Chapter 49:
"Time to eat…"
Sasuke guessed that Naruto was deliberately putting on an act, but hearing the choked tone in Naruto's voice still made his own heart ache.
"Then can you not beat me up today? I promise I'll wake up early tomorrow and train properly…"
Naruto looked down at Sasuke with a pitiful expression. He had already made one of the hidden figures leave. Now it really was time to eat.
But if Sasuke was unhappy, he might still get beaten again.
"I won't hit you today."
Sasuke let go of Naruto weakly and turned to go take a bath.
When it was time for dinner, Sasuke ate the rabbit meat while looking at Naruto. Some thoughts in his heart finally couldn't be held back any longer.
'Are you going to tell me or not?'
He knew Naruto was acting, but right now Sasuke didn't know who he was performing for. The feeling was incredibly frustrating.
'One person… someone who probably cares about me a little, and maybe cares about you too. But whether he can actually do anything about it is hard to say…'
Naruto ate with oil staining the corners of his mouth. The happy smile on his face from finally getting to eat meat looked somewhat pitiful, making the silver-haired Anbu who had just rushed back from the Hokage's office feel a pang of heartache.
'Someone who knows my family?'
Sasuke placed a larger rabbit leg into Naruto's bowl, then lowered his head and continued eating.
Normally he would leave two whole rabbit legs so they could each have one.
But tonight he didn't feel like eating the leg.
Even though they had skipped class, going into the mountains to catch rabbits and then putting on an act for the hidden watchers was quite tiring.
'According to the information I got, he should be your brother's former captain, and my dad's student…'
Naruto picked up the rabbit leg in his bowl. While quietly chatting with Sasuke, he suddenly looked up with teary eyes at the person across from him, then looked back down at the rabbit leg in his bowl…
The expression clearly showed he was moved just by getting one rabbit leg.
"No talking. Eat your food!"
'Stop looking at me with those ugly eyes, or I'll hit you!'
Sasuke snorted coldly out loud, then lowered his head and continued eating while mentally continuing the conversation with Naruto about the person who seemed to care about them a little.
'Right now that person is still an Anbu captain, but the Hokage wants him to retire from Anbu and take on students. He has rejected several classes in a row.
Maybe the Hokage's intention is to have him wait for us, but to avoid suspicion, they keep assigning him terrible students…'
Regarding Kakashi, Naruto decided to reveal a bit more to Sasuke.
From his observations, Kakashi had already reported their situation to the Hokage. But exactly how the Hokage would handle their living expenses issue was still unknown.
At least this person had genuinely tried. They couldn't pretend they didn't know.
'An Anbu captain? Then during the night our clan was massacred, he should have been outside waiting to handle emergencies, right?'
Sasuke's mood suddenly turned sour.
He had occasionally heard Naruto mention that the Uchiha district had been completely surrounded at the time, even with some special weapons present.
To him, anyone who showed hostility toward the Uchiha was his enemy.
Whether they were the mastermind or accomplices, they all had a grudge with him!
'Yeah. At that time, except for a few who had to stay at critical posts, almost all the Anbu were waiting outside the Uchiha district. Even some regular ninjas were gathered under different pretexts and put on standby…'
Over the years, Naruto had quietly gathered quite a bit of information about that night.
Konoha had truly been on full alert back then, all just to prevent any Uchiha counterattack.
No one had expected that the only person who could have stopped Uchiha Itachi would instead bring his wife and basically hand over their heads…
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