By the time Yuuga finished his “song and dance” and was dragged back to the bonfire by Ino, blank-faced, Anko was nowhere to be seen.
Shikamaru was rubbing his round little belly and staring up at the sky, sighing over life, and Choji was of course still stuffing himself, the smell of grilled meat drifting everywhere.
“Whoa, Iruka-sensei sent meat over?” The moment Ino saw the food she let go of Yuuga’s hand and pounced on the grilled meat, starting in on it with small bites.
She was starving too.
Yuuga looked around, but he didn’t see Anko Mitarashi anywhere nearby, so he asked Shikamaru, “Where’d Anko-senpai go?”
“She left.” Shikamaru tilted his head toward Yuuga and blinked twice, lazily.
“Anko-senpai said she had other things to take care of.
She wants you to go pick up her pay for the job from Iruka-sensei in a bit.”
Yuuga licked his cracked lips and let it go at that.
Better that she’d left.
If she hadn’t, he’d have had a headache on his hands.
Anko liked to “tease” Ino, and Ino had some inexplicable hostility toward Anko, and being stuck in the middle was no fun at all.
“Here, water.” Ino was sitting on the ground, happily working through a bowl of roast suckling pig, and she stuck out a hand holding her own cup, speaking indistinctly around her food.
“Your lips are about to split open.
Didn’t you bring water today?”
Yuuga took the cup and sat down right beside Ino.
He tipped his head back, held the cup up high and well clear of his lips, tilted it so the water poured out over the rim, and opened his mouth to catch it just right.
Ino snorted with laughter and raised an eyebrow, her voice sweet.
“Just drink it.
I don’t mind sharing with you.”
Yuuga drank his fill, set the cup down, ran his tongue around his lips, then met Ino’s teasing look with a faint smile.
“I know.”
Knowing it was one thing, doing it another.
If his lips touched the cup, that was an indirect kiss, and tonight the whole Academy was here, teachers and students, too many eyes and too many mouths.
He wasn’t about to let the gossips start watching Ino.
There was no fine wine, but there was the smell of grilled meat, laughter and voices, a bonfire climbing into the sky, and at somewhere around eight thirty the whole bonfire party broke up.
This time he didn’t walk back with Ino, Choji and Shikamaru, because he still had to collect his pay from Iruka.
When he knocked on Iruka’s door, a few ninja with Forehead Protectors were just coming out.
They nodded to him and left.
“Yuuga, come on in.” Iruka waved at the person standing in the doorway, a broad smile on his face.
Yuuga walked in and said, “Iruka-sensei, I’m here for my pay.
When Anko-senpai left today she told me to pick hers up for her.”
“Ah, she mentioned that to me.” Iruka handed Yuuga two identical envelopes.
“You worked hard today.
This is your pay and Anko’s.
I really don’t get it, why would Anko-senpai take on a small job like this?
She’s a special jonin, so I gave her the same pay as you.
Remember to pass it along to her.”
“Mm.” Yuuga nodded.
“Thanks, Iruka-sensei.
I’ll give it to Anko-senpai when I see her.”
“Good.
It’s getting late, you did well today.” Iruka ruffled Yuuga’s hair as he spoke.
It was past nine by the time Yuuga got home.
He tossed the two envelopes into a cabinet, let out a long breath and threw himself onto the bed.
He’d been out since morning, more than twelve full hours without a break, and after a month without taking a mission he was feeling it.
[Ding!
Congratulations, Host, Quest complete: Campus Patrol]
[Quest Reward: Cat-Cat Fruit]
“Hm?” Yuuga froze, and when he opened his eyes a flash of golden light faded and an ugly little Devil Fruit was sitting beside his head.
He sat up, picked up the fruit, and said in surprise, “This is…
a Devil Fruit?”
He recognized it on sight.
This was something out of One Piece, Rob Lucci’s Cat-Cat Fruit.
He hadn’t expected the System’s reward for finishing a quest to be a Devil Fruit.
Devil Fruits all seemed to have one weakness, though.
You couldn’t swim, and you had to fear seawater and Seastone.
Konoha was a long way from the sea, sure, but there was no guarantee he wouldn’t wander off to the Land of Water someday, and then that weakness would be fatal.
“Eat it?
Or not…”
While he was hesitating, an entry labeled “Attributes” appeared on the Cat-Cat Fruit, and he tapped it without hesitation.
[Cat-Cat Fruit, Zoan Devil Fruit, leopard model.
After consumption, the body takes on leopard form, resembling a “Sabertooth Leopard,” enormous in size, carnivorous, increased ferocity, enhanced abilities.
Weakness: none.]
Yuuga’s eyes fixed on that “none,” and a wave of delight went through him.
The Cat-Cat Fruit in his hand had no side effects at all.
It was a curse-free Devil Fruit.
He opened his mouth without hesitation and started eating the Devil Fruit in big bites.
It was sweet and tart and pretty good, and he hadn’t expected the System to be so considerate.
Yuuga licked his lips, and before long the whole Cat-Cat Fruit was down his throat.
A moment later he felt his body heating up, and then his clothes all burst off him.
He had turned into a leopard over three meters long, bigger than an ordinary tiger.
Now on all fours, Yuuga lifted one big furry paw, and the whole thing struck him as funny.
This big?
Really?
Then he thought about it and decided it was normal enough.
There were animals in One Piece dozens of meters long, so he could accept this Beast Form.
With a thought, he shifted into Human-Beast Form.
After a puff of white smoke he became a leopard beast-man that stood on two legs.
At around two and a half meters he was nearly as tall as the ceiling, and he could feel his body’s speed had gone up and his senses had sharpened.
He could even make out the voices of the kids in the house next door, whispering instead of sleeping.
He threw a casual punch, and the lamp hanging from the ceiling swayed, the wind off his fist fierce enough that he stopped at once.
If he broke the lamp, the landlord would skin him.
The room was too small.
Yuuga returned to normal, not entirely satisfied, and decided to find some free time to test his Beast Form and Human-Beast Form outside the Village.
Even in his normal state, though, his strength had gone up a bit, just not the way it changed after using the fruit, and the tiredness in his body was gone completely.
A gleam passed through his eyes.
If anyone asked, he could say it was something like the Beast Mimicry the Inuzuka family used, Kiba Inuzuka and the rest.