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"Ouch!"
Asuma turned his head to look. Not far away, an old craftsman's toolbox had fallen to the ground.
The tools inside were scattered everywhere.
One sharp chisel, by chance, flew towards a young craftsman nearby.
The young craftsman was wolfing down his food, completely oblivious.
The chisel was about to strike his instep.
Asuma's body moved faster than his mind.
His finger instinctively twitched.
Whoosh!
A kunai shot out, precisely striking the side of the chisel.
Clink!
The chisel was deflected, changing direction, and plunged into the mud right next to the craftsman's straw sandal.
The entire process happened extremely quickly.
The young craftsman was startled by the sound and looked down.
A chisel was stuck in the ground almost touching his foot, with a kunai beside it...
His face instantly went pale.
He looked up in a daze, just in time to see the cool-looking shinobi with a cigarette in his mouth not far away.
Although the young craftsman didn't understand what had happened, he wasn't stupid.
He knew that the difficult-to-approach shinobi had saved him.
He was stunned for a few seconds, then ran to Asuma with his rice bowl. His face still showed lingering fear.
When he reached Asuma, while Asuma looked confused, the craftsman suddenly bowed deeply to him and said, "Sir! Thank you, sir! Thank you for saving my life!"
He wasn't educated and could only express his gratitude in this way.
Asuma was startled by his profound bow, taking half a step back. His brows furrowed tightly.
"There's no need for this! It's a small matter!"
His tone was sharp, tinged with annoyance.
He was accustomed to battlefield merits, the Hokage's commendations, and his comrades' admiration.
But he had never been thanked so solemnly by a civilian for such a minor incident.
This feeling... was very strange.
Extremely strange.
It wasn't the heroic feeling of achieving great deeds, nor the satisfaction after killing an enemy.
It was an unfamiliar emotion that left him flustered.
The young craftsman was intimidated by his tone and dared not bow again, but he still looked at him with incredibly sincere eyes.
"To me, it's a life-saving grace! If my foot were crippled, my wife and children at home wouldn't be able to survive!"
"Thank you, sir!"
Looking at the craftsman's sincere eyes, Asuma's heart suddenly clenched.
His lips moved, but in the end, he only squeezed out one word from his throat.
"...Leave."
"Yes, sir!"
The young craftsman bowed again in thanks, then scurried back.
Asuma irritably ran his hand through his hair, leaning back against the stone pillar, but he could no longer find that sense of aloof detachment he had before.
Nara Shikato, who was nearby, watched everything. A smile played on his lips. He said nothing.
He slowly got up and left, leaving Asuma with a nearly untouched meal tray.
The food on the tray was still steaming, emitting an enticing aroma.
Grrr...
Asuma's stomach rumbled again, louder than any time before.
He buried his head deeper in annoyance, trying to block out the tempting smell with his arm.
He was Asuma Sarutobi, the son of the Third Hokage, a jonin of Konoha village, and one of the Guardian Shinobi Twelve.
How could he...
Yet Nara Shikato's words were like an unremovable thorn, pricking his mind.
"One of those who kills them is a visible enemy."
"The other is an invisible enemy..."
"Building houses here is also a form of protection."
Protection...
Asuma instinctively looked at his hands.
These were the hands of a shinobi.
The lines on his palms were clearly visible.
These hands had, with ninjutsu, torn open enemies' throats.
They had, wielding chakra blades, ended vibrant lives.
Every time a mission was completed, he would receive generous rewards, the praise of his comrades, and the village's record of merit.
That was everything he had been proud of.
It was his glory as a shinobi.
But just now, these hands, which had killed, had merely thrown a kunai.
No killing intent, no calculation.
It simply prevented an insignificant accident.
Then, he received a clumsy but sincere thank you.
"To me, it's a life-saving grace!"
The young craftsman's face made him more flustered than any eye technique he had ever seen.
The weight of that thank you was light.
But when it landed on his heart, it was incredibly heavy.
He suddenly realized that the glory he had pursued in the past seemed somewhat hollow at this moment.
Merits and bounty obtained from killing enemies.
And saving an unknown civilian, in exchange for a thank you.
Which one, exactly, was the Will of Fire his father often spoke of?
Asuma's mind was in turmoil.
He thought of the argument he had with his father before leaving the village.
"The village has become like this, don't you care at all?!"
"Asuma, you still see things too superficially."
His father's expression at the time was one of despondency, and also a kind of relief he couldn't understand.
Now, he seemed to... understand a little.
He looked up, gazing at the bustling construction site.
Hyuga Hizashi stood high up. His voice, amplified by the Yamanaka clan's secret technique, accurately reached every corner.
Uchiha Natsume moved quickly on the ground. His three tomoe Sharingan double-checked every detail.
Akimichi Hayama used the partial expansion jutsu to lift and place a crossbeam, drawing cheers from the craftsmen.
Kazuma and Natsukawa were tirelessly running around. Their ninjutsu might not be flashy.
But every technique was used where it was most needed.
Everyone was covered in dust and drenched in sweat.
But on everyone's face, there was a radiance he had never seen before.
They were using their strength to transform a barren land into a home capable of housing tens of thousands of people.
They were indeed protecting.
In a way he had never imagined.
What about himself?
Since arriving here, besides complaining, getting angry, and that unintentional act just now, what else had he done?
A strong sense of shame, mixed with hunger, surged from his stomach, rushing to his head.
Asuma's cheeks felt hot.
He felt like a complete fool.
An idiot stubbornly clinging to old rules, yet blind to the brand new world outside.
Grumble...
His stomach protested loudly once again.
This time, Asuma no longer suppressed it.
As if having made some kind of decision, he suddenly reached out and grabbed the meal tray.
His movements were somewhat rough, as if he was sulking with himself.
He picked up his chopsticks, grabbed the largest piece of meat, and without even looking, shoved it directly into his mouth.
The food, which was ordinarily mediocre, tasted delicious to him.
This delicious feeling, neither the special meals at the Hokage building nor the barbecue from the Akimichi clan of Konoha could replicate.
He no longer hesitated and began to wolf down his food.
Large mouthfuls of rice, accompanied by savory chunks of meat...
He ate quickly, eagerly, as if trying to make up for everything he had missed before.
Like a whirlwind, the entire plate of food was quickly devoured. Every last drop of sauce at the bottom of the plate was scraped clean with rice.
Only after letting out a satisfied burp did Asuma let out a long sigh of relief.
His stomach felt warm. A current of heat flowed through his limbs, dispelling his irritation.
He leaned back against the stone pillar, rubbing his slightly bulging stomach.
He suddenly understood.
The reason this meal tasted so good wasn't because of the chef's extraordinary skill.
It was because this was the first meal he had earned not through killing.
Protection?
Protection!
Even if this protection was only for an insignificant moment.
He ate this meal with a profound sense of peace.
This sense of peace made him feel more secure than the bounty from any S-rank mission.
Asuma stood up and dusted himself off.
He didn't return to his solitary corner but instead walked towards the construction site.
He wanted to personally experience it.
The weight of this protection.