen tubs of instant noodles before he finally felt satisfied. He leaned back in his chair and pondered life.

He rested for a good while longer.

Fully recovered, Uchiha Hui finally prepared to clean up the mess at home.

The body's previous owner had not been fond of tidying up, and his personality had kept him single to this day. As a result, his small home was still incredibly filthy. Uchiha Hui himself disliked such surroundings. He preferred to do everything in an orderly fashion.

And so.

After integrating Shikotsumyaku, he did not even go outside to test its power. Instead, he immediately began cleaning his rooms.

Just like that, time flew by until it was almost dinner, and Uchiha Hui had finished tidying all the rooms throughout his home.

"I have to admit, the Uchiha Clan has great genes!"

Uchiha Hui stood before the mirror, drying his wet hair with a towel as he smiled at his reflection.

He was already twenty-four.

The same age as the Fourth Hokage, whom he had yet to "meet."

And this was the prime of his life.

Unlike Minato, the "little sun" who always smiled and radiated warmth like the sun itself, he had spent years wearing a gloomy expression. Though his looks were no worse than Minato's, with the prestigious Uchiha Clan adding to his appeal, his entire bearing was somber, making him look difficult to get along with.

Of course, if anyone acknowledged the existence of a "Black Sun," Uchiha Hui seemed a fairly close match. His strength, however, fell far short of that "little sun."

"Then I'll quietly build up my strength, wait for the right opportunity, and leave Konoha!"

Uchiha Hui quickly finished getting ready. He put on a high-collared jacket bearing a "ping-pong paddle" emblem, slipped into an ordinary pair of dark trousers, and finally stuffed his Konoha ninja forehead protector into his pocket.

It was not that he refused to wear it. He simply felt that putting something like that on was rather strange. After all, as someone who had transmigrated here, he felt little attachment to Konoha, let alone its so-called "will of fire"!

Uchiha Hui headed toward the center of the clan compound.

He had already accepted Uchiha Fugaku's dinner invitation, so naturally he would not stand him up. He had no intention of inheriting the previous owner's grievances with him. At most, he just needed to avoid arousing suspicion or doing anything that could easily cause misunderstandings.

As for eating dinner at his older brother's home, that was hardly a big deal.

They were brothers, after all. Blood was thicker than water!

The Uchiha Clan Compound occupied a very central location in Konoha, and a large stretch of the surrounding area belonged to the clan. However, the Uchiha Clan was not particularly numerous. Despite its fame throughout the shinobi world, Uchiha Hui estimated that the entire compound, including ordinary clan members, probably housed no more than fifteen hundred people.

Of course, with the shinobi world's long history, there were bound to be descendants of the bloodline living elsewhere.

He walked for a little over twenty minutes.

Before long, Uchiha Hui spotted an imposing courtyard residence.

The courtyard's main gate bore the iconic Uchiha Gunbai emblem. Its vivid red resembled the fading sunset in the distance, striking yet tinged with decline.

Knock, knock!

He arrived at the entrance.

Uchiha Hui stepped forward and knocked on the door.

Soon, as he stood outside, Uchiha Hui heard footsteps. Judging by the sound, whoever was approaching was coming at a light run.

Creak!

As the door swung open, a ray of light from behind it shone directly onto Uchiha Hui's face. He instinctively narrowed his eyes, but his attention was soon drawn to the person before him.

A small figure stood half-hidden behind the door, a smile still on his face. Yet that smile vanished the instant he saw Uchiha Hui.

"What, you won't even greet your uncle?"

Uchiha Hui recognized him immediately.

It was none other than the Uchiha Clan's future "nightmare," the legendary "filial son," the instigator of the "Pacific War"—Uchiha Itachi!

But all that lay in the future. Right now, he was only a child, barely reaching Uchiha Hui's waist. His face was still full of innocence, and he had yet to shoulder even a trace of the Uchiha Clan's "darkness."

Pat!

Before the stunned Uchiha Itachi could speak, Uchiha Hui placed his hand directly on the boy's head and ruffled his neatly arranged hair.

Now he would have something to brag about when he went out. Kakuzu could claim to have fought the God of Shinobi and lived, while Uchiha Hui could tell people he had "subdued Itachi with one hand" and emerged completely unscathed!