Chapter 49

"Master!"

"Big Brother!"

"Rēn!!"

Just as Rēn pushed open the office door, before even stepping fully inside, a barrage of greetings smacked him in the face. Looking closer, he saw a crowd of little brats had invaded his newly renovated office. He immediately realized—there went his afternoon nap.

"Fujika, shouldn't you be in class at the ninja academy right now?"

Rēn walked over and ruffled his younger sister's head, then turned to look at Naruto and... Sasuke. That genuinely puzzled him. Naruto skipping class was normal. But Sasuke too?

"The school's boring! They gave us blunt shuriken to play with—it's so lame."

Fujika pouted in complaint, her little face full of displeasure.

"She swapped the blunt ones for real ones today and got punished by the teacher to stand outside until the end of the day. So she ran off." Naruto came closer and whispered the truth.

"Got it."

Rēn understood and didn't pay the matter too much attention.

During the war era, kids aged six or seven carried knives to the battlefield. Compared to that, today's ninja academy had gotten too soft. The students it turned out lacked the killing intent and ferocity true ninja should have. Throw them onto a real battlefield, and it'd be a miracle if one in ten came back alive.

In Rēn's view, a ninja's training had to be with real weapons—those blunt toys were meaningless.

Besides, Rēn had taught Fujika shurikenjutsu himself. He wasn't worried about her hurting herself. If she were dumb enough to do that, then she might as well give up on becoming a ninja and stay home as a proper lady.

"So, Sasuke, what's your excuse today?"

Rēn shifted his gaze toward the quiet pillar.

"Well..." Sasuke stammered, blushing.

Rēn turned toward his little informant from the academy. Sure enough, Naruto didn't let him down. As soon as Rēn looked over, Naruto spilled everything about Sasuke's glorious feat at school—he'd recently learned Fire Style: Great Fireball Technique under his father's guidance and couldn't resist showing it off during combat class...

"You... blew up the school building?"

Rēn's eyes widened.

"No, no! Naruto, don't talk nonsense! I just accidentally knocked down a part of the wall, just a tiny bit! The school building's still standing fine!" Sasuke argued with Naruto, face bright red. That lively look made it hard to imagine him growing into the gloomy, cold figure he once was.

"Great Fireball? You already mastered Great Fireball?"

It took Rēn a second to process.

Learning Great Fireball at age five was... well, okay, not that surprising. After all, he was the reincarnation of Indra's chakra in this life. Both he and Naruto had top-tier talent. In the original timeline, their potential had been wasted for various reasons, only truly blossoming around age fifteen or sixteen.

"My father taught me."

Sasuke said seriously.

But when he mentioned his father, a smile crept onto his face. He didn't care whether his father was still the clan head. To him, stepping down meant his father now had more time at home. And the father he'd almost never seen smile was now smiling regularly.

He even spent lots of time teaching Sasuke the Great Fireball!

That was something Sasuke never would've imagined before.

All of this had happened since his father stepped down as clan head. So Sasuke truly felt that it was great his father was no longer in charge.

"Nice work! But next time, if you're going to use Great Fireball at school, make sure it's toward an empty field or the pond."

Sasuke nodded, still blushing.

Fujika sneered from the side. Don't be fooled by them skipping class and all showing up at the police headquarters—her relationship with Sasuke was pretty cold. Honestly, Sasuke was closer with Naruto than with her. Even though they were both Uchiha and Sasuke admired Rēn...

That wasn't enough to make kids into friends!

Fujika thought Sasuke was clingy. Sasuke thought Fujika was way too wild for a girl. They just didn't get along. Meanwhile, Naruto got along with everyone and could play with anyone.

Oh, right—

Besides Fujika, Naruto, and Sasuke, Rēn's only disciple was also here.

As for why they were all together... well, Kurama Sōun loved his daughter dearly. Wanting her to recover sooner, he'd simply packed her bedding and sent her straight to Rēn's home.

Which wasn't strange at all.

In the ninja world, the bond between master and disciple could be just as close as father and son. That's true for direct disciples, not the students trained in regular squads. Real personal disciples would even live in their master's house and train under them. If the master ever died the disciple could perform the funeral rites as a son would.

And so,

The frail Kurama Yakumo moved into Rēn's house and naturally grew familiar with Fujika. Though whether they were friends yet wasn't certain. For now, they were just acquainted. Maybe when Yakumo was able to run around and cause trouble with Fujika, they'd become real friends.

"Alright, all of you go play! Don't cause trouble here." After greeting each of the little brats, Rēn waved his hand and shooed them all out. They were too noisy—he still had proper business to take care of.

"Yakumo, how have you been feeling these past two days?"

Rēn dragged his chair and sat in front of Yakumo.

He opened his scarlet eyes, carefully observing his disciple's condition, checking the stability of the seal.

"A lot better. I even tried walking this morning and made several laps in the yard without feeling tired."

Yakumo nodded hard.

"Good. That means it's working... looks like I really need to dive deeper into sealing arts."

When it came to the problem with his disciple, Rēn had thought it through. There were only two real solutions.

One: strengthen Yakumo's physical energy, for example, by implanting Senju or Uzumaki cells to balance her overpowered spiritual energy. But that option wasn't available for now—he had no access to Senju or Uzumaki cells.

And he didn't have the tech either.

That said, he wasn't completely out of options. He still had Samehada.

Option two: weaken Yakumo's excessive spiritual power—either by sealing it or forcibly extracting some of it. After careful thought, he decided to try sealing part of her spiritual energy without relying on dojutsu.

As for using Konohana-Sakuya to steal his own disciple's talent for personal gain? Rēn wasn't that kind of person. That terrifyingly vast spiritual power was her future foundation—he wouldn't rob her of it.

In the end,

Rēn chose to do both.

On one hand, he'd use Samehada to slowly help Yakumo strengthen her physical energy. Since she had to train too, it'd be slow. On the other hand, he'd dive into sealing arts and try temporarily suppressing her overwhelming spiritual power.

Rēn formed hand seals, and summoned Samehada, who was happily feasting away in the Konoha prison.