As for Little Sasuke's wildly overconfident challenge...
His defeat was inevitable.
In the end, Gua easily pinned him down and gave him a spanking.
Little Sasuke lay across Gua's lap, kicking his little feet behind him.
"Big brother, save me! Big brother, save me!"
Itachi ignored him completely.
Gua ignored him too, only occasionally swatting his backside with a little wooden stick.
"Who were those people who came to see your father?"
Gua asked as if in passing.
"You saw them too?"
Itachi shook his head. "I don't know who they were either. I asked Father, but he said I shouldn't ask about things I wasn't supposed to know."
Itachi's words put Gua even more on guard.
Holy shit!
Clan Leader, you really are plotting something big.
After playing with Itachi and Sasuke a little longer, Gua said goodbye to them and left when lunchtime came.
Itachi and Sasuke walked Gua to the door.
As they passed the living room doorway, Fugaku happened to come out.
But Fugaku didn't say much to Gua.
He merely nodded and offered a perfunctory greeting.
Gua could tell that Fugaku had a lot on his mind.
After leaving Itachi's house, Gua had a lot on his mind too.
He was beginning to see the downside of being an Uchiha.
Being an Uchiha seemed to mean teetering wildly on the brink of death every single day.
That had a lot to do with the Uchiha's awkward position in Konoha.
And with the Uchiha's peculiar mindset.
Gua felt that the two fed into each other.
Because the Uchiha had such a peculiar mindset, they occupied an awkward position in Konoha.
Because they occupied an awkward position in Konoha, they developed that peculiar mindset.
It was a deadlock.
To untie that knot, either the Uchiha had to