Early in the morning, Uchiha Itachi brought purified water and wild fruits.
"Gah!"
Beiyuan happily picked up a piece of fruit, pecking at today's breakfast.
"Itachi, your summoned beast is really unqualified..." Jiraiya also glanced at the crow with a fruit in its mouth, and started counting on his fingers: "Can't keep watch at night, can't catch fish... and unlike other people's detection-type ninja beasts... too lazy!"
Uchiha Itachi handed over a wild fruit, using the food to block Jiraiya's mouth: "Sensei... eat fruit."
He knew Beiyuan's temperament very well. Just being willing to come along and endure life in the wild was already not bad. How could he ask for more? Before leaving home, Uchiha Mikoto had especially instructed him to take good care of Beiyuan.
"Sensei, where are we going now?"
"Ah, I'm going to retrieve a companion..." Jiraiya laughed heartily and said, "He's lost his way. I'm going to bring him back to the village."
"Orochimaru?"
"Oh? You know him too?"
"One of the Three Sannin of Konoha, the cold-blooded Orochimaru..." Uchiha Itachi recalled the scene when he saw Orochimaru: "I saw him in front of the Memorial Stone. He told me life has no meaning..."
Jiraiya immediately looked unwell. He leaned close to Uchiha Itachi and warned him: "Don't listen to that guy's nonsense! Not a single word is worth believing! He once promised to help me with everything—but never did a damn thing!"
"Yeah! But I was still young then. After hearing what he said, I thought... maybe if I got infinitely close to death, I could find the meaning of life..."
"...That bastard even brainwashes children!" Jiraiya clutched his forehead, then scolded fiercely: "Idiot, what were you thinking?! What happened afterward?"
Uchiha Itachi stroked the crow's wings and couldn't help remembering: "After that... I was saved by Beiyuan."
Tracking Orochimaru was extremely dangerous. Jiraiya had no intention of letting Uchiha Itachi fight. If not for the Third Hokage's orders, he'd planned to keep Itachi doing minor missions in the village.
Jiraiya glanced at the young boy and secretly decided: when they reached Orochimaru's base, he'd leave Itachi in a nearby town!
According to the intel from the Third Hokage... they'd be seeing that guy in a few days!
"The Land of Wind is relatively barren. Most of it is desert and Gobi, eroded by wind and sand year-round. Resources are scarce... The ninja of Sunagakure have a deep mastery of Wind Release."
"Isn't it easy to be countered?"
"Silly boy! As one of the Five Great Nations, how could they only rely on Wind Release! Besides Wind, they also excel in puppetry, poisons, and a special kind of bloodline limit: Magnet Release!"
"Are they strong?"
"Very strong!" Jiraiya nodded seriously and said, "I once saw a couple who were excellent puppet masters. They caused Konoha a lot of trouble... If not for Sakumo's brilliant swordsmanship, we might not have won."
He added after a pause: "But puppet masters aren't invincible. They have counters—like that woman Tsunade. One punch and the puppet's done... Even old lady Chiyo has nothing to say!"
"...Tsunade-sama really is strong!" Uchiha Itachi agreed. If nothing else, just the way she punched Jiraiya during his evaluation... was really satisfying...
Jiraiya kept praising her: "Of course. Tsunade is the strongest woman in the ninja world, and the strongest medical ninja. We used to be teammates..."
"Thanks to Tsunade, the idea of having medical ninja accompany squads became widespread. That's why so many people now survive battlefields..."
"Mikoto was from the same generation as Tsunade's little brother, Nawaki... what a pity..."
"That year, Tsunade nearly caught up to me..."
The crow on the side shot Jiraiya a disdainful glance. Some people just couldn't help but start bragging once they started talking...
The problem was, Uchiha Itachi didn't know the truth and couldn't call him out... So the teacher and student got along better and better—except for the crow who wanted to cover its ears.
In the entire ninja world, when it came to knowledge—whether it was local customs or the characteristics of different nations' ninjutsu—there was nearly no one Jiraiya didn't know about... And that same thirst for ninja knowledge was also in Uchiha Itachi.
One loved to speak, the other loved to listen.
Jiraiya felt full of accomplishment, and Uchiha Itachi had gained much.
Neither of them realized—they were being watched. From the cover of a dense tree, the mysterious masked man and Zetsu were hiding their presence.
"That child, the Uchiha... he's the one Jiraiya took as an apprentice?"
"His name is Uchiha Itachi." The black-and-white Zetsu whispered the gathered intel. "Everyone in Konoha knows he's awakened the Sharingan..."
"Even at just six years old, it's not that surprising." The masked man snorted coldly.
"They say he awakened it during Namikaze Minato's inauguration. After the ninja academy opened not long ago, Uchiha Itachi graduated after only one day of class... and the very next day, Jiraiya—who had just returned to the village—took him as his student."
"The Sharingan awakens through powerful emotions of love and hate... So this kid, Itachi, did he abandon the Uchiha?"
The masked man's interest was piqued. That clan... he was long tired of it.
Zetsu tried to calm Obito down: "Obito, Uchiha Itachi is the future patriarch of the Uchiha. If he grows up, everything you've done in Konoha will be in vain..."
Because of Itachi, the rift between the Uchiha and Konoha's high-ups might shift in unpredictable ways! Their goal was to weaken Konoha, not to watch it rise again...
"Hee hee hee... He almost died in Konoha, but he didn't do anything!" White Zetsu suddenly interjected, "Though you did kill his teacher... hee hee..."
Boom!
The masked man punched Zetsu's head straight into a tree trunk!
"You talk too damn much..." The masked man stared at the teacher and student in the distance and said coldly, "He's just a child. If he gets in the way... Uchiha Fugaku, don't think you can trust the Hokage again."
"Hee hee... you're ruthless..." White Zetsu, even with a dent in his skull, still couldn't help commenting, "That's the patriarch's son, you know. Is this really okay?"
Black Zetsu quickly cut off White's words and changed the subject: "Jiraiya is one of the Three Sannin. Not someone easy to deal with... Obito, your body hasn't fully recovered, has it?"
"Don't worry about Jiraiya." The masked man shook his head. "If I'm right, he's going after that defector Orochimaru. We'll get our chance... those pathetic bonds..."
"..." Zetsu went silent.
He talked so confidently—yet who was it that kept sneaking back to Konoha all the time? Either visiting graves, or secretly spying on the white-haired guy or something...