“It’s over…” Asuma sat in the corner, his face deathly pale.
“That lunatic is listening to the lecture so intently—he’s definitely cooking up some ultimate move, researching new ways to kill us…”
“He’s taking notes? That’s gotta be a Death Note!”
“Is he researching how to kill people without leaving a trace?!”
The students around him swallowed hard, every one of them feeling a chill crawl down their spine.
［Emotional Damage Points from Kurenai Yuhi, +55!］
［Emotional Damage Points from Ibiki Morino, +33!］
Yoru had no time for these brats’ wild imaginings.
He looked at the key points on the blackboard, but his mind was racing through calculations.
In three years, the Third Ninja World War would break out in full.
In that meat grinder where a human life was cheaper than a dog’s, these theory lessons on the blackboard had been paid for with the lives of countless predecessors.
But relying on this exam-cramming education alone, he’d become cannon fodder the instant he hit the battlefield.
He needed a few hardcore trump cards for staying alive.
And in the short term, the one he had the best shot at getting was the taijutsu cheat—the Eight Gates!
A pure breakthrough of taijutsu limits, no Kekkei Genkai required, no Sharingan needed.
As long as his body was strong enough, he could force his way past human limits.
Since Kakashi would be able to open the first gate later on, it meant Might Guy was definitely a generous, top-quality leek.
Yoru raised his head, his gaze sweeping over rows of heads to lock precisely onto the dark, greasy bowl cut in the front row.
This leek didn’t just yield Emotional Damage Points—it could yield techniques too.
He had to find a chance to swindle this trump card out of him for free.
And starting after school today, he’d use his peak Genin-level chakra to train his body at high intensity and toughen this frame up first.
Time crawled by.
The bell finally rang.
The glow of the setting sun spilled into the classroom.
Obito slung his schoolbag over his shoulder, stretched lazily, and complained to Yoru through a yawn.
“Yoru, let’s go. We’ve been in class all day, I’m wiped. The second I get home, I’m sleeping like the dead.”
Yoru’s hand, packing his bag, paused.
He turned his head slowly.
His gaze went instantly sharp, boring into Obito.
The students nearby who hadn’t left yet flinched and froze in their tracks.
Yoru lowered his voice and spoke in a tone pitched just loud enough for the whole class to hear, brimming with heartbroken disappointment.
“Oh, Obito.”
His voice carried the bitterness of a man let down by a friend who wasn’t living up to his potential.
“You’re so young—how can you possibly sleep?” Follow the newest chapters on g.com.
Obito froze in place, mouth half-open, his half-finished stretch seizing up.
“Where do you think the gap between you and Kakashi comes from?”
Yoru didn’t blink, didn’t miss a beat, launching straight into max-level nonsense mode.
“I’m telling you—it’s because when Kakashi goes home, he doesn’t sleep at all!”
Obito’s eyes went wide as if he’d seen a ghost.
“N-not… sleep?”
“While everyone else is sleeping, he’s training every single second!”
The more Yoru talked, the more mystical it sounded, his tone deeply infectious.
“Even when he can’t hold out anymore and is forced to take a short nap…”
Yoru suddenly leaned in close to Obito, deliberately dropping his voice to build a scalp-tingling atmosphere.
“His muscle memory syncs with his nervous system to instinctively practice his blade swings while he sleeps!”
“Even with his eyes shut, his body’s automatically grinding mobs and leveling up!”
Yoru sighed and delivered the finishing blow with utter gravity.
“And look at you—you can burn two whole hours just running into a few old ladies.”
“With that lazy attitude, when are you ever going to surpass that show-off?”
Obito was completely dumbstruck.
He just stood there, blank.
His brain couldn’t help conjuring an utterly bizarre scene:
Kakashi in his mask, lying flat on the bed, eyes closed, limbs stiff as a zombie’s, frantically slashing a short blade through the air.
Obito gasped.
The students nearby who’d been listening with pricked-up ears collectively gasped too.
The whole class was profoundly shaken by Kakashi’s anti-human level of grinding.
“No wonder he’s so strong…” someone sighed softly.
His muscles keep swinging a blade on their own while he sleeps?!
Is that something a carbon-based lifeform can actually do?!
Just then, out in the corridor past the front door, Kakashi—thick bandages around his leg, on his way home—was walking by, step by expressionless step.
Every word of Yoru’s absurd, outrageous nonsense drilled straight into his ears.
Kakashi’s footsteps came to an abrupt halt.
He paused for about 0.3 seconds.
His forever dead-fish eyes went wide.
What kind of endless bullshit is this lunatic spewing?!
Whose muscles swing a blade by themselves in their sleep?!
Aren’t they afraid of turning into sashimi in the middle of the night?!
Even Kakashi didn’t know he’d already reached such a godly level of grinding.
He turned his head and looked into the classroom through the crack in the door.
Kakashi opened his mouth, instinctively about to curse.
But then he caught sight of Yoru, standing with his arms crossed, smiling as bright as spring flowers.
Then he looked at Obito’s eyes, brimming with deep conviction and pure stupidity.
The sharp pain of yesterday’s kunai through his legs instantly flooded his mind.
He couldn’t engage.
He absolutely could not engage with this walking monster.
Arguing with these two weirdos was just asking for trouble.
Kakashi shut his mouth, face livid, his cold gaze sweeping over Yoru.
He let out a cold snort of utter disdain through his nose.
“Hmph.”
He shook his head hard, quickened his limping pace, and fled down the corridor without looking back.
The classroom fell into dead silence.
Three seconds later—
Obito pointed at the spot where Kakashi had vanished from the doorway, looking as if he’d been struck by lightning.
He yanked at his hair and let out a soul-shaking scream.
“Holy crap!!! He actually admitted it!!!”
［Ding!
Emotional Damage Points from Obito, +666!］
［Ding!
Emotional Damage Points from Kakashi, +888!］
［Ding!
Emotional Damage Points from Kurenai Yuhi, +122!］
Listening to the dense chime of gold coins rolling in, Yoru smiled brighter than the sunset outside the window.
Obito’s worldview was being ground into the dirt, and Kakashi’s frustration had turned into solid, massive points.
This wave was pure profit.
Yoru picked up his schoolbag, slung it over his shoulder, and strode into the sunset.
In his mind, a perfect plan to swindle the Eight Gates for free had already taken shape.
Meanwhile, over on the playground, Might Guy was in the middle of his unshakable after-school extra training.
The sunset dyed the playground a deep orange.
The figure in green spandex threw punches like a machine, each one carrying the whistle of air splitting apart.
Yoru’s gaze passed over the crowd to settle on that green figure.
“My dear friend…” he muttered to himself.
“Your Eight Gates—I’ve already got them reserved.”