“My sister is perfectly fine!”
Before Itachi could even speak, the little lolita next to her, who had been looking around, immediately denied it out loud.
“Satsuki…”
Itachi gently pressed a hand on Satsuki’s shoulder.
But hearing someone claim her most admired older sister was sick, Satsuki remained thoroughly indignant.
She pouted her lips and muttered in a small voice, “What kind of divine doctor?
He’s clearly a quack!”
These words happened to be overheard by Naruko, who instantly bristled.
She immediately stepped up and began bickering with Satsuki.
Looking at the cute, feisty display of these two little lolitas, neither Yasuka nor Itachi made a move to stop them.
Itachi turned to Yasuka, inquiring what exactly was wrong with her.
“A sickness of the heart.”
Yasuka didn’t fully understand the plot; he only vaguely knew a few details, including the fact that Itachi would eventually massacre her entire clan.
Combined with the gloominess she displayed and her hidden emotional instability, it was practically guaranteed that Itachi was not mentally sound.
She was like a landmine—once the pressure reached a certain point, she would detonate directly.
Itachi, who hadn’t taken his words seriously at first, straightened her posture.
Acting as a double agent over these past few days had indeed left her mind and body exhausted and anxious.
But in order to prevent Satsuki and others from worrying, she had been trying her best to hide this anxiety, passing it off as mere exhaustion from missions.
“May I ask…
do you have a solution?”
Itachi looked at Yasuka, deciding to re-evaluate this divine doctor with newfound seriousness.
Meanwhile, Yasuka was contemplating that if the Uchiha clan avoided being wiped out, it would logically cause a massive shift in the plot, which would highly benefit him.
The only issue was figuring out where to start; it wasn’t as if he could just tell the village not to wipe them out and expect the Third Hokage to actually listen.
After thinking it over, Yasuka decided to start with the woman in front of him.
He stated that he had some soothing medicines and incense that could alleviate Itachi’s anxiety.
“By the way, you should come over for some psychological counseling.”
“Psychological…
counseling?”
This unfamiliar terminology left Itachi somewhat bewildered.
Seeing this, Yasuka explained:
“Ninjas are humans after all, and as long as you’re human, you have desires and emotions.
After executing high-intensity missions, it’s possible to develop severe PTSD.”
“P…
T…
S…
D?”
Itachi struggled to mimic the acronym Yasuka had used, her eyes entirely vacant and perplexed.
Seeing her reaction, Yasuka covered his face.
*My mistake,* he thought, *I forgot that the vast majority of ninjas are essentially illiterate.*
“It’s a psychological illness that varies from person to person…”
Yasuka explained it as best as he could using concepts Itachi could understand.
The more he did, the more he missed conversing with a certain long, straight, black-haired person.
“I…
think I understand roughly.”
Itachi nodded stiffly.
She constantly felt like the look Yasuka was giving her was the exact look one gives to an illiterate person.
But…
she was, no matter how one looked at it, one of the absolute top geniuses of the Uchiha.
Being viewed this way felt incredibly strange.
“In any case, want to give it a try?
It will make you feel a lot more comfortable.”
Looking at Yasuka’s burning gaze, Itachi felt a bit overwhelmed.
Were she and Yasuka really that close?
Was there a need to go to such lengths for her?
“Yes or no?”
Yasuka blinked, staring fixedly at the young girl in front of him.
His eyes were entirely filled with a raw craving for the talismans, completely devoid of any impure intentions.
“Let’s…
let’s give it a try then?”
Itachi had never been stared at with such a pure, intense gaze before, causing her body to experience an inexplicable sense of discomfort.
Under Yasuka’s enthusiastic invitation, she walked into a room that had been modified in advance.
After a bit of tinkering from Yasuka, Itachi obediently lay down on the bed.
Catching the scent of the incense wafting through the air, her body began to relax completely out of her control.
Itachi instinctively wanted to resist, yet her exhausted body refused to follow her mind’s commands.
Within a few breaths, she sank into a deep, heavy sleep.
By the time Yasuka walked back out, Naruko and Satsuki were in the middle of a scuffle.
However, compared to Satsuki, who had been trained by her clan from a young age, Naruko was clearly no match.
Seeing Satsuki about to trip Naruko, Yasuka directly scooped the little Uchiha up by the collar, stating that her sister was currently undergoing treatment and she should just wait obediently.
“Hmph!”
Little Satsuki turned her face away huffily, her cheeks puffing out exactly like a little steamed bun.
Yasuka couldn’t resist poking her cheek, and the little steamed bun instantly deflated with a soft “Pffft~”.
“I’m going to fight you to the death!!!”
Looking at Satsuki as she furiously stuffed cherry tomatoes into her mouth to vent, Yasuka also prepared some dango for Naruko.
Watching the two little ones constantly bickering made the corners of his mouth tilt upward.
After all, both of them were just too cute; it was fundamentally impossible to dislike them.
“Th…
Thank you…”
Satsuki looked at the smiling Yasuka.
Although this man was highly annoying at first…
he wasn’t *completely* unlikable, she supposed!
After all, the cherry tomatoes at his place were truly delicious.
Yasuka ruffled Satsuki’s little head.
Satsuki almost threw a tantrum, but looking at the delicious cherry tomatoes, she endured it.
Turning to look at Naruko, who was looking up at him expectantly, Yasuka placed his other hand on her head as well.
Yugao silently hid in the corner.
Watching Yasuka’s doting care for the little lolitas, she quietly jotted it down in her little notebook.
During this time, aside from the Uchiha, other clans like the Sarutobi and Shimura also visited with gifts.
Following that, it was as if a switch had been flipped, and other clans arrived one after another.
Yasuka couldn’t possibly entertain every single clan personally, so he simply left Haku in charge of receiving the gifts.
Perhaps because Itachi’s accumulated pressure had been too immense, she slept all the way until the afternoon.
Since Satsuki insisted on waiting for her sister to wake up, Yasuka simply cooked a portion for her as well.
However, Satsuki and Naruko had to compete over absolutely everything.
Even during lunch, they tried to see who could eat more and eat faster, until Yasuka corrected them, forcing them to obediently chew and swallow slowly.
By the time Itachi finally woke up, Satsuki had already started playing together with Naruko.
Although they kept saying they hated each other out loud, in their hearts, they had already recognized each other as friends.
Yasuka, meanwhile, was continuing to tell them stories about the “blond boy.” As a close friend of the Fourth Hokage, he knew far too much about Minato’s dark history and unofficial lore.
In any case, Minato himself wasn’t around to object, so there was no harm in talking about it.
“Satsuki.”
Looking at her younger sister’s deeply engrossed expression, Itachi couldn’t resist calling out to her, beckoning her over.
Seeing her sister acting so close to someone else always brought an inexplicable sense of discomfort, as if the precious little cabbage grown by her own family was about to be dug up by a wild boar—even if Yasuka clearly didn’t seem like that kind of person.
“Sister, you’re awake!”
At this moment, Satsuki completely dropped her tsundere act in front of Yasuka and Naruko, running to her sister’s side with pure joy.
Looking at her sister’s joyful hopping, a trace of doting fondness surfaced in Itachi’s eyes.
She then turned to express her gratitude to Yasuka.
Upon waking up, she felt her body was immensely lighter, as if a massive weight had been lifted from her shoulders.
Perhaps…
she really could come back to try this again?
“How much do I owe you?”
“No need.
You’re my very first client, so it’s free of charge.”
Yasuka waved his hand, adding that if she ever needed anything, he would find a way to help her out.
“Th…
Thank you…”
After thanking him, Itachi took Satsuki and prepared to head home.
On the way back, Satsuki suddenly asked Itachi in a highly fidgety manner when they would be going back for another medical appointment, insisting that Itachi must bring her along when the time came.
Facing her sister’s knowing gaze, Satsuki shrank her neck a bit, and then defended herself by explaining the stories Yasuka told about the Fourth Hokage “blond boy,” as well as how he gave her plenty of delicious snacks and cherry tomatoes.
At the very end, she did her absolute best to act like she didn’t care at all, muttering, “That person named Naruko doesn’t have any friends.
I…
I just feel sorry for her, that’s all!
It’s not like we’re good friends or anything!”