Kiyoshi opened his eyes. The ceiling was pale in the morning light.
He lay there for a few seconds, then reached out and opened the system panel.
A glowing screen appeared, with an extra line on the panel.
Taijutsu potential assessment complete: Grade D.
He stared at that line for several seconds.
Then he swore. "That's fucking it?"
He sat up and looked again.
Grade D... not C, not B, but the lowest grade, D.
The system hadn't even offered an explanation. It had thrown out a grade and fallen silent.
He waited. Nothing happened on the panel. He waited some more. Still nothing.
He closed the panel and sat on the edge of the bed, his feet dangling above the floor.
In his previous life, he'd been in decent shape. During his years in sales, he'd been out and about every day, jogging from subway stations to office buildings. He'd run even faster when clients chased him down to beat him up.
He'd been a fair bit fitter than most people his age.
But the system said grade D.
This six-year-old Uchiha kid's body simply wasn't up to it. Willpower couldn't make up for that.
He looked down at his hands, pale and soft, without a single callus on his knuckles.
He got up, washed, changed, and headed out.
The morning air was pleasant enough, carrying a hint of dew.
As Kiyoshi walked to school, that grade D kept turning over in his mind.
When he passed the training ground, his feet slowed of their own accord.
Several students from the higher grades were practicing Taijutsu inside.
A boy in a dark blue short-sleeved shirt was practicing punches. Each punch whistled through the air, his movements clean, his shoulders steady as he drew his fist back.
Another student, a girl, was practicing kicks. Her leg rose above her shoulder, steady, and she landed without a sound.
Kiyoshi stood outside the fence and watched for a few seconds.
Those students looked only eight or nine, but their movements already had some polish.
He remembered trying to exercise yesterday and nearly collapsing after thirty push-ups.
The gap was more than a little wide.
He looked away and kept walking. After a few steps, he glanced back again.
In the classroom, Iruka stood at the front and clapped twice.
"All right, let's start by reviewing yesterday's chakra extraction practice. Who wants to tell us how it felt?"
Several classmates raised their hands.
Naruto was called on first. He stood up and scratched his head. "I... I felt it! There was something a little warm in my belly!"
Iruka smiled and nodded. "Good. That means you're on the right track. Keep practicing."
Kiyoshi pressed a hand to his forehead. That was Kurama messing around!
Just then, Iruka's gaze landed on Kiyoshi and his strange expression.
"Uchiha Kiyoshi, you were the second to succeed yesterday. Tell us how it felt."
Kiyoshi stood up, his face expressionless. "Fine."
Iruka waited a moment, confirming that he had nothing else to say. "...That's all?"
"Yeah."
Iruka gave a helpless smile. He was about to tell him to sit down when his gaze paused, settling on his wrist.
An iron-black bracelet, with lettering faintly visible on the inside.
"That bracelet of yours... it's rather distinctive."
Kiyoshi's heart tightened.
Instinctively, he wanted to pull his wrist behind him, but he held back. Keeping his face blank, he said, "Thank you for the compliment, sir."
Iruka didn't press him. He gave him another look, then told him to sit down.
Kiyoshi sat, his heart beating a little faster than usual.
Please don't let anyone notice anything strange about this system stuff!
He glanced down at the bracelet on his wrist and tugged at his sleeve, but couldn't quite cover it.
The bracelet was black and wouldn't stand out much against dark skin, but paired with the light-colored sleeve of his school uniform, it was rather conspicuous.
If someone leaned in for a closer look, they could see the lettering inside, too.
He silently decided to wear long sleeves starting tomorrow.
After school, Kiyoshi didn't go straight home.
He went to the training ground on the hill behind the village.
Yesterday, when the system had given him his Taijutsu assessment, it had also quietly listed a suggestion.
There had been no sound, no pop-up, just an extra line on the panel: daily basic Taijutsu training; use of an Instinct Soldier Pill recommended; each training session should last at least thirty minutes.
He'd read that line twice and committed it to memory.
The training ground occupied a clearing on the hill, surrounded by trees. The ground was packed dirt, with several wooden posts standing along the edge.
No one was there.
Kiyoshi stood in the center of the clearing and took a deep breath.
He got down and started doing push-ups.
One.
Two.
Five.
Ten.
By the fifteenth, his hands had started shaking.
He gritted his teeth and kept going. Sixteen. Seventeen. Eighteen. Nineteen. Twenty.
After twenty, he lay on the ground panting for a few seconds, his palms braced against the dirt, his knees a little weak.
He pushed himself up and sat on the ground to catch his breath, then started doing sit-ups.
He did a little better with sit-ups than push-ups, managing thirty. Then came squats, another thirty.
After finishing the set, he stood upright, panting. His arms shook, and so did his legs.
He looked down at his hands.
A six-year-old's hands, pale and soft, without a single callus on his knuckles.
Pressing his palms against the ground had left a faint red mark.
"I can't even do thirty push-ups."
He said it softly, as though stating a fact.
Then he fell silent for a while.
There were less than two years left until the night of the massacre.
And right now, he couldn't even do thirty push-ups.
Suddenly, he found it almost funny, with a sense of absurdity that screamed, You've got to be fucking kidding me.
In his previous life, he'd played the groveling lackey in front of clients. In this one, he played the big shot in front of the system.
Fine, he'd put on an act, but his body wouldn't even cooperate.
Even Naruto, that dead last, probably couldn't manage many.
But Naruto had a better physical foundation. With the recovery power of the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki, one day of training for him was worth three for Kiyoshi.
There was no competing with that. It was inborn. He lowered his eyes. There wasn't much point comparing anyway. Better to compete over who could live longer.
He sat down and leaned against a wooden post, panting.
After resting a while, he got up and continued with punching practice.
Left fist, right fist, left fist, right fist.
Punching empty air.
After about ten minutes, his arms were too sore to lift. He stopped, shook out his hands, and prepared to gather his things and head home.
Out of the corner of his eye, he caught a mark on the wooden post beside him.
He crouched down.
There was a gouge on the surface of the post, about a palm's length long: three shallow, parallel lines, as though something sharp had scratched it. Not a kunai. A kunai's blade was flat and would leave a single line. Not a shuriken either. A shuriken had pointed tips.
This mark looked like claws.
He reached out and touched the gouge. The edges were a little rough; it didn't look fresh.
He checked around the wooden post. There were no footprints on the ground, no other traces.
He crouched there and stared for another two seconds. He didn't know what he was looking for; he just wanted another look.
He stood up and surveyed his surroundings.
The training ground was quiet. Trees swayed in the wind, leaves rustled, and nothing seemed out of the ordinary.
But he couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong.
It wasn't a sound or a smell, just a feeling. A faint sense of being watched, coming from the trees.
He stared at that patch of woods for a few seconds.
The shadows of the trees shifted. No one was there.
He looked away, dusted off his hands, shouldered his schoolbag, and left.
As he walked out of the training ground, he glanced back at those trees again.
The wind kept blowing. The trees kept swaying.
There was nothing there.
He turned away and quickened his pace. This wasn't the first time.
Sometimes he felt the same thing on his way to school, but when he turned around, he never saw anything. Before, he'd thought he was imagining it. Today didn't feel that way.
When he got home, Misa was cooking in the kitchen, her spatula clinking against the rim of the pan. Kazuhiko wasn't home yet.
Kiyoshi put his schoolbag back in his room, sat on the bed, and opened the system panel for a look.
Awkwardness value: 820. Face value: 452.
He still had a fair way to go before saving up a thousand.
He closed the panel, lay down, and stared at the ceiling.
Keep training tomorrow.
If thirty push-ups aren't enough, then do thirty-one.
Thirty-two the day after.
There would be a way.
He rolled over, rested his wrist against the pillow, and closed his eyes.
But his mind was still on that gouge.
Three lines.
Like claws.
Was there really nothing in those woods?
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