On the third day of his vacation, Shuo decided to stick strictly to his plan of "going out for a stroll and eating something good."
He slept until he woke naturally, took his time washing up and eating breakfast, then changed into his most comfortable casual clothes. He wore no ninja vest and brought few ninja tools, carrying only his wallet and a few emergency Shuriken as he ambled out the door.
His destination was clear: the newly opened dango shop in the Shopping District.
He had heard their three-color dango and red bean-filled sticky rice dumplings were superb, and he had been thinking about them for days.
The Shopping District was bustling that morning.
The sense that the war had ended grew stronger by the day. Shops pulled out all the stops to attract customers, and most passersby wore relaxed smiles.
Hands in his pockets, Shuo strolled slowly down the street, enjoying this rare leisure time without a mission to fulfill.
Passing Ichiraku Ramen, he saw Teuchi hanging a new sign outside and greeted him with a smile.
Passing the bookstore, he spotted a few familiar ANBU faces acting furtively in front of the Icha Icha Paradise shelf.
Passing the ninja tool shop, he saw the owner enthusiastically pitching "the latest Kunai, complete with Explosive Tag slots" to a few Genin, spittle flying.
Everything was peaceful and ordinary.
Shuo relaxed along with it.
He even bought a candied apple from a roadside stall and ate it as he walked.
The sugary coating and slightly tart flesh melted in his mouth. Not bad.
As he approached the dango shop, he noticed what seemed to be a small commotion outside.
Several people had gathered there, their voices rather loud.
"...I told you, I didn't steal it! I was just passing by!"
It was a girl's voice, on the verge of tears.
"Hmph! If it wasn't you, who was it? My wallet fell right beside you! You must have picked it up and tried to slip away!"
That was a woman's shrill voice.
"I really didn't! You can search me!"
The girl was both anxious and angry.
"Search you? Who knows if you've hidden it somewhere else! Everyone, tell me who's in the right! This girl from out of town has sticky fingers!"
The woman began stirring up the onlookers.
Chewing his candied apple, Shuo approached at a leisurely pace.
In the middle of the crowd, a plainly dressed girl stood red-faced and teary-eyed, helpless before a middle-aged woman who glared with her hands on her hips, spittle flying.
An embroidered wallet lay on the ground.
A typical street dispute.
Shuo had no interest in this sort of drama. He only wanted to buy dango.
He skirted the crowd and headed toward the dango shop entrance.
"Out of my way! You're not leaving until you hand over that wallet!"
But the woman refused to let up and grabbed the girl's arm.
"Let go of me!"
The girl struggled.
Someone nearby could not stand watching and tried to reason with her. "Ma'am, talk it out calmly. It really might be a misunderstanding..."
"A misunderstanding? My money disappearing is a misunderstanding?!"
The woman raised her voice even louder.
Shuo had already reached the dango shop's counter.
The owner, a plump woman, had been craning her neck to watch the commotion. Only when Shuo approached did she look away. "What can I get you, young man?"
"One skewer each of three-color dango and red bean sticky rice dumplings."
Shuo paid.
"Coming right up. Just a moment."
The woman deftly began preparing his order.
The argument outside continued and even seemed on the verge of turning into a shoving match.
Leaning against the counter as he waited for his dango, Shuo watched out of the corner of his eye.
His gaze settled on the embroidered wallet lying on the ground.
Its opening was half-parted, revealing the corners of several banknotes inside.
A few seconds later, he looked away and yawned.
Boring.
That was his assessment.
This sort of drama spoiled the pleasant mood of buying dango.
Just then, in her desperation, the girl whose arm was being held gave it a sharp jerk, trying to break free.
Caught off guard, the woman stumbled, her heavy body pitching backward, about to crash into a nearby pinwheel stall!
The stallholder, a thin little old man, cried out in alarm.
The onlookers screamed too.
Just as a minor dispute was about to escalate into an incident that injured someone-
Shuo happened to take the two skewers of dango the owner handed him.
Holding them in his left hand, he gave his right wrist an almost imperceptible flick.
It was neither hand seals nor a throw.
His fingertips merely shifted, silently "flicking" out a trace of extremely faint, almost undetectable light energy.
His target: the edge of a paving stone beneath the woman who was about to crash into the pinwheel stall, slightly loosened by the crowd trampling over it.
The light energy precisely "tapped" a tiny protrusion at the stone's edge.
There was no sound and no light.
But that faint, perfectly placed impact of energy made the stone "tilt" upward ever so slightly.
The movement was tiny, perhaps not even a millimeter.
But that hairbreadth of difference-
The heel of the woman's backward-stumbling foot caught squarely on the slightly raised edge of the stone!
"Ow!"
That insignificant trip redirected her backward fall toward the pinwheel stall. Losing her balance, she flailed in place for two turns like a clumsy duck, then landed on her backside with a thump, right beside her own fallen embroidered wallet.
The scene instantly fell silent.
The woman sat on the ground, dumbfounded.
The girl froze too.
The onlookers were stunned as well.
Shuo bit into a three-color dango and nodded in satisfaction.
It tasted good: soft, chewy, springy, and just sweet enough.
"My... my wallet!"
Coming to her senses, the woman spotted the wallet beside her backside and immediately snatched it up. She opened it and found the money still inside.
The anger on her face instantly turned to embarrassment and... lingering fear?
If she had not inexplicably tripped just then, she might have damaged someone else's stall and had to pay for it.
"Well... miss, I'm sorry..."
The woman sheepishly climbed to her feet and dusted off her backside. "Maybe... maybe I dropped it myself by accident..."
The girl breathed a sigh of relief, wiped the corners of her eyes, and hurriedly squeezed through the crowd without saying much.
The farce ended in this ridiculous fashion.
The crowd gradually dispersed amid a buzz of conversation.
Shuo finished his dango too, tossed the bamboo skewers into a trash can, and ambled away.
From start to finish, no one noticed the idler eating by the dango shop counter.
[Ding! Resolved a street dispute through "imperceptible" means, preventing the situation from escalating. This behavior captured the essence of Kizaru's "better to avoid trouble, but when trouble comes, solve it with the least effort." Imitation Points +18.]
The corners of Shuo's mouth curved slightly.
Nice. I even earned a little extra on a dango run.
He continued wandering through the Shopping District, bought some snacks, then browsed a newly released travelogue at the bookstore for a while (without buying it). Finally, he found a quiet teahouse, ordered a cup of barley tea, and sat by the window, watching people come and go on the street.
Sunlight streamed through the window, pleasantly warm.
As he drank his tea, he felt the fatigue and tension of the past few days finally begin to fade.
Now this was what a vacation should look like.
After sitting for a while, he was about to leave when he saw two familiar figures pass outside the teahouse.
It was Kakashi and... a silver-haired boy he did not know, but who looked somewhat familiar?
Both wore masks and had somewhat cold demeanors, though Kakashi was more languid, while the silver-haired boy was more... sharp?
Like an unsheathed blade.
Shuo recalled that Kakashi seemed to have a contemporary named "Tenzo" or "Yamato."
No, the timeline didn't seem quite right. Could he be a senior from ANBU?
As he pondered this, Kakashi seemed to sense something and turned toward the teahouse window, meeting Shuo's eyes.
Kakashi paused, then said something to the silver-haired boy beside him, and the two entered the teahouse together.
"Yo."
Kakashi walked over and sat opposite Shuo, still wearing that same dead-fish stare. "Enjoying a pretty leisurely vacation."
"Not bad."
Shuo nodded and looked at the silver-haired boy standing ramrod straight behind Kakashi, his eyes appraising. "And this is?"
"A senior from ANBU. He's supervising me for now."
Kakashi gave a brief introduction. "Sir, this is Uchiha Saku, the new member of Minato-sensei's squad."
The silver-haired boy nodded to Shuo in greeting but said nothing. His gaze swept over Shuo, seemingly assessing something.
Shuo nodded back without asking further.
Better not to pry too much into ANBU people.
"Were you on a mission?" Shuo asked Kakashi.
"Yeah. Just got back."
Kakashi pulled a copy of Icha Icha Paradise from inside his clothes and began reading, clearly not intending to discuss the mission's details. "What about you? Your vacation ends tomorrow, right?"
"Yeah."
Shuo sighed. "The good times are always so short."
Kakashi paused in turning a page and glanced at him with his dead-fish eyes. "Minato-sensei said you requested three days of compensatory leave? That border mission must really have been 'hard work.'"
Shuo heard the teasing in his words but kept a straight face. "It wasn't too bad. Mostly, it was mentally draining." Like matching wits with Fugaku and Tekka.
The silver-haired ANBU suddenly spoke, his voice low. "Uchiha Saku... I heard you destroyed the enemy command post at the border outpost with some kind of Light Release ninjutsu?"
Shuo inwardly tensed.
ANBU really were well-informed. He looked at the other boy, whose eyes were calm but held a probing look that would not accept evasion.
"I got lucky. It was a shot in the dark."
Shuo began deftly deflecting. "Besides, it was mostly thanks to Minato-sensei, Kakashi, and the others drawing their fire."
The silver-haired ANBU stared at him for a few seconds but did not press further. He merely said, "A very unique ability. Properly controlled, it will be a powerful weapon for Konoha."
It sounded like praise, but Shuo kept feeling as though he had been labeled "hazardous-keep under observation."
"You're too kind, sir."
Shuo spoke modestly.
Kakashi closed his book and stood. "We're off. Still have a report to write." He told Shuo, "Training ground tomorrow. Don't be late. Minato-sensei said he has a new training plan."
A new training plan?
An ominous premonition rose in Shuo's heart.
"Got it."
He answered.
Kakashi and the silver-haired ANBU left the teahouse.
Shuo sat a little longer, finished his barley tea, then got up and left too.
Walking back to the Uchiha Clan Compound, he thought about Kakashi's words and that silver-haired ANBU's appraising gaze.
Looks like continuing to slack off in Konoha... won't be that easy.
Still, he felt the remaining change and unfinished snacks inside his clothes.
At least he had perfectly accomplished this vacation's goal of "eating good food."
The setting sun stretched his shadow long.
He ambled toward home, humming a tuneless little song.
Tomorrow's business could wait until tomorrow.
Right now, he only wanted to enjoy the peace of his vacation's final night.
(Provided no one came knocking again.)
Before you continue