Year 14 of Konoha, spring.
The cherry blossoms had fallen, and tender new leaves filled the view with green. Moisture from the Naka River mingled with the smell of freshly turned earth. Spring should have been a soothing season, yet many people felt as though a wad of wet cotton had lodged in their chests, leaving them stifled.
That stifling feeling reached its peak when Tsume Inuzuka and Kurama Unkai came calling one after the other-for the Uchiha and the Kurama Clan, that was.
Tsume Inuzuka came first. On the evening the drawing results came out, an undisguised howl of anger and grievance erupted from the Inuzuka Clan Compound, followed immediately by the answering whines of her Ninja Dog, Haimaru. Tsume had drawn the worst lot. That meant she had to obediently spend six full years at the Ninja Academy. Under the clan's arrangements to "go through the motions," those six years would essentially be "wasted." At most, she would learn the commonplace Three Basic Body Techniques, and even her coordination training with Haimaru would have to be squeezed into whatever gaps she could find.
What kind of temper did Tsume have? She had run wild since childhood and feared nothing and no one in Konoha. She had long since decided that little brother Yinglang was someone powerful to rely on, someone capable who would make sure she ate well if she followed him. Now they wanted her to sit in school for six years, listening to those Senju Clan teachers drone on? Play house with a bunch of brats who might even be scared of dogs? And be separated from Haimaru, too? Not a chance!
She did not bother crying or making a fuss before the clan leader-she knew it would be useless. That very night, under cover of