[Hokage] A rose in mourning for the summer moon

Recall.

The reason why I know Uchiha Itachi is because he became my patient when he was 5 years old.I was also 5 years old that year.

A long time ago—maybe it can be called "a previous life"—for a long time, I firmly believed that 5 years old is an undoubted age group that belongs to toddlers.A 5-year-old should go to kindergarten or preschool.

But this new experience in my life tells me: No, 5-year-olds are ready to start being raised as fighting machines.

Just at the age of 5.

When I was 5 years old, I was sent to a ninja school.We took some culture classes, more taijutsu classes, and the teacher said that we could not start learning ninjutsu until the second grade.

At that time, I was still in an extremely excited mood, full of expectations, thinking that this other world would be a stage for me to flex my muscles and shine.I don't care if my father drinks and gambles and my mother moves back into my parents' house and doesn't care for me; in my mind, they are just two strangers, essentially the same unhappy families I've seen on the news, Damn, but also strange, has nothing to do with me.

All the sufferings are just the hardships before success, the predicament that the protagonist must go through.that is it.

So, I soon learned that there was another way of writing what I called "that's all" - a big mistake.

It was a year that deserves to go down in the history books, but not because a kid like me turned 5.The real reason is that it was the last year of the war.And "war" has never been an easy and romantic word.

What a fool I am.

That's about two weeks after the ninja school enrolls.

The end of the war is coming. The wartime propaganda posters plastered on the streets have not been removed. People come and go in the memorial monument and the cemetery. The shopping street is depressed and deserted.The children in the school set up their poses and rushed towards each other "Wow", simulating the scene when the two armies were fighting.I wandered around the school, only thinking that the word "war" sounded as far away as a butterfly in the setting sun, even with a vague beauty.

It was at this time that the gymnastics class ushered in new content.The teacher who taught the class was a very young woman, named Yuriko or Ayako, I don’t remember much; in my memory, she was young, beautiful, and soft-spoken, and when she smiled, she would show not-so-good-looking teeth, but she was very special. energetic.

I liked her very much at one time.until that class.

In that class, she said, we should learn something new and real, otherwise we will not be able to become a qualified ninja.She also encouraged us a few words, basically saying that the war has just ended, and Konoha has lost a lot of talents, so we must study and train very hard to make up for the losses caused by the war.

I joined the others in answering out loud, "Yes—"

A group of kindergarten-age students and a young female teacher no more than 20 years old on the stage; the students said "yes" in a childlike voice, and the teacher was smiling like a vine flower blooming outside the window.

Yuriko - or Ayako - took out a rabbit.like a magician.

"Look good." She said with a smile, "Everyone should do this."

She took out a short knife, and in an instant, quickly pierced the rabbit's heart.She moved so fast that before even the blood flowed, she pulled out the murder weapon and cut off the rabbit's head in the next instant.

The rabbit was thrown to the ground, with only a few blood spatters on her hands.

"It is necessary to accurately remember the position of the vital point, so that you can kill with one blow."

The young female teacher smiled, showing not so good teeth, but still so lively, looking kind and happy.

"Everyone should practice hard with the teacher." She smiled, and turned into a rabbit, like a magician who is about to bring a show to make people happy. "So, who will come up first?"

After a long time, I learned that the short sword she took out was called "Kunai", and I also knew that besides Kunai, ninjas also use shurikens, long swords, or other weapons.At that time, I was already a qualified ninja. I had crushed many human lives and seen truly powerful ninjas. Of course, I had already realized that the skills displayed by the teacher were not so brilliant.But I still can't forget that scene when I was a child.

That was the first time I really faced death, albeit only as a rabbit.

The poor rabbit was pierced through the heart and decapitated; when it fell to the ground, its hind legs were still twitching, and the little head rolled and came to my feet, leaving long bloodstains, Finally facing me, staring at me with those dark red eyes.

I also watch it.

None of the students around were frightened by this scene.They still answered the teacher's questions loudly, eager to try, happily wanting to be the first person to kill the rabbit with their own hands.

Children's voices are so high-pitched, so loud, so loud; they surround me, together with the scent of flowers wafting from the window, and together with the golden sunlight coming in.

Along with the smell of blood in the air.

"...Xia Yue, classmate Xia Yue? It's your turn."

The teacher on the stage is laughing, and the students around are laughing.They were all so young, even so young.The scenery outside the window is so good.The world in my eyes is so good.But the rabbit stared at me coldly, like a dead person.

At that time, I didn't know that our blood did endow us with red eyes, and in that bloody night, many people with bloody eyes would indeed die.The blood-red eyes stared at the blood-red world, just like the rabbit that day.

Can the life of a rabbit be compared with that of a human?

Is the death of a rabbit the same weight as the death of a human being?

I do not know.

It was only at that moment that I did realize the truth of death.

"Xiayue-san, Xiayue-san...Uchiha Natsuki-san!"

Death is the greatest horror in the world.Killing other life requires enduring such horrors.And to kill a life of the same kind, maybe you have to kill your own humanity first, so that you can do it without hesitation.

If the death of a rabbit is so bloody, what is the death of a man, what is the death of a group of people, and what is war?

What is this world like...?

"...Student Xia Yue!"

The weather is good, the scenery is good, and the excitement in the school looks good.The teachers are friendly and the students are lively.It seems like nothing is wrong.

Well, it's only me who's wrong.

In the year when the third war ended, two weeks after entering school, there was a kid named Uchiha Natsuki who was sent to Konoha Hospital because of fainting.She was ridiculed by her classmates, who said she was cowardly and incompetent; the teacher sighed and said with regret that maybe this child is not suitable to be a ninja.

When she woke up in the hospital, she didn't know the ridicule and regret at school, but she had expected it.Lying on the bed, looking at the green leaves and sunshine outside the window, she expected the ridicule of her classmates and the future of a ninja.She thought for a long time, and calmed down like a real grown-up.

The only thing she didn't expect was that, also on that day, she would meet someone.That person is her kindred.They share a surname, but in terms of blood, they are no more close than strangers on the side of the road.

That person is Uchiha Itachi, they are the same age, and they were admitted to the hospital on the same day.It's just that she was scared into the hospital by a dead rabbit, but he came back from the real battlefield.

In such a comparison, she is really inferior.Uchiha Natsuki is really bad.

I'm so mean.