"I am not afraid."
Sasuke tried to spit the words out, but the moment he looked up he met Naruto's cold gaze. That calm, blade like stare cut straight through him. The protest died in his throat. A weight pressed on his chest. His hands trembled around the kunai. He lowered his head and did not dare look again.
"Seems Uchiha Itachi judged you well." Naruto gave a small shake of his head. "This is your measure."
Shame surged up like a tide. Sasuke crushed the kunai in his grip and lifted his eyes, bloodshot and fierce.
"I am not afraid. You—"
The words snapped off. Right before his eyes, Naruto tipped backward and dropped from the cliff. Sasuke's pupils shrank. He sprinted to the edge and peered down.
Naruto was falling fast, stabbing his kunai into the rock to slow his slide. In a few breaths the figure vanished from sight.
A wave of vertigo hit. Sasuke staggered back and swallowed hard. He raised the kunai again, thought racing.
"Ha. Naruto, that Uchiha brat will never jump."
Naruto landed at the base and Kurama's voice rolled out of the seal. Nine great tails swayed behind the iron bars, oddly excited.
"I agree he should not try it," Minato said, face drawn tight. "His upbringing is nothing like Itachi's. They are the same age, but the gap in strength is too wide."
Sensing Sasuke motionless above, Naruto spoke softly. "He will come down. If he would not, he would have turned and walked away the moment I jumped."
Kurama bristled. "Where does your confidence in that boy come from"
Minato shared the doubt, but another concern gnawed at him. "Naruto, if he really jumps and something goes wrong, you will save him, right"
"Maybe."
The flat tone made Minato even more uneasy.
"Then why give him four kunai marked for Flying Thunder God"
"If Father already noticed, why ask me"
"Ah. I"
Minato's expression turned awkward. After what Naruto had done one night here last year, Minato could not be sure how far his son would push Sasuke.
"Father, I am helping him. We both watched the puppet memories of Itachi and Sasuke. On the night of the massacre, Sasuke already opened his Sharingan."
Naruto walked to the river and sat on a jutting rock.
Minato froze. Those words sounded familiar. The last time Naruto said them, his kunai went straight through a man's heart.
"Naruto, the horror of that night must be carved into him."
"I think a person becomes brave only when facing fear head on."
"He is still a child."
"Hush." Mockery flashed in Naruto's eyes. "That child just jumped."
Wind roared.
Sasuke could barely keep his eyes open. He twisted his body, slashed both arms outward, and drove his kunai into the cliff face. Sparks spat from stone.
The world flew upward. Wind howled in his ears. The fall did not slow enough. He hacked again and again, arms burning.
Despair crept in. Regret pricked his spine. Strength drained from his forearms.
Fear swelled. It grew wild.
One kunai skipped off the rock and spun away.
Sasuke's head sagged. Consciousness blurred. His eyelids drooped.
"You are not even worth killing."
"Foolish little brother. If you wish to slay me, then feed your hatred. Nurse your grudge. Live on, ugly and unbowed."
"Run if you want. Crawl if you must. Keep breathing."
"Uchiha Itachi."
Sasuke's eyes snapped open. He jammed in a fresh kunai and went to work, carving the cliff in a flurry of desperate strikes.
From below, Naruto finally caught sight of him. One glance at the fall speed told him the truth. Sasuke would not make it. For a stretch he had stopped controlling his descent at all. If this continued, the ground would welcome him as pulp.
When thirty meters remained, Naruto vanished from the rock.
Sasuke's vision flickered. Naruto appeared at his side and seized his arm.
A flash.
Before Sasuke could process it, he stood back in the little grove at the training ground.
What happened
He stared at Naruto, stunned. He had been falling. He knew he had. Sweat poured from his brow, slid down his cheeks, dripped from his chin to the soil at his feet. Only then did he notice that his clothes were soaked through.
"Looks like you were shaken hard. Want to go home and change"
Naruto drew out a scroll, crouched, unfurled it, and fed in chakra. Six mechanical crossbows bloomed on the ground, the same kind he used to volley multiple kunai.
"How did I suddenly"
Sasuke wanted answers, but a tide of exhaustion crashed over him.
He collapsed.
Naruto arched a brow, stepped over, and checked him.
Breathing steady. No trauma. A clean faint from overdrawn stamina.
His awareness slid into the Mirror World and opened Sasuke's puppet profile. He came back a moment later with a grim line to his mouth.
Sasuke had been terrified during the jump, but even at the edge, the Sharingan he had once awakened did not flare. In both Itachi and Shisui's memories, intense pressure could trigger the eye. In the original Chunin Exams, one brief exchange with Rock Lee had pushed Sasuke's Sharingan forward, and that was just a bruising lesson.
If a cliff was not enough
Naruto glanced around the grove.
Time for another plan.
"Wake up, Sasuke."
Darkness fell away. Sasuke felt like he had been sinking for a long time. Through the fog he heard a voice he knew too well.
"Uchiha Itachi."
He burst upright and found himself in armor, a longbow in hand.
"Up here, Sasuke. The boar that has been attacking the villagers is coming."
He lifted his head. Uchiha Itachi stood on a nearby rooftop, smiling gently as he called.
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