Live with No Regret!

"Normal Speech"

'Inside Thought'

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Acceptance doesn't mean resignation; it means understanding that something is what it is and that there's got to be a way through it.

-Michael J. Fox

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"-ko, Miko-tan."

A childish voice shook me out from my reverie. A tiny hand tugged the hem of my clothes repeatedly. It seemed, my momentary silence upset the yellow-haired toddler in front of me.

"Miko-tan okay?"

The two years old toddler with a pair of cute whisker that plastered on his face asked me worriedly. Those blue eyes inspected me if something wrong happened to me.

"Hmmm. O-okay, Naru-tan."

The lack of clear pronunciation made my mouth twitched a bit. However, my answer considered being alright by the toddler. The said toddler went back to his castle block while gave me some of the blocks. I indulged him by building my castle, accompanied him in playing. Despite that, I could not shake this irritating feeling of mine. I'm an adult - trapped in this toddler's body - for God's sake, I needed an adult entertainment. [Author: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)]

While silently grudging, I could not help myself stopped staring at a red-haired toddler in front of me which turned out to be myself. In the last two years since being reincarnated, for the first time, I saw the appearance of my current body today. In those years ago, I avoided all the windows and mirrors in the house at all cost. I was afraid when I saw myself in there I would not recognize myself anymore.

A pair of blank blue eyes stared back at me. My pale cheeks flushed under a set of three stripes cute whisker. Surprisingly, I had straight-smooth red hair. It was not a bright red, but dark like blood. I did not recognize myself anymore, as there was nothing left from the previous me. I only saw a reflection of a tiny toddler with a stricken expression.

In particular, all of my new features reminded me of my current mother, Uzumaki Kushina, except for the blue eyes and whiskers. When it came to genetics, I was sure this body would bloom beautifully in the future with those curves and postures.

'Damn, I knew it! I'll be such a hottie in the future!'

Contrary to me, all Naruto's features had a similarity to Minato. Even Naruto could pass as one of Minato's shadow clone for sure. Speak of the devil, the man so-called as father showed up before us.

His unkempt yellow hair swayed back and forth, while he made his way toward us. He was not the same vigorous youth as portrayed by the media in my past world. I could only see a man who carried heavy loads on his shoulders as if he brought the burden of the world by himself. Behind his sunny smile, I knew that he hid his tired face, especially after facing shameless people. Therefore, this man would play the fatherly-doting facade flawlessly if I were not his daughter. Too bad, I was his daughter.

"Daddy, Naru-tan miss daddy."

Knowing his daddy rarely visited them, Naruto flung himself to Minato's embrace. It seemed his longing for his daddy was prominent than his desire to play with toys. Unlike him, I only stared at Minato blankly. Moreover, Minato did not have any personal meaning in my heart yet.

"This much! Naru-tan miss daddy this much."

Naruto made a large circle gesture with his hands while smiling at Minato charmingly. Awkwardly, I approached the man and greeted him.

"Daddy."

I patted Minato's other hand that not carried Naruto, acknowledging his presence. It was hella awkward for me calling someone younger than me with daddy.

Did not deter by my lack of enthusiasm of seeing him, he scoped me to his embrace as he did to Naruto.

Minato hummed approvingly of Naruto who animatedly recited how we spent the day by playing together. Not to garner the man's attention to me, I let Naruto took the limelight. Because I did not want the recognition of this man. What if he noticed something wrong with me? That his daughter was not as simple as it seemed.

'Well, I don't want to have any Yamanaka mind raping my mind.'

Suddenly, Minato said something that made me regret not to pay attention to my surrounding.

"Hold tight to daddy, okay?"

I held back a string of curses as I felt my body forcefully sucked into somewhere, different from Naruto who shrieked gleefully.

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Not so long, I found myself seated on a high stool chair. Minato on my right while Naruto on his right. I smiled inwardly at Minato's choice of place for having dinner. I did not think that Minato would this eager to convert his children to be ramen-believers like him.

I quietly snorted at the notion. Winning the love of his children through their stomach while influencing his taste buds to us. Minato had a long way to go.

While inwardly criticizing Minato, I inspected Ramen Ichiraku Restaurant. It was not as small as I thought it would be. A long counter table restricted the customers entered the kitchen area while we still could see the process of ramen making. The high stool chair was comfortable enough to sit on, in fact, it could make the yellow-haired bundle-of-energy sat on the chair calmly. As the wall painted by light brown color, the light that emitted by yellow bulbs exuded warm and familiar feelings of a family restaurant.

Seeing us, Teuchi, the owner welcomed us with his business smile. There was no sign of Ayame yet, his daughter.

"Welcome at Ramen Ichiraku, Minato-san. It has been ages since your last visit."

The said man could only scratch his nape while smiling sheepishly.

"Yeah, I've been busy lately, Teuchi-san."

Teuchi nodded his head in an understanding manner as he realized his new little customers.

"So, what're your order? How about my new little customers choose them?"

As Naruto and I did not know the menu, we stared at Minato in a questioning gaze.

"Let's try what daddy tries, okay?"

Minato suggested something to our ears and encouraged us to say it to Teuchi.

"I want a bowl of Miso Chashu Pork Ramen, please," said me politely then followed by Naruto. "Uncle Teuchi, one Miso Chashu Pork Ramen."

"My, you have polite and smart children, Minato-san. What's your name little one?"

As the question directed to me, I introduced myself politely.

"My name is Uzumaki Michiko. Nice to meet you, Teuchi-san."

I bent my body a bit to give the man a little bow. Now, Teuchi gave an expectant gaze toward Naruto.

"Uzumaki Naruto, the future Hokage, dattebayo!"

Then, he gave an awkward bow, trying to imitate mine. While Naruto's self-introduction amused Teuchi to no end, my eyebrow twitched a bit remembering Naruto's motivation to be a Hokage. He wanted to be Hokage so he could occupy his daddy for himself. On my side, Minato glowed like a hundred volts bulb at Naruto's behavior. Because Minato thought that his son possessiveness was endearing.

"Okay! Three bowls of Miso Chashu Pork Ramen will be ready soon," exclaimed Teuchi.

As Teuchi prepared our ramen, Naruto poured all of his attention to every gesture Teuchi made, ignoring Minato who seemed wanting to say something to him. Poor Minato.

Realizing that Minato ignored by his son, he changed his attention to his other victim - er, children.

"Do you like eating outside, Miko-chan?"

"Yeah..." I paused for a bit. "It's nice to eat outside sometimes."

Truthfully, this was the first time Minato brought us outside. For the past two years, Naruto and I spent our times together without care of the outside world. We did not do play date as we did not know others in our age. I might even believe that Minato intentionally isolated us.

"Which one do you prefer? Eating inside or outside?" Minato asked me again.

"Both. I think?"

I felt unsure. Our nannies - Anbu - always cooked foods that too nutritious to my liking. It was a universal fact that nutritious foods - sometimes - were the pain the ass. At the same time, eating outside had its own disadvantage. Minato was our father, and we were his children, if we went to the outside, we were like a walking advertisement. We garnered every attention of Konoha's villagers, especially Minato's fangirls or worse fanboys.

I shivered at the notion. I even regretted thinking about that. Now, I needed a mental-bleach for my mind. Damn it!

"-chan, Miko-chan, are you cold? Your body's shivering all over."

Minato pulled a long red scarf out of thin air and wrapped it around my neck then my hands.

'Must be the work of Fuinjutsu,' suspected me. 'What a pity if I didn't learn it in this lifetime.'

"Y-yes," lied me. I did not need Minato to know what I thought before.

Later, three bowls of steamy Miso Chashu Pork Ramen served before us. Teuchi put each ramen in front of us then gave Naruto and I pairs of small plastic chopsticks, that reminding me of training chopsticks.

'Hmmm... What a thoughtful owner.' I approved Teuchi's action as I inspected my ramen. 'The look is too good to be eaten.'

Toppings of the ramen laid out beautifully as if they were a work of art. The characteristic smell of noodle and meat fused into one as the air carried it, enticing people who sniffed it. If you were here, you could see the drools that pooled on Naruto's lap.

'Minato, please swipe those drools.' I looked at Minato with an expectant gaze, but not heeded by the man whose thought misinterpreted the meaning of my gaze.

Only on his eyes that Minato thought his daughter wanted him to spoil her by spoon-feeding her.

'Ah, my daughter is cute,' thought Minato happily. 'Finally, I could redeem myself for my absence all these days.'

Because of this misunderstanding, the calm dinner became chaos. While I wanted to eat peacefully by myself, Minato insisted on helping me ate my ramen while sprouting nonsense like, "Let daddy spoil you."

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It had been hours since I had my dinner and now was the bedtime. Before that, Minato spent his time with us storytelling The Tale of Utterly Gutsy Ninja. A cliche story about a man who vowed to break the circle of hatred in his world. To my amusement, Naruto pointed it out that he had the same name as the protagonist. Naturally, Naruto became so happy that he wanted to follow the protagonist's steps, to break the circle of hatred in this world.

Hearing his son said those words, Minato supported the idea and not laughed at Naruto. Even though Minato knew that Naruto did not even know the meaning of hatred yet, his heart became relieved.

'If you become a ninja, it's the same as signing a warranty for harboring and giving others your hatred, stupid fools.'

That time, I suppressed my inner thought inside, afraid that would be leaked out. After all, I knew from my own experience, jobs related to killing and protecting could be the source of someone's hatred. For example, someone's hate toward me had led me to my demise, my death. Hence, my biggest regret was I did not know the person who planned my death.

In sudden, an Anbu appeared behind Minato and gave sign language to Minato. It seemed it was important enough to make Minato's expression changed for a split second.

With that, Minato tucked us to bed early. He said how he loved us and kissed both of our foreheads before transported himself to where he was needed.

An hour had left since Minato's departure, and Naruto who slept beside me had long asleep. As for me, I could not sleep at all. I was wondering about my existence in this world.

'Why was I reincarnated and with memory intact?'

'Why was me?'

Those questions always resonated before me every time. I took a glance at Naruto. His almond face shape was not seen yet because of his chubby cheeks.

'It felt surreal to have him as my sibling.'

Naruto, my twin here, was The Child of Prophecy who would bring the peace to The Elemental Nations, the last reincarnation of Otsutsuki Asura and the Jinchuriki of Yang Kurama.

The thought of the future him flashed before my mind. However, I could only see a toddler who liked to cling to me now. Where ever place I went, he followed me while saying, Miko-tan. When I took a nap, he would hold my hands tightly and followed my action. Even his first word was Miko-tan, followed by daddy. In a word, this Naruto was not the future-Naruto I knew yet.

'Then, why would I reincarnate as his sibling, twin precisely?'

As far as I knew, Naruto was an only child. No sibling, especially twin. However, I reincarnated as his twin. I did not know if this were a God's or Devil's work for being reincarnated in this world.

These two years, I learned to accept the impossible. I tried to see Naruto as my sibling and Minato as my father, not as fictional characters. Still, it was hard for me to do so.

However, the feeling of protectiveness seemed grew in my heart for Naruto, to protect him from this cruel world.

'Yes! I will protect him,' vowed me unconsciously.

In my last life, I did not have a sibling and an orphaned from a young age. I used to wonder the feeling of having a sibling, someone who I would dote and protect for. Now, my wish came true. I had a sibling, Naruto.

'At least I will try to protect him and not repeat the same mistake again. So, when I leave this world, I will not have any regret anymore,' said me as darkness enveloped me, making me to a dreamless sleep.

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Hiya, I'm back!!! Finally, after finishing all of Devil's work - the examinations - for college entrance, I could breathe a fresh air of my little freedom. Thank you to you all who waited for this long, I only could say I love you for being patient and still interested with this story.

So, here's 1 of 9 left behind chapter. After this, I'll regularly update again according to the schedule. Previously, I update twice-a-week. Now, I'll try to update thrice-a-week.

Well, it's my ambition and dream to update every day for you. However, I'm not that skilled yet. I also want for once to enter the top 50 ranks *wistful gaze* of original work, and I need your help to realize it.

Okay, I'll stop rambling now. Let me hear your thought about this chapter. You could also join me on Discord now: https://discord.gg/EVqT5aD. It's still new and needs many improvements.

See you in the next update!