There, embedded in the target, was the shuriken he had just thrown.
"Huh, it hit?" Sasuke murmured.
Compared with the disastrous scene moments earlier, the improvement was downright frightening.
What was still wrong?
He had readjusted both his strength and his stance.
Yet he was still a little off the bull's-eye.
Where was he going wrong?
Wind speed?
Gravity?
Uchiha Satoru pondered for a moment, then hurled all his remaining shuriken.
The centers of the targets all around him bristled with coldly gleaming shuriken.
He had figured it out: after releasing the shuriken, his hand needed to follow its original path. That way, the exact timing of the release mattered much less.
He did not need to nail that precise release point.
As long as he let the shuriken leave his hand at any point along the trajectory, its flight path would stay steady.
Uchiha Satoru quickly got the hang of it.
Not a single throw missed after that. Every shuriken struck the bull's-eye.
Sasuke watched from the sidelines, dumbfounded-his second brother had gone from missing the target and hurting himself to hitting every shot, as though he had become a different person.
He could clearly sense that his second brother was improving at a terrifying speed.
Only the tiniest glimpse of that fearsome ability to learn had shown itself.
Even that tiny glimpse was enough for Sasuke to find it utterly beyond reason.
"Amazing."
Sasuke stared at the white-haired boy before him, whose expression was utterly serious.
For a moment, his second brother seemed a little unfamiliar.
"Hey! Little Sasuke!"
"Pretty amazing, aren't I?"
After finishing his shuriken practice, Uchiha Satoru noticed Sasuke staring blankly at him.
"Oh, come on!"
Sasuke turned his head away, speechlessly eyeing Uchiha Satoru, who had not managed to stay serious for even two seconds.
His second brother was still the same as ever.
The corners of his mouth lifted slightly as that thought crossed his mind.
"If you don't say anything, I'll take that as a yes!"
"Hahaha! I, Satoru, really am invincible!"
"Want to learn, my dear little brother?"
"I've got a secret trick."
Uchiha Satoru looked at Sasuke with a radiant smile.
A trick?
His second brother had been so awful with shuriken before, then suddenly became this incredible. He had to be hiding some amazing secret to learning.
Unable to contain his curiosity, Sasuke hesitantly nodded.
"The trick is-"
As though sensing something, Uchiha Satoru abruptly flung the shuriken in his hand in one direction.
He walked over with a cold gaze and saw a small white snake pinned to the ground by the shuriken.
"I hate slimy, slippery, cold little creatures like these more than anything."
He stared into its golden snake eyes as he spoke coldly.
He followed up with another shuriken, finishing off the white snake.
Orochimaru had some nerve, coming into the Uchiha Clan Compound.
Even if it was only a clone.
This was the home of the Uchiha Clan, with their Sharingan active.
What made him so confident he wouldn't be discovered?
Come to think of it, Dad and the others seemed to be out today.
Could it really be such a coincidence?
Or had he already gotten involved with Danzo and obtained that information beforehand?
As Uchiha Satoru mulled it over, he unleashed a burst of Fire Release, burning the white snake's corpse until not even ashes remained.
With slippery snakes, burning them was the safest option. Who knew what bizarre thing might burst out of its belly?
Inside a pitch-black cave.
"Hehehe..."
"What a perceptive child."
"Should I say that's only to be expected of Uchiha blood?"
"Every one of them is so gifted."
An inscrutable gleam flickered in golden snake eyes identical to the white snake's as Orochimaru spoke in a raspy voice.
He had originally intended to observe the child he had his eye on today.
Instead, he had encountered Uchiha Satoru along the way and witnessed his terrifying ability to learn on his own.
Seeing how little chakra he had, Orochimaru had initially felt no interest.
Who would have guessed there would be an unexpected surprise?
He had the feeling that this boy could notice things ordinary people could not.
As expected of the Uchiha Clan-every one of them was so exceptional.
Talent was something that left ordinary people like him hopelessly behind.
Now he wanted to study him even more.
Alone, Orochimaru lapsed into an obsessive chuckle.
"How fascinating!"
His pupils abruptly narrowed into vertical slits.
"What are you doing, big brother?"
Sasuke looked in confusion at Uchiha Satoru, who had stopped halfway through his sentence.
"Ah, nothing."
"I saw a greedy little snake swallow an animal bigger than itself and choke to death."
Uchiha Satoru turned back with a grin.
"What snake would be that stupid? You're making that up, aren't you?"
Sasuke asked doubtfully.
"Huh, did you get smarter?"
Uchiha Satoru looked as though he had seen a ghost.
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