Chapter 2: Attending School
"Continue."
Pulling himself out of his thoughts, Seimei stopped overthinking and raised his hand, ready to resume practicing the Clone Technique.
However, the moment he formed the hand seals, he realized his chakra was completely depleted—he didn't have enough left to perform the technique again.
He opened his panel for a glance, and sure enough, his chakra had hit rock bottom.
Recalling the process from memory, Seimei sat cross-legged and focused his attention inward, using intent to draw out the physical energy generated by his cells.
Then, he blended it evenly with mental energy. After a brief transformation, it turned into chakra and merged into the chakra pathways throughout his body.
As this process continued, his chakra gradually began to fill once more.
...
An hour later.
Seimei opened his eyes.
"Panel."
With a thought, he brought up his proficiency panel.
[Name: Uchiha Seimei
Age: 10
Physique: 5
Spirit: 7
Chakra: 2 → 52 (125 → 126)
Bloodline: Sharingan · Not Awakened (51/100)
Skills:
Chakra Refinement Technique: lv0 (1/100)
Clone Technique: lv0 (6/100)]
Just like with the Clone Technique, once he had personally refined chakra for the first time, a new skill called "Chakra Refinement Technique" appeared on the panel.
At lv0, the technique could increase his chakra limit by 1 point per hour of use and restore 50 chakra points.
At the same time, it also increased proficiency by 1 point.
It could be expected that as the skill level rose, its effects would improve as well.
Right now, his growth rate might not match that of prodigies—but in the future, that could very well change.
With that in mind, Seimei didn't waste any more time and closed his eyes to continue refining chakra.
...
Time slipped by, second by second.
In the blink of an eye, another hour passed.
Seimei opened his eyes and sensed his chakra—it was nearly at capacity, so he stopped refining.
In fact, he couldn't refine any further even if he wanted to.
After all, chakra wasn't conjured from nothing; the process consumed both physical and mental energy.
Earlier, fusing with his predecessor's memories had already taken a toll. Then came planning, experimenting with the panel... his mind was exhausted.
Continuing now wouldn't just be inefficient—it might cause actual harm.
In that case, better to pause for now.
'Still, it'd be a waste to let this chakra sit idle.'
Determined not to squander it, Seimei forced himself to stay focused. He recalled the Clone Technique steps from memory and began forming seals again.
A few minutes later, his chakra was drained. He had attempted the Clone Technique five times in total.
Unsurprisingly, all attempts failed.
It made sense. Actual students at the Ninja Academy needed years to master the Three Basic Techniques. For an outsider to succeed after just a few tries would be pure fantasy.
Even with the benefit of inherited memories, he wasn't there yet.
Still, according to his proficiency panel, he was already four-fifths of the way there.
At this point, his only bottleneck was the amount of chakra he had.
But that wasn't something he could change overnight. He wasn't a genius, after all—not the type to possess massive chakra reserves at a young age.
For now, his only choice was steady growth.
Looking out at the bright moon through the window, Seimei pushed away further thoughts, washed up briefly, and returned to his bedroom.
Before long, faint snoring sounds came from the room.
Outside the house—
At some point, a shadowy figure had appeared.
A pair of scarlet eyes glowed in the night. It was an Uchiha ninja who had already awakened the three-tomoe Sharingan.
He stared silently at Seimei for a while, then disappeared without a trace.
...
The next morning.
Seimei woke from sleep, and the first thing he did was open his panel.
[Name: Uchiha Seimei
Age: 10
Physique: 5
Spirit: 7
Chakra: 37 (127)
Bloodline: Sharingan · Not Awakened (51/100)
Skills:
Chakra Refinement Technique: lv0 (2/100)
Clone Technique: lv0 (19/100)]
Only after confirming everything was real did he breathe a sigh of relief.
Then, his attention shifted to the "Chakra" section.
It was clear that even without actively refining it, his chakra had naturally recovered more than 30 points during the night.
However, Seimei didn't immediately use it.
He had to attend school today, and who knew if something might come up—he couldn't risk depleting his reserves.
In fact, he had considered taking a few days off to make use of the foundation his predecessor left behind—but that might attract too much attention.
In that case, going to school was the better choice.
If he slipped up, he could blame it on recent trauma.
But if he holed up at home and someone came knocking, it would be harder to explain.
After weighing the options, Seimei decided to continue attending school. As long as he kept a low profile, there shouldn't be any major issues.
With that decided, he didn't dwell on it. He quickly got ready, ate a little something to fill his stomach, and headed out to the Ninja Academy.
At this point, the Uchiha clan hadn't yet been relocated to the village's outskirts. They still lived in the central area, not far from the school.
So Seimei arrived at the academy in no time.
Using his memory, he found his classroom. On the way, a few people greeted him. He responded with a simple nod.
Thankfully, his predecessor had been like many Uchiha—cool and reserved—otherwise, pretending to be him might've been much harder.
Ding-ling-ling~
About ten minutes later, the school bell rang.
A ninja in his twenties entered the classroom. This was their homeroom teacher, who also taught their classes—his name was Sugiki Kazuto.
According to his predecessor's memories, Sugiki, like most instructors at the academy, didn't treat students very differently based on their backgrounds.
So Seimei didn't need to worry about his surname causing trouble.
Just as he was thinking this, Seimei noticed Sugiki Kazuto glance at him, which made his heart pound.
Fortunately, the man didn't look for long and soon began class.
Standing at the podium, Sugiki started speaking—but Seimei didn't catch a word.
His mind was occupied, wondering why Sugiki had looked at him that way.
He was sure it wasn't a casual glance. The man had been watching him closely.
'Did he notice something?'
Uneasy thoughts filled Seimei's mind.
Ding-ling-ling~
Suddenly, the bell rang.
Seimei snapped out of his thoughts. Unknowingly, a full class had passed.
Sugiki looked at the distracted Seimei and shook his head, saying nothing. He simply said "class dismissed" and left the room.
As Seimei's teacher, he already knew about the death of Seimei's parents.
In fact, the death of any student's relatives would be reported to the teachers by Konoha's higher-ups.
The purpose?
Naturally, it was to help teachers guide their students and prevent extreme reactions.
Originally, Sugiki had intended to speak with Uchiha Seimei today.
But the Uchiha clan had already contacted him the night before and told him not to intervene. So he didn't.
Their reason was simple—they wanted to observe whether Seimei would awaken his Sharingan.
To the Uchiha leadership, losing an average clansman meant nothing. But if that loss triggered a Sharingan awakening, it was a major gain.
So they didn't want Sugiki interfering.
If this were Iruka in the future, he might've resisted the pressure and guided Seimei anyway. But Sugiki Kazuto wasn't like that—he didn't have the same sense of duty.
So he went along with it.
Seimei, of course, knew none of this. He was still feeling anxious over Sugiki's attention.
But after thinking it through for a while, he figured Sugiki probably meant no harm.
Most likely, the man had just learned of his parents' deaths and was showing a little concern.
"Phew—"
Now that he had thought it through, Seimei finally let out a breath of relief.
(End of Chapter)