AFK Great Fireball

The next day.

Gua got up early, had breakfast, and went straight to Itachi's house to call him out.

This was the first time Gua had ever been so proactive.

He had no choice. After his mother's scare yesterday, he kept feeling as though the night of the massacre was tomorrow, and a game-over screen for the entire clan might pop up at any moment.

That forced him to feel a sense of urgency.

Fortunately, when he left home that morning, his father, Dashan, had left even earlier, so he hadn't stopped Gua and forced him to stay home reading extracurricular books or anything like that.

Unfortunately, when Gua arrived at Itachi's house, he discovered that many Uchiha clan members had gathered there.

His own father was among them.

Noticing Gua's arrival, Dashan visibly froze. Hadn't he told Gua to stay home and read?

This boy.

Dashan shook his head, feeling a little helpless.

Still, there was nothing he could do now. It was fine for Gua to come out occasionally if it made him happy.

Dashan stood with the other adults in the clan, with Clan Head Fugaku at their head. They seemed to be having one of their usual discussions.

Gua didn't listen closely. He went around the courtyard and happened to run into Itachi as he was heading out.

"Gua."

Itachi was a little surprised by how out of character Gua was acting today.

"Yeah, let's hurry up and train."

Gua said.

Although he was urging Itachi along, he still sounded as flat and robotic as usual.

"Oh, okay."

Itachi agreed. He had been heading out to find Gua anyway.

Now that Gua had come to him, the two of them could head to the Back Mountain together.

The two arrived at the Back Mountain.

Itachi began demonstrating the Great Fireball Technique for Gua.

"Snake, Goat, Monkey, Boar, Horse, Tiger!"

"Fire Release! Great Fireball Technique!"

Holding two fingers together in front of him, Itachi's chest heaved. A thin stream of fire shot from his mouth, then burst explosively several meters ahead, billowing outward into a massive fireball that covered a full seven or eight meters.

"Gua, what do you think? Have you learned it?"

Itachi stopped what he was doing and turned to look at Gua.

Gua shook his head.

"But I can give it a try first."

"Okay."

Gua stepped forward and began forming hand seals, imitating Itachi's movements from just now.

"Snake, Goat, Monkey, Boar, Horse, Tiger."

"Fire Release, Great Fireball Technique."

Copying Itachi's movements, Gua held two fingers together in front of him and expelled a mouthful of chakra.

Whoosh~

Nothing happened.

"It failed, huh."

Itachi was the first to sigh.

Gua, however, remained calm and nodded.

He didn't feel much about his failure.

After all, if you came dead last on every exam, coming dead last one more time was hardly surprising.

For the rest of the day.

Gua kept trying Fire Release over and over.

Time flew, and the hours slipped by.

The day passed in the blink of an eye.

When the evening sky turned red, Gua said goodbye to Itachi and went home.

When he got home, only his mother, Nai, was there again. The police force had been rather busy lately, and his father, Dashan, was always leaving early and returning late.

Gua guessed that Orochimaru had gone completely mad.

He had begun abducting people for experiments without any restraint.

And that was indeed the case.

Somewhere underground in Konoha.

The village's pipes tangled overhead, and the ground was damp. Water dripped rhythmically from above, pattering against the floor and echoing clearly through the empty underground space.

A tall, slender man with long hair and a clammy, sinister air approached from the darkness in the distance.

Tap, tap, tap!

As the man drew closer, his narrow, venomous snake-like eyes and pale skin gradually came into view.

His long hair covered half of the Konoha forehead protector on his head. As he stepped out of the darkness, he licked the corner of his mouth, displaying that frightening natural gift of his.

It was Orochimaru, one of the Konoha Sannin.

"Lord Danzo, you wanted to see me?"

Orochimaru looked straight at Shimura Danzō, who sat motionless ahead of him. His voice was hoarse, and his signature sinister smile never left his lips.

"Have your recent human experiments been progressing smoothly?"

Danzo spoke slowly, his voice low.

"Everything is going smoothly. I need more and more expendable materials, but none of that is a problem."

Orochimaru licked the corner of his mouth, indicating that everything was proceeding according to his plan.

"Quite a few Shinobi have gone missing from the village lately. That was your doing as well, wasn't it?"

Danzo fixed his dark, malicious eyes on Orochimaru, but there was little accusation or anger in his voice.

Orochimaru smiled without answering.

Danzo didn't press him further.

"You'd best be more careful when you act. Those Uchiha have their eyes on you now."

"Is that so?"

Orochimaru didn't seem surprised by this outcome. "Then I'll simply reduce my use of expendable materials."

With that, Orochimaru turned to leave.

Yet after taking two steps, he suddenly stopped and turned back to regard Danzo with an amused look.

"If I were to capture a few Uchiha, there wouldn't be any problem with that, would there, Lord Danzo?"

Orochimaru had coveted Uchiha bodies for a long time.

What he was really asking Shimura Danzō today was whether Danzo would help him suppress the matter if the Uchiha investigated under the authority of the police force.

He knew Danzo had the power to keep the Uchiha in check.

And that was precisely why he had partnered with him.

"Don't go too far!"

Danzo's low voice served as his answer to Orochimaru's question.

"Heh heh, understood."

Orochimaru turned around with a smile on his lips and slowly strolled out of the dark, damp underground space, like a clammy venomous snake slipping back into the shadows.

Gua ate dinner with his mother, Nai, that evening. His father, Dashan, hadn't come home.

According to Nai, his father would be working overtime in the evenings for a while.

Shinobi were disappearing more and more frequently, and the Konoha Military Police Force had to step up its nighttime patrols.

Gua understood perfectly. What job didn't involve overtime?

Besides, that bastard Orochimaru was striking more and more frequently. Even the children at their Ninja Academy had begun talking about who had gone missing and things like that.

It was clear that Orochimaru was truly growing more and more brazen.

At the same time, Gua thought of the Third Generation, that kindly-looking old man who always had a pipe in his mouth. Could he really be unaware of what his own student was doing?

Gua couldn't figure it out.

Nor did Gua intend to dwell on it any further. He went back to his bed to sleep and train AFK.

[Taijutsu (tenfold boost active)]

[Eyesight (tenfold boost active)]

[Great Fireball Technique (tenfold boost active)]

There was no telling what time his father, Dashan, had come home the night before.

By the time Gua got up the next morning, his father, Dashan, and his mother, Nai, were already seated around the low table, with breakfast laid out.

Simple glutinous rice balls and miso soup.

"Gua, try not to wander around outside lately, okay? It hasn't been very safe out there."

His mother, Nai, reminded him at the breakfast table.

Gua nodded as he ate his glutinous rice balls.

So his father kept him at home that day, but Gua didn't resist.

After all, he really didn't care about this sort of thing.

AFK training was AFK training, wherever he did it.

After finishing his glutinous rice balls and drinking every last drop of his miso soup, Gua returned to his room alone, reading an extracurricular book while training AFK.

Today's story is about the heroic Jiraiya stumbling into the Silk Cave.