"Hey, redheaded kid."
On the main road, the square-faced Chunin walking ahead turned back with a grin.
"Just another five kilometers to Konoha. Nervous?"
"First, my name is Uzumaki Hayashi."
The boy he had called out to dragged his feet and lazily lifted his head.
The wind tossed his red hair into unruly tufts, revealing a face that was almost unfairly beautiful.
His eyebrows were delicate, but his eyelashes were ridiculously long, falling in neat rows and casting faint shadows beneath his eyes. His features were so exquisite that it was impossible to tell whether he was a boy or a girl.
"Second, Nervous and I aren't that close."
"Third-"
He glanced at the square-faced Chunin and continued.
"You've looked around a dozen times on this trip. Your neck hasn't stopped moving. If anyone's nervous, it's you, Uncle Tanabe, isn't it?"
Chunin Tanabe's mouth twitched, but he finally kept quiet.
Beside him, the tall Chunin who had remained silent swallowed, forcing back a laugh.
As it happened, Tanabe had only been guessing when he called him a "redheaded kid."
The mission briefing contained exactly one sentence: there was a Redhead child near the ruins of Uzushio Village.
Everything else had been left blank. Since the child sounded pretty brash, Tanabe figured he was a boy and addressed him accordingly.
And this escort mission had taken Konoha three whole years of searching.
After Uzushio Village's destruction, the Uzumaki Clan's bloodline had scattered far and wide. The Third Hokage had issued an absolute order: whenever they found one, they were to escort them back immediately. This red-haired boy might very well be the last member of the Uzumaki Clan.
"You really don't need to be so reserved."
Tanabe leaned closer and lowered his voice, adopting the air of someone sharing inside information.
"The First's wife was a princess of the Uzumaki Clan. The Fourth's wife was one of your Uzumaki, too, with a full head of red hair. Several prominent families in the village have Uzumaki blood running through their veins."
"Just show that face of yours at the village gate, and nobody will dare give you trouble."
They continued forward. Tanabe held his tongue for another quarter kilometer before finally giving in. He leaned closer again, lowering his voice even further.
"Come to think of it... I think there's another boy named Uzumaki in the village. About your age."
"Tanabe."
The tall Chunin spoke, his voice equally low.
"Once we're in the village, don't ask what you shouldn't ask, and don't say what you shouldn't say."
At that, Tanabe sheepishly shut his mouth.
Uzumaki Hayashi's eyelid twitched.
There should only be one person in Konoha who still bore the Uzumaki name.
His expression remained unchanged, but his awareness had already sunk into the depths of his mind. A pale blue screen unfolded before his eyes, visible to him alone.
[Host: Uzumaki Hayashi] [Age: 12] [Bloodline: Uzumaki Clan (87% purity)] [Abilities: Mind's Eye of the Kagura (beginner), Chakra Refinement Technique (proficient)] [Current mission: refreshed]
Three months after arriving in this world, Uzumaki Hayashi knew this panel inside out.
In his previous life, he had been an office drone who stayed up until three in the morning waiting for novel updates. When he opened his eyes, he had become a homeless child in a town outside the ruins of Uzushio Village, with this thing added to his brain.
[Anti-Bullying System]
Its stated purpose sounded lofty: [Correct all bullying in the Shinobi World and return the will of fire to its proper path].
In practice, though, it acted like a nosy neighborhood auntie. Whenever a child got shoved around or an old person got scammed out of money, it was more eager to intervene than anyone.
Over those three months, using the [Mind's Eye of the Kagura] from his beginner's gift pack and assorted mission rewards, Uzumaki Hayashi had managed to establish himself in town as "that redheaded kid who stands up for people."
Until seven days ago, when the system had him "accidentally" reveal his red hair in front of a squad of Konoha Ninja.
After that, he had found himself on this road home.
As he walked, Uzumaki Hayashi opened the newly refreshed mission.
[Daily mission: prevent the bullying Naruto Uzumaki will suffer today] [Mission details: before dusk today, children in the village will surround Naruto Uzumaki. Ensure that he does not go home injured tonight.] [Mission reward: increased maximum Chakra Limit (elite Chunin level)] [Failure penalty: none.]
His steps faltered for half a beat as he read the mission.
The name Naruto Uzumaki slammed into his mind, setting off an entire story he knew well enough to recite by heart.
"Hey, Hayashi!" Tanabe called from ahead. "What are you spacing out for?"
"It's nothing, Uncle Tanabe."
Uzumaki Hayashi answered, his fingers curling at his sides before quickly relaxing again. His face still wore the same lazy expression, but he now had a few other plans in mind.
A few kilometers farther on, Tanabe's mouth started running again.
"What do you want to do once you're back in the village? Given who you are, the Third Hokage will definitely have special arrangements for you. But tell me, what do you want to do?"
Uzumaki Hayashi thought for a moment, then casually made something up.
"Open a little shop?"
"No ambition."
"Or go to school, coast along, graduate, lie around eating ramen every day, and make the Uzumaki bloodline great again!"
"...Well, at least you're honest."
Uzumaki Hayashi smiled and said nothing more.
Of course, there were things he couldn't say yet. He had come to Konoha because he wanted to straighten out the crooked path this world had taken.
Konoha's gates were grander than he had imagined.
A towering gatehouse, streams of people coming and going, and the sweet scent of a dumpling shop drifting through the air. Tanabe proudly introduced one thing after another, like a tour guide returning to his hometown for the holidays.
The elderly ninja at the registration desk took the documents. His gaze passed over that red hair, and his pen hand paused for a moment.
"A member of the Uzumaki Clan..."
The old man murmured the words and lowered his head to fill out the form. When he reached the sex field, his pen suddenly hovered in midair.
He looked up, inspected Uzumaki Hayashi from head to toe twice, and asked hesitantly.
"Are you... a boy or a girl?"
"Can't you look for yourself?" Uzumaki Hayashi shot back, expressionless.
Well, now-
In all his years, the old ninja had never met such an arrogant brat. He stopped asking, adjusted his glasses, leaned closer, and carefully studied every part of that face.
The eyebrows, the eyes, the nose, the chin.
After a long while, the old man confidently withdrew his gaze and put pen to paper. Stroke by stroke, he neatly filled in the sex field with-
"Female."
Once he finished, he gave his work another satisfied look and proudly filed the documents away.
Uzumaki Hayashi had no interest whatsoever in what the man had written. His attention had long since wandered elsewhere.
With the paperwork finished, Tanabe pushed up his Forehead Protector.
"You two wait here."
"I'll report to the mission hall. Iwai, keep an eye on him."
Chunin Iwai nodded and stationed himself against the wall like a stake driven into the ground. Uzumaki Hayashi found a spot at the base of the wall as well and slowly squatted down.
Then he closed his eyes. His Mind's Eye of the Kagura snapped open.
First, the world went dark. Then it lit up again. All of Konoha spread out within his perception-masses of chakra, large and small, packed close together, stretching from beneath his feet all the way to the horizon.
Uzumaki Hayashi's awareness skimmed over them, searching one by one.
Toward Hokage Rock, several masses were so deep he couldn't see their limits. He glanced at them and steered clear. A few more lurked deep underground, cold and twisted together. They didn't seem friendly.
He searched farther east and soon found it.
On the eastern side of Konoha was a small mass of chakra.
It was thin and weak, so pitifully inconspicuous amid the light filling the village.
The surrounding Chakra masses clustered in twos and threes. Only this one hung alone deep in an alley, with not a single other mass willing to approach it.
The strange thing was that, despite being so thin, it showed no sign of dissipating.
Uzumaki Hayashi stared at that mass of chakra for a while.
He had never seen one so utterly alone.
And deep within it lay a darkness of terrifying proportions, as though the entire core of the earth had been crammed into a child's body.
That darkness seemed to sense something and stirred lazily.
A thin film of sweat instantly broke out across Uzumaki Hayashi's back. He hastily withdrew his perception and skirted around that immense darkness.
Then he looked again at the area surrounding the small mass of chakra.
Two or three masses of Chakra were drifting toward it, radiating a foul, ugly malice.
[Ding-]
The system notification sounded right on cue.
[Bullying incident detected in progress.] [Target: Naruto Uzumaki.] [Current location: eastern village, alley behind Third Street.] [Distance: 1,200 meters.]
At the base of the wall, the red-haired boy opened his eyes.
He slowly stood, brushed the dust off his trousers, and grinned at Chunin Iwai.
"Uncle, I'm going to the bathroom."
Iwai replied, sounding rather exasperated.
"...There's a bathroom right inside the registration office. You're plotting something else, aren't you, kid?"
"Of course not. First, holding it in is bad for your health. Second, if I go a little farther, I can take in Konoha's scenery along the way."
"When Uncle Tanabe gets back, tell him something I ate upset my stomach."
Uzumaki Hayashi waved a hand. Before Iwai could react, he had already sauntered three meters away.
His red hair flickered in and out of sight among the crowd, like a small, conspicuous flag.
[Ding-] [Mission timer started.]
Naruto Uzumaki, your big brother's coming!
Before you continue