Getting her exam ticket, Sarada understood why Uncle laughed at her attestation fear. The problems and questions were obvious to her; they'd fused with her shinobi nature, while peers sweated.
Second stage no issue. Transformation Technique easy. Substitution with standard log—to not scare examiner or reveal new ace. Cloning snagged. Unsure what clone examiner wanted, she made a shadow clone. Chunin gawked at flesh-and-blood vs. illusory but gave top marks.
Fights days later. Contrary to smug Michi's prediction, Sarada didn't fear sparring—eagerly awaited. She'd trained with talented Uchiha: eleven-year-old Anbu entrant Itachi, early-grad Izumi. She usually lost to uncle and friend, so curious vs. peers.
Eve of final exam day, returning from market with veggie bags, Sarada bumped her new acquaintance. She only talked clan with family, Izumi, Shisui. Recognized some Military Police officers from meetings glaring at Itachi, but no youth interactions.
Michi strolled Uchiha district with motley teen crew. Friends: Shisui-age guys, fourteen-ish girl, eight-ish kid.
Sarada hoisted food bag high, hoping Michi missed her. No dice.
"Hey, Sarada!"
Damn.
She lowered bag, faked surprise:
"Uh... Hi."
Michi's friends behind ogled the new girl. Sarada uneasy. Michi thrived.
"So, exams?"
"Peachy."
Sarada circled the teens, strode on. No desire chatting Michi amid staring Uchiha treating her like oddity.
"Hey, where ya going?"
Boy instantly beside, arm around her shoulder, blocking. Shiver ran. Michi magnetic yet repellent. Near him, Sarada forgot shinobi, recalled girl. Charming, uninhibited; compliments, unique looks drew her. Yet unreliable. Rubbery. Too flexible. Respected guys weren't: uncle, Shisui, Boruto, Shikadai, even kid Nanadaime Hokage or Dad. Or just surface? She barely knew Michi. Looks deceive.
No, not looks. That instant feel. Shisui-san's "strength." Inner core. Michi lacked.
Teens circled.
"She's all skinny," girl skepted. "Hey, real shinobi?"
Hairstyle like Izumi's, but black not chestnut. Izumi soft, shy—save Itachi-mood swings. This one confident, bitchy.
Sarada silent.
"Nekone, easy, don't scare her. Walk with us, Sarada?"
They marched in step. Crew flanked Sarada and Michi, casual stroll.
"Ready for tomorrow's spars?"
Michi's fingers still gripped her shoulder.
"Yes. Quite."
Michi chuckled. Older guys guffawed.
"Back off," Michi smiled waved. "For real. Sharingan'll get you through. Dunno if ya use it, but this class weaklings. Might forfeit seeing Sharingan."
Now brag how great you are. Go on.
"But remember my warning? Don't wanna hurt ya, but won't hold back if ya don't yield."
Metallic note in voice.
"I'll keep it in mind," Sarada dryly.
Thought: "Leave me alone already."
"Wanna hit a spot with us?"
"Feels like Michi found a girl," one guy whispered loudly to another, uncaring if Sarada heard.
She did.
"Thanks. Nah."
"Boyfriend won't let?" Michi grinned. "C'mon, Sarada. Don't be shy. You're one of us."
"Not 'us,'" she snapped, shrugging uncomfortably from Michi's hold. "Not 'one of you.' Leave me be."
Boy's eyes flashed ill. Pushed him before friends—pride stung.
"Hm," thin lips smirked. "Think 'cause clan head adopted ya, you're above us?"
"Don't think that."
"Dumbass," Nekone snorted. "Michi-kun wanted help ya fit. Stuck between Leaf and clan. Konoha won't take ya as Uchiha; offend Michi-kun—no place here. We're your future team."
Just what I needed. Don't want enemies, but damn, why cling?
"Sarada?" soft voice sang behind.
Hand on shoulder. Familiar touch unlike Michi's. No shiver—warmth spread, unusual calm.
"Hi, guys."
"You?" older guys muttered. "Shunshin..."
Sarada disbelievingly looked up at youth drawing her close.
Uchiha Shisui!
"Thanks for keeping Sarada company. I'll take over."
He confidently led her from the circle. No words. No stops. Sarada heard Michi's friends murmur behind, words indistinct. She walked by Shisui, feeling his hand's weight, and when far, whispered:
"Thanks."
Shisui nodded, released.
"Heard what they said."
He gave time to recall Nekone chat, continued:
"Youth interest ain't casual. Shoulda warned sooner, naively thought Itachi would. You only hung with me, Itachi, Izumi... Might sound boastful, but among youth—we're tops."
Not boast. Shisui earned it.
"Even Izumi-chan. Don't know her well, but she tries hard, awakened Sharingan at five."
"Five?!"
"Yep. Hanging with us gave wrong clan impression. Sarada, not all like us. That crew... None awakened Sharingan."
"What?..." Sarada marveled.
"Kekkei Genkai not all Uchiha. Michi, Nekone etc.—maybe someday, not lost yet. But no guarantee. Now imagine: girl appears, unknown before, lived clanless thinking villager. Suddenly awakens dojutsu. Taken under wing by Military Police head, Uchiha leader Fugaku."
Sarada got it.
"They envy..."
"Yes. Nekone said they're your future team... Like you depend on them, they favor ya. Never real friends, Sarada. Stand out, differ, far better than peers—you alone. Or with equals."
"You saying I'm your equal?"
Shisui rank her Uchiha elite?
"Yes," simply, smiling. "Talented, persistent. Of course you're ours."
"Shisui..."
Sarada hated revisiting that talk, but couldn't endure. Needed know. Shisui chats personal; realizing soul-baring to hypocrite playing close—killed her.
"You call me by name. Not 'girl' or 'spy.'"
"So?"
"You still suspect me?"
"Of course."
It felt like a knife to the heart. Thoughts raced chaotically through her head, refusing to form coherent logical chains.
"So... You've been pretending all this time," she said quietly. "That I'm 'one of you.' That you're my friend."
Shisui sighed:
"You're such a child after all," he slowed his pace, looking thoughtfully at his feet. "Naive and trusting."
He looked at her sadly. Who knows what Shisui was thinking at that moment?
"It's going to be tough for you, Sarada."
He called her by name again.
She turned away. Her chest hurt too much. Shisui scratched his neck and sighed heavily again.
"Yes, I suspect you. But I also allow for the possibility that your whole crazy story could be true, you know. So everything I've said or will say—it's from the heart."
Sarada covered her mouth with her palm, not even knowing why.
"Better?" Shisui asked.
Still not removing her hand from her mouth, she nodded. The paper bag of vegetables pressed to her chest rustled.
"Don't just stand there," he put his arm around her shoulders again. "Let's go. I promised to walk you home."
The third stage of the exam was held in the academy's backyard. Everything here was unfamiliar to Sarada. This building would be destroyed by Pain in about ten years—less, even—and the academy would be rebuilt. New walls, new classrooms... A new era.
The area, fenced with chain-link, was overgrown with grass, but around the logs with targets, the ground was packed bare earth instead of grass. As it turned out, there was one more test before the sparring: checking weapon-handling skills. It came as a surprise to Sarada, but she got her perfect score easily.
The examiner, a squat, cheeky man with a pointed goatee, was reviewing the participants' table on his tablet and scribbling something. In the shade of a tree, on a low wooden fence like a perch, sat Michi with his classmates. He didn't greet her or call her over.
*What a relief,* Sarada thought grimly. *Thanks to you, Shisui.*
Shisui's sudden intrusion had clearly shown Michi's group that lonely Sarada didn't feel alone and that someone was looking out for her.
"Please clear the center of the area," the examiner grumbled. "Come on, come on..."
The graduates scattered along the perimeter.
"First match: Akimichi Chotsu and Toniko Richi. Step to the center."
From the crowd, a shaggy chubby boy emerged reluctantly, along with an unremarkable black-haired kid.
Akimichi. That was Chocho's clan.
Sarada wistfully remembered her charismatic friend from the future, compared her to the chubby boy now lazily fending off his opponent's attacks, and grew sad. She really was an outsider here. The examiner called pair after pair; Sarada watched the fights disinterestedly and thought about how her life in the past might have turned out if she hadn't met her uncle, if her dad's family hadn't adopted her, if...
"Uchiha Sarada and Hochira Moshiko."
Sarada rose on wooden legs from the fence. Too late, she realized it would have been good to warm up a bit before the fight, and stood opposite her opponent. The pale-skinned girl in a black mesh crop top extended her hand in a dueling gesture. Thin strands of light hair escaped from her ponytail, carelessly tied at the crown with a rubber band. Moshiko eyed Sarada with interest.
"Hajime!"
The Sharingan activated in a fraction of a second; the light-haired girl didn't look away in time. Or maybe she didn't even try. Sarada sent an illusion into her opponent's pupils—a full spectrum of effects: vision, hearing, tactile receptors, signals from the vestibular system.
Sorry, Moshiko. Now your mind is cut off from reality.
The girl collapsed to the ground, flailing her arms and legs chaotically as if fending off something. Then she stopped moving altogether. The graduates watched her in stunned silence. Those sitting behind the examiner might have noticed Sarada using the Sharingan, but the ones by the tree only saw her back with the Uchiha crest on her dress. Among them, only Michi must have understood what happened to Moshiko. The examiner stared blankly at the motionless girl for a moment, then made a note on his tablet and announced:
"Winner: Uchiha Sarada."
No one clapped. Everyone was shocked. The examiner knelt beside Moshiko and touched her hand—probably infusing chakra to pull her out of the genjutsu. She stirred, opened her eyes, and looked around wildly.
"Come on, get up."
From the group of girls on the side fence, two friends jumped up and helped Moshiko to her feet. Sarada returned to her spot. Watching the next fights listlessly, she noticed the graduates glancing at her warily.
*If you stand out, if you're different, if you're significantly better than your peers—you'll be alone,* Shisui's voice echoed in her head.
Yes, Shisui-san, you're absolutely right.
She suddenly thought that Shisui and Itachi must have experienced this too. Though Shisui, with his super-friendliness, probably never felt lonely—he could make friends anywhere. And her uncle was always alone and probably didn't mind.
In the future, things were different. Sarada was top of her class, the last of the legendary Uchiha clan. But in the academy, they saw her first as Sarada, the goody-two-shoes, and only then as an Uchiha heir. And she didn't have the Sharingan back then either.
Meanwhile, Michi was called for sparring. She watched his fight with interest. Michi was good at taijutsu. He beat his opponent easily and spectacularly.
"Winner: Uchiha Michi," the examiner announced.
From the tree shade, his fan club clapped approvingly. Whistles sounded. The pudgy-cheeked examiner shot a disapproving glance at the noisy graduates but said nothing. Michi high-fived someone loudly and climbed onto the fence railing.
"Toneki Yoro and Uchiha Sarada."
This time, she got a non-clan boy. She faced Michi's group.
"Hajime!"
Chakra of the fire nature, giving off faint warmth, rushed toward her eyes. Surprisingly, Sarada had thought the same trick wouldn't work twice and the boy would realize not to look her in the eyes. But no such luck. This time, she created an illusion with taste. Ordinary control over the visual center, but...
Yoro assumed a fighting stance with kunai ready and jutted out his elbow. Sarada didn't move. She stood like her uncle at the start of every spar—fully relaxed, arms hanging freely. Yoro stared confidently at her face but glanced at his own hand, and sudden fear appeared in his eyes. His hand trembled. His fingers unclenched, and the kunai dropped into the dust. Yoro had already forgotten about Sarada. Staring in horror at his shaking hand, he suddenly screamed in terror. The spectators on the fence perches flinched. Only Sarada understood what caused such wild panic in Yoro. She controlled her opponent's vision; at that moment, it seemed to him that his hand was melting. First, the skin turned to liquid. Then blood oozed out, followed by flesh melting away, exposing pale bones...
Sarada decided not to connect the pain receptors: to scare Yoro half to death, the sight of his liquefied flesh—once a hand—spreading in a puddle on the dusty ground was enough. He kept screaming hysterically and grabbed his right wrist with his left hand.
And now the final touch: tactile receptors engage.
Yoro gripped his wrist, but... felt nothing. It seemed to him that his fingers had grabbed air instead of a hand. That finished him off completely.
Sarada had already deactivated her Sharingan to save chakra. The examiner hurried to dispel the illusion, led the terrified-to-death boy to his friends, and only then scribbled in his sheets. He didn't even announce the winner.
Returning from the area to her spot, Sarada crossed paths with Michi's wolfish glare. He couldn't use the Sharingan. And watching the girl who, in his opinion, had recently been "nobody," take out one opponent after another without lifting a finger, Michi grew darker and darker. His once-charming animal face now looked rat-like. He envied and feared that they'd pair him with her in sparring and he'd be humiliated. Or that he'd see what Yoro saw, scaring everyone present with his nightmarish scream.
Maybe they won't pair us. Though I'd like to fight him; I'm curious to compare our strengths.
And the examiner seemed curious too. Because shortly after, he announced:
"Uchiha Sarada and Uchiha Michi."
The guys under the tree buzzed.
"Come on, Michi, show her!"
Someone whistled. The examiner winced but said nothing again. Sarada stared intently as the boy slowly took position opposite her.
"What, gonna chicken out with Sharingan again?" he asked contemptuously, surely hiding his envy and fear.
Chicken out?
Michi thought awakening the Sharingan was enough to conquer the world. He couldn't even imagine how delicate and painstaking the work was to create such a realistic genjutsu.
"No. I want to fight you on equal terms."
Michi relaxed a bit but narrowed his eyes and pressed his thin lips together. He realized: Sarada knew he hadn't awakened the Sharingan; someone told her.
"Get ready," the cheeky one urged impatiently.
They raised their hands.
"Hajime!"
Michi instantly hurled a handful of shuriken at her. Sarada deflected them with her kunai and leaped back. If he was good at taijutsu, no need to let him close. Michi threw a kunai with an explosive tag attached, but Sarada knocked it aside with a shuriken, and it ricocheted to the fence. An explosion boomed.
Michi had never seen her fight before and didn't expect the nobody girl to be so well-prepared. He bit his lower lip and began forming seals. Familiar seals... Sarada formed them faster. To use techniques in training with Itachi, she'd worked hard on speed. Michi exhaled a small fireball, but Sarada's stream of flame swept it away. The stands whooped excitedly. The boy hastily dodged the attack, but the fire still singed him a bit. Sarada confidently threw shuriken at him. He deflected. Another volley. This time with electricity. A practiced combo she'd used with Izumi. No dodging—you had to block.
*This is gonna suck, Michi. Sorry,* Sarada thought vindictively.
Confusion showed in the boy's eyes. Using nature transformation techniques on the academy exam... A classic Uchiha fireball was one thing. But Raiton? He never expected that. He blocked the first few shuriken, but the electric shock slightly paralyzed his arm, and he missed the last ones. They hit his shoulder and thigh—Sarada deliberately avoided vital organs.
Gritting his teeth, he pulled the bloody shuriken from his body and tossed them to the ground.
"You bitch."
*Not a beauty anymore?* Sarada realized. Michi was wounded and weakened; close combat was no threat now. She let him close the distance, blocked several impressive kicks, dodged a right hook, and struck Michi in the chest, gathering a bit of chakra in her fist. He flew to the other end of the training area and gasped for breath, but his lungs seized from the impact with the ground.
The examiner extended his tablet hand toward Sarada, signaling: *Pause. Hold off,* and knelt by Michi to help him recover. Finally, the boy learned to breathe again, and the examiner announced:
"Winner: Uchiha Sarada. And yes, Sarada, this is your last fight. I've assessed your skills; no need to do all five spars and injure more students unnecessarily. You're free."
Michi watched her go with a gaze full of hatred.
***
Read the story months ahead of the public release — early chapters are available on my Patreon: Granulan