There was so much about Shikaku worth learning from.
From the top of his head to the tips of his toes, even the smallest thing he did was worth paying attention to, and that in itself felt almost unbelievable.
Of course, the most impressive thing of all was the strategy he built inside his head. Everyone listened to every word he said in total silence, willing to trust their lives to him without hesitation.
There was also so much to learn from Inoichi, especially that emotional, deeply human side of him.
He handled communications for their side, always stationed in the rear, and yet the danger he faced was no less real than the people standing on the most dangerous front lines.
He once said that if he ever released his jutsu, every ally depending on it would fall into panic, so even if an enemy put a blade to his throat, he still would not let it go.
And everyone believed, without question, that he meant it.
Whether it was the calm decisiveness of Shikaku, or the deep loyalty and powerful sense of responsibility that defined Inoichi, there was so much worth learning from both of them.
And then, finally... Chōza was the one worth learning from more than anyone.
Once he stepped onto the battlefield, he was always the first one out front, the one who tore open a path for the rest of the squad.
That was why even Shikaku and Inoichi, commanding from the rear, trusted Chōza more than anyone else.
And for Byakuya, it was the same.
"...So this is how it really is."
Standing among corpses scattered every which way, Byakuya, covered in blood from head to toe, looked up at the sky with a hollow expression.
To be honest... he was getting sick of this... He thought he was starting to understand why Shikamaru used to envy the clouds drifting overhead.
"Haha, all of a sudden I'm in the mood for ramen tonight. Don't you think so?"
"Chōza-san, we're standing in the middle of a battlefield. Where exactly would ramen come from?"
"Well, sure, that part's a problem, but you can still create the atmosphere. It's all about atmosphere."
Known as the battlefield cook, Chōza picked up a few clumps of wild grass while flashing his usual bright grin.
Maybe he was just that good at cooking, because whenever he set his mind on ramen and started throwing something together, whatever came out somehow really did taste like ramen.
At that point, calling him a battlefield cook almost felt wrong.
He was more like a battlefield magician.
[Time to regroup. Sweep the area and report back to headquarters before sunset.]
"Chōza-san, we should get moving."
"Yeah, let's go."
Hearing Inoichi's voice ring through his mind, Byakuya walked over to Chōza, who was still crouched in the grass looking for something.
He had assumed Chōza was picking weeds.
Instead, he found him gathering the personal belongings left behind by fallen comrades.
"What are you collecting those for? Even if you return them, nobody's going to thank you for it."
Leaning off to one side, Byakuya looked down at the bloodstained bracelet in Chōza's hand and frowned.
There was no one assigned specifically to return the dead's belongings. It always fell to their comrades to do it.
And Byakuya had never seen anyone hand those things over to grieving families and come away with kind words.
Watching Chōza quietly go on with it anyway, Byakuya could only think the man was far too soft-hearted for his own good.
"Sometimes things like this help the living keep going."
Chōza did not look at him, so Byakuya could not see his face. But the sight of Chōza using the hem of his clothes to wipe blood from the bracelet reminded him of his old self, and an unpleasant feeling rose in his chest.
"That's nonsense. The living have to forget the dead if they want to keep moving. Hang on to dead people's things, and you'll never be able to take the next step."
"Hahahaha! Sometimes, Byakuya, you really don't sound like a kid your age at all."
Someone else might have gotten angry, but Chōza only laughed openly, pushed himself to his feet with a grunt, and looked at Byakuya with the same easy smile.
"I'm just returning something to where it belongs. That's not for us to judge. And anyway, I'm not doing this for family members I've never met. I'm doing it for comrades who fought beside me."
"..."
"Come on, come on. Let's get going. I'll make you some good ramen when we get back."
Watching Chōza stride ahead in high spirits, speaking with total confidence, Byakuya shook his head as if he simply could not understand him.
These people were too kind.
Way too kind.
Especially in a place where people died every single day.
"...If you're going to send something back, don't send that one. It smells too much like blood."
"Really? Let me check. Huh. I can't smell it."
Of course you can't. Everything around us smells like blood.
Byakuya gave Chōza a flat, speechless look, then turned sharply and leapt up into the trees.
In the distance, the setting sun glowed orange-red as it slowly sank toward the horizon.
---
"I heard they held the graduation exam yesterday."
"Oh! So that means your friends are graduating, Byakuya?"
While eating the wild greens Chōza had somehow transformed into something that tasted like ramen, Byakuya listened with little interest as the Ino-Shika-Chō trio talked among themselves.
He had almost started to think time had stopped in a place like this.
Apparently, it was still moving after all.
He had been so busy fighting to stay alive that he had not even noticed the days passing.
"We're short-handed over here. Think any of them will get sent to us?"
"Probably not. Once they're assigned a jōnin instructor, they'll have to start with D-rank missions."
"That's a shame."
Chōza tipped back the bowl and drained the last of the broth in one long gulp, then smacked his lips in satisfaction.
If he were doing food videos, he'd absolutely go viral... what a waste that he wasn't born in the modern world, Byakuya thought to himself.
"You've never done a D-rank mission before, have you, Byakuya?"
"...No."
Byakuya was still picturing Chōza as a superstar food creator when Inoichi spoke to him, so he gave a distracted answer and slowly began tidying up the dishes.
"It probably wasn't easy for the Hokage to decide what to do with you back then. That side was pushing pretty hard to get you transferred over."
"Wow, just what you'd expect from someone that talented. Everybody wanted him."
"That side?"
Byakuya had not really cared, and was only half-listening, but then an unexpected comment from Shikaku made his hands stop in the middle of putting away the pot.
"Root suddenly started making noise about taking you."
"Maybe the Hokage made the right call after all."
"...Sounds like there was a lot of talk behind the scenes. They didn't take our side's opinion into account at all."
Root. So they meant Danzō's people.
A flicker of interest actually stirred in Byakuya.
If he had gone there, he could have disappeared from everyone's sight.
And that would have made it much easier, someday, to show up in front of Naruto and throw his throat onto a shuriken in Naruto's hand.
"Don't worry. We're never handing you over to them."
By whatever logic Shikaku had interpreted the look on Byakuya's face just then, he spoke with absolute certainty.
Byakuya simply listened in silence.
"All right, let's clean up. Tomorrow we finally get to head back to the village for the first time in ages."
"At last, I'll be able to stretch out and sleep properly again."
"First thing I'm doing when we get back is eating meat. If I don't replenish myself, this body's going to fall apart."
Watching Chōza rub his stomach and complain that he had gotten thinner, everyone nodded.
"Yeah, you really have."
"Once we're back, I'm eating enough for twenty people."
Shikaku and Inoichi both answered him with perfectly serious faces, and only then did they slowly stand up and start packing away the rest of their things.
Come to think of it, how many days had it been since they had last gone back to the village?
Normally, a night like this would have made sleep impossible.
But tonight, aside from the people assigned to watch duty, everyone lay down and drifted off almost immediately.
And the first watch of the night just happened to fall to Byakuya.
"...This is going to be a long night too."
Without a phone, the hours crawled by unbearably slowly, and for him, staying up through the night felt even worse than usual.