"O flower blooming in the wilderness~"
"Could you please tell me;"
"Why must people hurt one another and fight;"
"O flower blooming so proudly~"
"What do your eyes behold;"
"Why do people always find it so hard to understand one another..."
The lilting song echoed in his ears, dreamlike and unreal.
Someone... was humming a short, repetitive song beside him. Everything was quiet, as though the whole world were listening.
His restless heart grew calm.
The melody was beautiful, yet listening to it made him sad.
It was not the kind of heart-wrenching sorrow that lay plainly on the surface.
It was a gentle, helpless sorrow that sang of fate.
Like a lover's whisper, a traveler's murmur.
Sadness and tenderness welled up within him.
With so many people and things, it was not a lack of understanding, but helplessness.
So many people drifted apart as they walked on;
So many things faded as they watched;
So many dreams broke off as they dreamed;
So many tears dried up as they flowed...
His vision came into focus, revealing an enchanting starry sky, with tears blurring the edges of his sight.
Uchiha Izuna's eyelids felt terribly heavy, a sign of too little sleep or overstrained eyes.
He did not know why he was crying.
Perhaps his eyes had suffered some serious injury? That had to be it...
Fireflies darted busily through his field of vision.
The song came from above his head.
That woman... was somewhere above his head, wasn't she?
His singing had not stopped, and at such close range, it affected Izuna deeply.
He wanted so badly to close his eyes and keep sleeping...
But Uchiha Izuna knew he could not. Yet he did not want to disturb the person singing, or interrupt such a beautiful song.
For a moment, Uchiha Izuna seemed to understand why his older brother had lost his appetite and could neither eat nor sleep in peace.
Uchiha Izuna rarely praised anything, but today, he could not convince himself not to praise this silver-haired girl's singing.
Even Uchiha Izuna could not find the right words to describe the effect this song had on him.
However, Uchiha Izuna had no idea that reality was a million miles from what he imagined.
Yanbai had placed his hand on Uchiha Izuna's head and had been using "Healing" on him all this time.
But after doing it for so long, he had grown bored and started singing without thinking.
Yanbai's hand remained pressed against Uchiha Izuna's skull. After watching him quietly open his eyes, Yanbai saw him continue to stare at the night sky and cry, as though he had been broken.
Yanbai narrowed his eyes and stopped singing.
The kid was awake already. Why keep singing? Wasn't that awkward?
Once Yanbai stopped singing, the nighttime forest seemed to come alive again, replacing his song with a symphony of insects and wind.
"You..." Uchiha Izuna struggled to open his mouth.
Uchiha Izuna recalled what his father had once said.
This silver-haired girl could not possibly have given Madara any pleasant memories. Otherwise, Madara would never have awakened his eyes because of him.
For a moment, Uchiha Izuna did not know what to say.
"You must have decided to come looking for me on your own, right? Your brother doesn't know, does he?" A moment's thought was all Yanbai needed to understand.
The Uchiha Clan was probably busy dealing with the mess on their employer's side right now, and Uchiha Tajima likely had no time to spare.
As for Madara Uchiha...
Yanbai thought the "special recipes" he had sent over would keep Madara Uchiha occupied for a while, at least.
"If you'd told Madara you were coming to find me, he would definitely have stopped you." Yanbai chuckled.
To Yanbai's surprise, Uchiha Izuna struggled up from the grass into a sitting position and said bitterly, "My brother likes you so much. Of course he would stop me from seeing you?"
Yanbai: "..."
Huh?
Why did that sound so wrong?
Madara Uchiha liked him?
He wasn't Hashirama. What had he ever done to deserve Madara's affection?
No, wait. This had to be some melodramatic romance Uchiha Izuna had dreamed up himself. It had absolutely nothing to do with Madara Uchiha.
Yanbai's smile gradually disappeared. "Hearing you say that actually makes me feel sorry for you," he said quietly. "It means you don't understand your brother at all."
Even stronger anger welled up in Uchiha Izuna's heart.
Compared with Madara Uchiha, who could neither eat nor sleep in peace day after day, Yanbai's response struck Uchiha Izuna as far too heartless, infuriating him.
In Uchiha Izuna's mind, his brother was the best. His brother might reject a girl, but how could any girl reject his brother?
What he did not know was that reality was worlds apart from what he imagined.
This was probably the side effect of talking on completely different wavelengths.
Yanbai stared coldly at Uchiha Izuna. "Before deciding to see me, you should have asked Madara which crematorium is best, where burial plots have the most potential to rise in value, how to visit me in a dream from the underworld to convey your hatred, and what position is most comfortable to die in."
Uchiha Izuna: "..."
Although this was only their first meeting, their interaction was as violent as a chemical reaction.
But Uchiha Izuna, normally so eloquent and quick with an argument, remained unusually silent and did not trade barbs with Yanbai.
Because after hearing Yanbai's words, the pain that the gentle singing had suppressed suddenly woke again.
"What position is most comfortable to die in"...
That was right.
This silver-haired girl was certainly no helpless woman.
Uchiha Izuna's eyes uncontrollably activated their two tomoe. He clutched his head with both hands, as though recalling some terrifying experience.
Although he managed to stifle his screams this time, the pain still tormented him like maggots burrowing into his bones.
The pain he had temporarily forgotten returned.
Uchiha Izuna spoke with terror written across his face:
"It was you... you saved me, didn't you?"
"What kind of ability was that?"
"That... that ability!"
Seeing that Uchiha Izuna, who had only just regained consciousness, was about to lose his mind again, Yanbai hurriedly interrupted his train of thought and diverted his attention. "Ah, yes, yes, yes. Right, right, right. My cooking really is delicious."
Damn it, he should never have brought that up. If Yanbai hadn't been afraid this little brat would die, he would never have used that technique in front of him.
Uchiha Izuna looked utterly bewildered. "Ah, no... it was..."
Yanbai hastily cut him off and continued, "No what? It's very late, you know? I'm leaving. Could you stop losing your mind like this? If I hadn't been worried wild dogs would carry you off, I would have gone home ages ago."
Uchiha Izuna's eyes widened, his brows twitching repeatedly.
Yanbai wrapped his outer robe around Uchiha Izuna's upper body, covering his tattered clothes, and said, "You cast the Great Fireball Technique yourself, and you burned your own clothes. That had nothing to do with me, right? I'm giving you my coat to cover yourself. I'm very kind, aren't I?"
Uchiha Izuna remained expressionless, the corner of his mouth twitching.
With the light behind him, Yanbai smiled very kindly and said, "If you dare go back and tell your brother I bullied you, your conscience will definitely hurt, won't it?"
Uchiha Izuna: "..."
Before you continue