Chapter 202: The Naturally Evil Uchiha x Solitary Yang Cannot Grow Without Yin
Roy smiled and patted Itachi's little head again. He stood up slowly, stretching lazily with his arms wide one second, and in the next, his body flickered, leaving afterimages as he moved... The fine hairs on Itachi's temples swayed slightly. The boy, kneeling on the corridor, felt his lap empty. Looking again, his Nii-san had already slid open the door and walked out, leaving only a vague shadow.
"Nii-san..." Itachi's mature eyes, unlike a child's, watched in a trance...
Roy used "Mastered Shadow Step" to move his feet, adjusting to his body. The "Main Body Power Acceptance Rate" jumped from 80% to 81%...
With shoulder-length black hair, the boy smiled. "Father."
Fugaku Uchiha had just returned from duty, brows furrowed deeply. He was still wearing the black tight combat suit under the green Jonin flak jacket, his face stern. Only when he saw Roy at home did his brow relax slightly. He nodded gently to the boy. "You're older now. There are some things you should know."
Following Roy's example of patting Itachi's head, the man rubbed Roy's head. "Come with me to the clan meeting today. Don't speak, just listen carefully. Tell me your thoughts when we return."
"Fugaku, isn't it a bit too early?" The kitchen curtain lifted, revealing a gentle face.
Mikoto Uchiha, wearing an apron, walked out holding a windbreaker with the red and white fan emblem. While speaking, she didn't stop moving, putting it directly on Roy. Looking the boy up and down, she smiled with satisfaction. "So handsome."
"Mom gave birth well."
"Of course." Mikoto's eyes narrowed into crescents, her smile like a flower.
Fugaku patted Roy's shoulder. Indeed, the boy looked the part wearing the windbreaker with the Uchiha clan crest. For a moment, it reminded him of his younger self, taken by his father to attend a clan meeting around this age, witnessing the complexity of the adult world for the first time...
"Not early," Fugaku said expressionlessly. "The clan suffered heavy casualties this time. The situation waits for no one. The younger generation needs to step up."
War was never child's play, but a true struggle of life and death. Roy had heard from Obito's big mouth a few days ago that this clan meeting wasn't just a meeting, but a memorial service... Every Uchiha who died on the battlefield would be invited into the clan's ancestral grounds, the Naka Shrine, to be worshipped alongside ancestors who died in the Warring States Period, the First and Second Shinobi World Wars, and on missions...
As Fugaku's wife, Mikoto naturally understood the current situation. She nodded, letting Roy leave with Fugaku. Just then...
The curtain was pulled open, revealing Itachi's chubby face. Mikoto took Itachi's small hand, watching the two leave, and lowered her head to say to Itachi, "Itachi, tell Papa and Nii-san to come back early. Mama is making hamburger steaks for them."
Itachi pursed his lips, hesitated for a moment, then waved to Roy and Fugaku...
Creeak~
The door closed, separating inside from outside, and isolating the small family from the clan and the village into two worlds.
Tap... tap...
On the way to the shrine, Fugaku walked in front, Roy followed unhurriedly behind... Passing a flower bed...
Fugaku stopped. "Jin, pick a few flowers for your deceased uncles, aunts, brothers, and sisters."
The man led by example, bending down to pick a few flowers himself, gathering them into a bunch...
Roy was dazed for a moment, suddenly remembering Great-Great-Grandfather Maha telling him to bring a pot of chrysanthemums for Grandpa Zzigg when paying respects. A phrase surfaced in his heart... The joys and sorrows of humanity are universal...
Whether "Hunters," "Demon Slayers," or "Ninja," all are made of flesh and blood. Where there is "joy," there is "sorrow"; where there is "hope," there is "despair"; where there is a "goal," there is "confusion." "Contradiction" yet "Unity" exist simultaneously...
The boy bent down, picking a few white chrysanthemums. His lips moved silently, mouthing the word "Contradiction." He vaguely felt he had been ignoring something all along... trying to think about it, it was foggy and elusive. Standing up...
As Fugaku approached the shrine, he met many Uchiha clan members.
"Clan Leader..."
"Fugaku-sama..."
"Jin is here too..."
Faces greeted and left. Among them were a few acquaintances... such as Tekka Uchiha, Inabi Uchiha... Yashiro Uchiha... Obito Uchiha... and...
Shisui Uchiha, who ran excitedly on his short legs upon seeing Roy.
"Nii-san!" At five years old, Shisui ran with the style of the future "Shisui of the Body Flicker." Not yet lean like his future self, his chubby face still had traces of baby fat. Carrying a sword on his back, he rushed to Roy like the wind, excitedly holding up five fingers. "Five, Nii-san!"
"I killed five enemies with the swordsmanship you taught me~"
[Notification: Detected one "Potential Believer"...]
[Potential Believer: Shisui Uchiha... Grateful for saving his life and teaching him, admires the Host greatly...]
[Loyalty: Absolute Loyalty, can entrust his life, ready for conversion anytime...]
Roy smiled at the boy. Since saving Shisui and being pestered into teaching him "Flame Breathing," the boy progressed rapidly, quickly mastering the essence of the breathing style... "Total Concentration: Constant." Coupled with his innate talent, making a name for himself on the battlefield at the age of five indirectly proved...
Konoha was truly short on manpower... Not just him and Shisui, even Itachi would be taken to the battlefield next year to resist Kumo's invasion. Especially after Kumo sent the AB Combo (A and Killer B) to ravage the battlefield... the situation became increasingly severe...
"Show-off. Let me see if you're hurt." Roy grabbed Shisui by the collar like lifting a rabbit, shaking him. The boy nearly lost his pants and hurriedly covered his crotch.
"Nii-san, I'm a big kid now, save me some face..."
With people coming and going in front of the shrine, it was embarrassing... Shisui held up his pants, complaining resentfully.
Ignoring him, Roy kicked his butt. "Go play somewhere else."
Shisui pretended to be in pain but dodged nimbly. He bowed respectfully to Fugaku. "Uncle Fugaku."
Like a little tail, he followed closely behind Roy as usual...
Fugaku watched the boys play quietly, his gloom lifting slightly. Saying nothing, he just patted Shisui's head encouragingly, then glanced sideways at Roy. Thoughts churning, he recalled Sakumo Hatake visiting late that night and saying... "As long as you nod, I'll report to the Hokage immediately and strive to become Roy's jonin sensei."
Fugaku looked at the snow-white long sword at Roy's waist, said to be a trophy from the battlefield. He had never denied his son's swordsmanship talent, but it wasn't until the White Fang visited that he realized he had still underestimated it.
"Self-created swordsmanship. Roy is the most talented swordsman I have ever seen, bar none." This was the fair evaluation Sakumo Hatake gave after witnessing Roy's swordsmanship on the battlefield that day.
Unfortunately... Sakumo Hatake's idea was impossible to realize. He probably knew it too... it was perhaps wishful thinking... because... Fugaku's face darkened. Neither the Hokage nor the three advisors would want the Hatake clan getting too close to the Uchiha. The heavy casualties among the clan's youth this time might have been pushed by someone behind the scenes.
The invisible hand is the most deadly...
Accompanied by Uchiha members greeting Fugaku, they entered the shrine.
Fugaku took a deep breath, stepping into the shrine with Roy and Shisui. A few steps brought them to the main hall, where rows of coffins were neatly arranged. Inside lay the Uchiha clan members who died on the battlefield.
Some bodies were whole, some missing limbs, and some... simply missing, leaving only a set of clothes they usually wore in the coffin...
Roy followed Fugaku across the threshold into the main hall. The Uchiha standing before the coffins parted to make way for him and Fugaku. At the front... an old man, a middle-aged man, and two young men nodded to him...
Fugaku walked forward silently, standing before the coffins. Closing his eyes to adjust his emotions, he opened them again and offered flowers to each coffin. Roy followed quietly, offering flowers with Fugaku. Then the old man, the middle-aged man, the young men...
And every Uchiha clan member in the hall...
Until the last bunch of flowers was offered...
Fugaku turned around, sitting on the floor with his back to the coffins. The clan meeting officially began in this sorrowful atmosphere.
Shisui was observant. Attending the clan meeting for the first time, he knew when to speak and when not to. He knelt quietly beside Roy, next to Fugaku.
In the front row were Yashiro Uchiha... Inabi, Tekka... and Setsuna Uchiha, who looked like a candle in the wind, ready to extinguish at any moment!
As an Uchiha elder active during the Second Shinobi World War, Setsuna Uchiha was a contemporary of Hiruzen Sarutobi and Danzo Shimura. Imprisoned years ago for inciting rebellion due to dissatisfaction with the Second Hokage Tobirama Senju's policies towards the Uchiha... Now old and frail, his release wasn't out of pity, but clearly a transaction between the clan and the village.
"Let's begin." As Fugaku spoke expressionlessly.
Sitting in the front row, vaguely subordinate to Setsuna Uchiha, Yashiro Uchiha, Fugaku's most trusted subordinate and advisor, broke the silence, voicing the topic of the meeting and the thoughts of all Uchiha present except for the ignorant children like Shisui attending for the first time: "Clan Leader, we can't go on like this."
Yashiro frowned. "The mission assignments this time were very wrong. I suspect the higher-ups are deliberately suppressing our Uchiha clan."
"Yes, Clan Leader," Inabi Uchiha said angrily, his arm in a sling. "I was assigned a B-rank mission, but it turned out to be A-rank on the battlefield. If Yashiro-sama hadn't arrived in time, who knows if I could stand here talking to you now!"
"Me too... and me... I took a C-rank, turned out to be B..."
"No doubt, such a huge intelligence error causing so many of our deaths must be related to the higher-ups!"
"Shh... don't talk nonsense!"
"Who's talking nonsense? What can't be said? This is the Uchiha clan, not the Hokage Building!"
"Hiruzen Sarutobi did dirty deeds, and we can't talk about it? Ask your dead father if he agrees?!"
Ting-a-ling... The wind chimes in the corner of the Naka Shrine tinkled in the wind...
Complaints, anger... doubts... clamored. The Uchiha who lost relatives and friends all had red eyes. Intelligence errors couldn't be brushed off lightly with a sentence like "the battlefield is dynamic."
No one was a fool. Coupled with the various isolation policies adopted against the Uchiha since the Second Hokage took office... and the intensified suppression by the Third Hokage and Danzo...
Anyone with eyes in the clan could see it!
But who told Tobirama Senju to plant the seeds of suspicion the moment he killed Izuna Uchiha? Roy sat silently beside Fugaku, listening quietly. Regarding the conflict between the Uchiha and the village, and the eventual annihilation, perhaps no one knew the real truth better than him!
Rather than a conflict between Uchiha and Konoha, it was a conflict between Indra and Asura... Yin Release and Yang Release... Spear and Shield... Seemingly irreconcilable, yet objectively existing... independent of human will...
Contradiction... Yin and Yang... are actually one...
The noise in the hall continued, even escalating... Pent-up frustration and dissatisfaction, once released, were like a bursting dam...
Fugaku Uchiha listened quietly without saying a word.
Below him, Setsuna Uchiha also closed his eyes in silence... letting the situation ferment...
Roy took everything in, finally finding what he had been ignoring.
He lifted his chin, glancing out the window. Afternoon, the sun slanted west. Sunlight fell on trees, casting tree shadows; on walls, casting wall shadows; on people, casting human shadows...
Yin and Yang, Light and Shadow, Spear and Shield... Wherever sunlight shines, shadows follow... And I...
The boy lowered his eyelids, stroking the corner of his windbreaker with the red and white fan Uchiha crest...
His ink-black eyes were brighter than ever...
Sudden enlightenment—
"Now I am the naturally evil Uchiha!"
"Before, I habitually illuminated and killed the 'Dark Side,' but never thought... to use the dark side, control those negative emotions, making them my driving force, my tools..."
En released, Heart Worms wriggled!
As the saying goes, "Solitary Yang cannot grow, solitary Yin cannot grow"...
Roy looked up again. The "complaints," "anger," "dissatisfaction"... instantly turned into fragrant spiritual food!
"Heart Worms, eat for me!"
☆☆☆
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