Miss Namikaze Haitao flattered Obito and praised him endlessly, living up to the spirit of a devoted little sycophant. As a result, their relationship became exceptionally close, and Obito even felt a sense of regret that they hadn't met sooner. Obito's parents had passed away early because of the war, and he lived with his grandmother. Perhaps because he had been alone and lonely since childhood, he always put on an attitude that nothing mattered. Yet, there were only two people in the world who knew the true loneliness hidden inside him.
One was his grandmother, Uchiha Haruko, and the other was Rin. He always remembered what Rin had told him—if you feel lonely, just say it out loud, stop trying to act tough. Therefore, he liked Rin, liked that kind of pure care, and liked Rin's clean smile. As for this sudden girl who popped up and insisted on making him her boss, he found her quite unexpected, but he didn't dislike her. It felt as if he had suddenly gained a little sister—yes, a little sister. How he wished he could have a brother or a sister.
Was he lonely? Was he all alone? Wasn't he already blessed with so many things now? Come on, Father, Mother, Obito here is going to be the man who becomes Hokage!
Miss Namikaze Haitao, for her part, found Uchiha Obito's thoughts remarkably easy to guess. She didn't even need to use the skills honed from watching years of palace intrigue dramas to figure out what was on his mind. Being friends with someone like this allowed her to let down her guard and feel completely at ease. Therefore, whenever Obito tagged along with her dad to do simple and bizarre missions, like catching stray cats or fixing sewers, she would tag along too.
Gradually, Haitao stopped wondering where Uchiha Itachi had disappeared to. She stopped worrying about how that boy was doing either; after all, there were so many people in the Uchiha clan, and they were all so cool and overbearing. Since that kid was the clan leader's son, there was no way he would actually get dragged off to patch up the sky.
Localized skirmishes continued, but the atmosphere in Konoha Village remained peaceful. The ninja, led by the Third Hokage, worked hard to prevent the war from affecting the lives of ordinary villagers, and the results were quite good. At any rate, Haitao hadn't been impacted much—or rather, she hadn't yet experienced the cruelty of war.
There was only one thing that bothered Haitao, something she had suddenly realized while sleeping one day: Kakashi's left eye should be a Sharingan, yet right now he didn't have one at all. From the plot points she already knew, that should be something exclusive to the Uchiha clan, so why did Kakashi have one?
Could something like that be achieved through genetic mutation? That was impossible, right? It wasn't just a simple change in eye color. Could it be that he was an illegitimate child of the Uchiha clan? Thinking about it that way actually seemed to make sense. Some kind of old-school romance plot about eloping to the moon—she understood now, she understood completely.
Miss Namikaze Haitao sat right there on her roof, pondering the meaning of life. The autumn wind was really quite strong out here. Speaking of which, parents around here were truly fearless. Aunt Mikoto knew that she bullied Uchiha Itachi and still dared to let him play with her. Her own mother was even bolder; she was just a little toddler, yet her mom dared to open the roof hatch in broad daylight and let her crawl up here to play, with zero fear that she might fall off.
Sigh, the main issue right now was that she couldn't sort out the timeline and the plot at all. She had only just seen Gaara's entrance during the Chunin Exams, having watched at most a few video clips, and she couldn't even recognize all the characters. What on earth was she supposed to do about the future?
Actually, back in her adolescence—or rather, her girlhood—she had read a fair amount of shoujo manga, things like Shugo Chara!, Ouran High School Host Club, Tokyo Mew Mew, and so on. So why couldn't she have transmigrated into a shoujo manga? At least she wouldn't be in mortal danger, at least she would know the plot and the characters, and at least she wouldn't step on any landmines.
Still, it was a good thing she hadn't transmigrated into that currently super popular Jujutsu Kaisen. Word had it that one person died every ten steps and not a single soul was left within a thousand miles, and the author even got beaten up.
Sighing, she looked up at the sky in speechless resignation once again. The weather really was lovely today.
"Momoko, Momoko, hurry down! We have a guest today," Kushina's voice rang out before Haitao had even spent much time daydreaming, sounding rather excited.
Haitao quickly scrambled to her feet. "Ah, coming!"
A guest was coming? What kind of guest could possibly prompt such a big fuss from Mom? Come to think of it, not many guests ever visited their house; the most frequent visitors were by far Aunt Mikoto and Uchiha Itachi. She couldn't help feeling a little curious about the background of this legendary guest.
"Minato and Kushi, it really has been a long time."
Before she had even reached the top of the stairs, Haitao heard the voice. It sounded like a very mature uncle. She had never heard this voice before, which meant she definitely didn't know this person.
"Yeah, it has been a while. How long does Teacher Jiraiya plan to stay this time around?"
Haitao finally walked out from the stairwell. "Mom, Dad, um? A white-haired grandpa?" Given that Miss Namikaze Haitao was perpetually foolish, she subconsciously blurted out what was on her mind. Actually, she couldn't entirely be blamed; it was hard not to suspect that a man sporting a full head of white hair and a deeply mature voice was just some old codger.
Kushina covered her mouth and giggled, while Minato's trembling shoulders betrayed the fact that he was desperately holding back his laughter. Jiraiya was taken aback for a moment before offering a helpless smile. "I'm not a grandpa. I'm only thirty-five. Hurry up and call me older brother."
"Older brother?" Minato gave a wry smile. Teacher Jiraiya still spoke with such utter lack of logic. Going by this seniority, he supposed he came out ahead, but who on earth referred to himself that way? It really was a rare sight.
"..." For a moment, Haitao truly didn't know what to say. Who was this guy? She felt like she had seen him somewhere before—in some video edit or another. She couldn't quite remember the plot, but she distinctly remembered the screen being flooded with comments: *A swimming dragon returns to the sea, yet the sea does not welcome Jiraiya.*
"Who are you?"
"Me?" Jiraiya took two steps backward and began performing a bizarre routine all by himself, striking poses and chanting words at the pauses, making the whole spectacle look rather comical.
Yet Haitao watched him very intently. The moves actually looked quite cool, except that this uncle's hair looked like it would be prickly to the touch. She wanted to reach out and pet it. Not only did she want to, but she actually went ahead and did it.
Before he could even finish his lines, Jiraiya's "spellcasting was interrupted" right there by Haitao. However, looking at the child's chubby little face, Jiraiya couldn't bring himself to utter a single harsh word. He remembered this child's name. "Momoko?"
"Mm, Namikaze Haitao."
"Yosh! Tell me, Momoko, do you want to learn Ninjutsu with me? You're two and a half, about old enough to start learning Ninjutsu, aren't you?" Jiraiya quietly withdrew his long white hair. Minato's child shouldn't have poor aptitude, and combined with Kushina's Uzumaki Clan bloodline, this child's future was bound to be immeasurable.
Before Haitao could say anything, Kushina scooped her up into her arms. "No thanks. I don't want Momoko learning Ninjutsu at such a young age. We can talk about it later. I want her to always be happy and do whatever she wants to do. Whether she becomes a ninja or not, I will support her no matter what."
This was her first child. The moment those eyes first blinked open to look at her, she felt that only the most wonderful things in the entire world were worthy of those clear eyes.
"True, none of us should ever crush our own dreams onto our children. What we need to do is become the sky that supports their dreams." Jiraiya pulled out a chair and sat down. "It's been a long time since I've had food cooked by Minato. Kushina, how is it that you're not cooking today?"
Kushina settled Momoko into her exclusive little seat before replying, "Didn't Teacher Jiraiya want to eat Minato's cooking? As for me, my cooking isn't as good as his, so I'd better stay out of the kitchen and not make a fool of myself in front of you. Besides, you couldn't possibly be thinking of teaching Momoko Ninjutsu right now, could you?"
How should she put it? Jiraiya was indeed an exceptionally brilliant ninja, but Kushina always worried that he would teach Haitao bad habits. She could even envision the day when Haitao grew up to be a boss lady chewing on a tobacco pipe and getting into street fights.
At that thought, Kushina couldn't help shivering. How terrifying.
"Kushina, Minato, Konoha is going to undergo a drastic change very soon," Jiraiya said thoughtfully. The timing of their summons for him to return was all wrong; local skirmishes had grown increasingly frequent lately, and there was a strong possibility they would soon escalate into a full-scale Ninja World War.
Both Minato and Kushina could sense the unusual atmosphere permeating the air in Konoha. "No matter when it happens, as Konoha's ninja, we will never back down. Right, Teacher Jiraiya?"
Seeming to have anticipated that Minato would say just that, Jiraiya broke into a broad, sweeping grin. "That's right, Minato, Kushina."