[Chapter 34: Lots of Talking Actually]

Ok, ok, let me put in an obligatory flashback to explain what the fuck is happening.

So we all know that we've never actually had a meeting with Shiori yet, right? So I decided at 2:41 am that, fuck it, we're doing it. And so we did: we scheduled a date, we actually came in, they introduced each other, and then we chit-chatted.

It was fine, right?

But then Shiori, the ass he was, decided to oh-so-subtly insult Hiro. "Is he always this... obnoxious?"

Hiro and I were literally just talking about whether or not Shino had a secret stash of bananas in his cocoon body. So imagine my surprise when he just casually said that.

Of course, Hiro got pissed and yelled at him and then things lead to another and now I'm here: laughing at whatever their bullshit. It's just-- I struggled to look at Hiro's enraged face. He looks so stupid when he's clearly losing all of his dignity left in him!

"See? Even Megumi is laughing at your barbaric self," I choked out at my teacher's comment. Letting out an offended and betrayed sound, the Hyuuga shook his head in my direction.

"What the hell, Princess?!" Came his pissed shout.

"The fact that you call her a Princess is you acknowledging the fact that she's above you."

"It's literally her title though?!"

I had to let out another laugh, waving my hand dismissively as I tried to straighten my back in composure. "Sorry, sorry," I sighed softly, rolling my shoulders. "I was just laughing at this whole situation in general, nothing against you." Before he could retort anything else, I clapped my hands together with a smile. "Anyways, let's actually start this meeting!"

"Finally," The oldest person in this booth signed, a resting bitch face on him. "It took well long enough."

Despite grumbling and curses spewing out of his mouth, my Hyuuga friend sat back down, "You were the one who started it." I heard him mumble under his breath. Shiori probably heard him too but decided not to say anything, opting to just cross his arms in silence.

I hummed, dang this was a very bad first impression for them, I couldn't help but think as I grabbed something. But then again, it was kinda like the same with me. Presenting my certain thing in my hands, I plopped it down and opened it up proudly, "Now, how to make the future less sucky!"

With narrowed eyes, the older male who was sitting beside me raised a brow. "You wrote English in your notebook?" Their body language was so dry that it didn't even feel like a question. "I did not expect you, despite being such an airhead, to take such a dangerous risk."

Hiro opened up his mouth to yell at the pink-haired individual but I raised up a hand, indicating that it was fine. The boy furrowed his brows but complied, making me smile as I turned to my teacher. "Don't worry, Shi-Shi! I actually had a reason this time!" I raised an index finger up, "Well," I waved it around, "You know how we all kept our memories of our past life?"

"Yeah?" Hiro responded back with confusion laced in his tone, placing a hand under his cheek and his elbow on the sodden table. "What about it?"

"Glad you asked, my dear viewer!"

"This isn't a live show—"

"Maybe to you, it isn't!" I interjected without a beat. "Anyways, even if we were mentally grown-up—" I blinked, glancing at the adult next to me. "Were you a grown-up?"

"Yes." Shiori signed in silence, taking a sip of his teacup with his other hand.

"Okay then! Even so, technically we were just fresh, fleshy crap!"

"Please don't call children that ever again." My younger male friend shot back with a slight tremble in his voice, stretching his facial features to form an expression of disgust.

I giggled, continuing my explanation despite the many interruptions. "And so our brains would probably fall apart with all of our memories cuz of how undeveloped it was," Patting the thin papers of the notebook, "So to make sure I didn't forget, I wrote it all down!"

My teacher was still skeptical. "Even then, you would have been considered suspicious if the village ever found this."

"Oh don't worry," I responded dismissively. "I'm kinda already used to being suspicious, being an Uchiha and all."

Hiro's brows were knitted together further. "That's not something you should say so... casually." Came his puzzling comment.

Glee bubbled in my throat, "It's better than being a bitch to everyone, like the rest of my clan."

"Moving on," Shiori butted in, seeming to be done with the topic already. "Let's get to the point— our plans."

I rumbled out a soft hum from my throat. "Well," Dragging on the word with a smile, I flipped to the appropriate pages with quick fingers. "They're not necessarily plans, more like 3 am thoughts, but they're something!" I pointed at my first bullet point. "First, we're gonna get jacked!"

"What."

"She means we're gonna get strong," Despite his annoyance towards the older male, my dear Hyuuga explained with a sigh. "But we're already doing that— what was the fucking point of saying that?"

"Look— considering all the shit that's gonna happen in the few years, I kinda have to say it." Came my reply. I moved my index finger to the next point on the list. "Here are the people we're gonna save," I darted their attention to my totally awesome doodles on the other page, "Itachi, Asuma, Nagato, and Neji." Not all that I wanted but considering what we can do, that's the most we can possibly save. Probably.

In the corners of my eyes, I saw the Hyuuga across from me scrunch his nose.

"Who is Nagato?" The pink-haired individual questioned with his swift fingers. They peered closer at my book with squinted eyes.

"Your distant relative who really likes dead people and kills Jiraiya." They raised a brow but decided to not question it due to keeping the flow going. But unfortunately for him, that wasn't going to happen.

"Damn your art skills suck." I let out an offended squawk at Hiro's blunt statement.

"Hey!" As if in a tragic play, I placed a hand over my heart with a teary-eyed frown graced on my facial features. "I worked hard on them, ok! Don't mind the eraser marks that vaguely look like mustaches!"

"Yeah," His face softened to express exasperation, lifting up his spoon to eat his pumpkin pie. "Sure, Princess."

A loud finger snap brought back our attention. With Creased brows, the adult next to us stared in disdain, sipping his tea with his other hand. "Stop straying from the topic," They sat down their cup. "You two both have the attention span of a goldfish."

"Oi!"

"Goldfish are cute!"

Hiro darted his light eyes back at me, a vein twitching, "That's not what you're supposed to say! You're supposed to be offended by that!"

I could only giggle, covering my mouth with a hand as a half-assed attempt to hide it. "What? Just being honest~!"

Although it was barely audible, an annoyed sigh echoed across the booth.

Kugui,,,

I didn't know about that!!! Wow, that's actually really cool. But also weird, he looks like around Kakashi's age! Maybe he uses the same jutsu as Tsunade...

Anyways! I've always wondered. What's Suna like??? Is it hot as hell? How do you guys get water? And are there people cute like you?!

Oh to be surrounded by cuteness! I would faint!

Oh, and Riku's adorable! Reminds me of some of Itachi's crows, very nice to pet.

—MeguMegu

"Huh," I let out, slicing a tomato cleanly with my sharpened kunai. "That wasn't so hard."

Tenten chuckled beside me with a grin, "I know, right?"

True to her word, Tenten ended up teaching me how to sharpen my weapons. It wasn't much: apparently, all I had to do was when the whetstone was soaked, I had to place one side of the kunai at a 20-degree angle against it. Next, I had to gently drag it against the block. When I was done using its course-grinder side, I could flip the prism to its fine-grind side and start over.

After that, I got honing steel from Tenten, I set it vertically and softly scraped my weapon against it. It was basically the same process but instead of flipping the steel, I had to flip the kunai.

It was surprisingly relaxing, listening to the double-bunned girl's clear instructions whilst I worked. Maybe she would've made an ASMR channel if YouTube existed. I'd subscribe faster than you can say 'first!' and annoy everyone!

Setting down, I smiled back at my senpai with glee stuck in my throat. Think of all the money I can save!!! "Thank you, Tenten!" Stepping forward with a bounce in my footing, I hopped to quickly embrace the unsuspecting girl with my arms. With her body tending from my touch, the kunoichi stumbled with a sharp intake before standing firm.

"Wo-Woah!" She stammered her hand up in surprise. I nuzzled close to her chest, giggling at the hastened vibrations of her beating heart. "It wasn't even that much work!"

I looked up at her, "Lemme just hug you, ya cutie!" Blinking, the brunette just laughed softly as her arms slowly wrapped themselves around my body. I hummed cheerfully.

"Wow, you're so warm."

"Hehe, one of the perks of being an Uchiha."

Moving my head to sit on her shoulder, my eyes landed on a peculiar sight. Ooo, is that what I think it is?

Albeit a little reluctantly, I released my hold of my new friend, inching out to peer in further on my new fixation. I pushed my hand out, placing them on the table as I stared at the very detailed work in front of me. "Are these seals?"

Hearing footsteps behind me, I turned my head to meet Tenten's sheepish gaze, her hand stretching the back of her neck. "Yeah, I make my own."

I gasped, my fists going up with excitement swelling in my chest. "That's so cool!" The girl blushed, so I did the only sane thing to do: add to the fire. "You must have great chakra control! And really neat handwriting! And so much skill!"

"Hey, hey!" She complained, her hands pushing the air towards me as if that would shush me. Her cheeks were dusted pink with embarrassment, but I think that only makes her cuter~! "I don't think it's that much of a great thing."

"Eeeeeeehhh?" I dragged out with a pout. With an index finger darted at my senior, I proceeded to gush about her. "Not only is talent in fuinjutsu rare since the Uzushiogakure incident, but seeing the fact your body isn't in bloody clumps, you're hella good!" Especially at this age too.

She turned her head away, seeming to only be more flustered. "It's only cuz I wasn't good enough to be a medical ninja and I had the materials so..." Hearing her trail off, I narrowed my eyes. It feels like she's hiding something... I blinked— but that's something I can find out for another day! "And besides, I haven't done any major stuff, yet."

"Yet!" I repeated with a light-hearted tone in my voice. My finger had raised up to point at the tall ceiling. "Which means who knows what you'll be able to accomplish!" You'll actually do absolutely nothing but I won't tell you that.

"Uh-huh, sure," The older girl didn't believe me. I pouted.

It was then I took it upon myself to make it my goal to get the screen time she deserved.

ົົ✧

I was confused— that, I was sure of.

The morning was the same as usual: I wake up, eat, almost trip because of how fast Lee runs, go to the training field to meet with Shiori, and wait.

Except we're still waiting.

And all I could think of is oh shit, am I going to die today? Shiori never dilly-dallies on our training, especially if he's here first. In which he always is.

So I'm just sitting here, bbq sauce on my titties, as I silently wonder if it was too late to write a will. And despite the shade that the tree gave me, a small trail of sweat fell down to my side of my face.

Looking up, I forced a smile at the person who was above me. "Uh— Shi-Shi?" The older male tilted their head down at me, their face only a blank expression. Internally, I huffed. Really making it hard to know what you're thinking, are ya? But I digress. "Are we actually doing something? Cuz if not I'm gonna go pray to my Kushina shrine."

He raised a brow at the last portion of my sentence but didn't bother to comment on it. Pushing himself off of his firm tree branch, the pink-haired shinobi landed silently, straightening up his back with a blow to his stray hairs. "You're in luck," His nimble hands wrote out to me. "You'll be creating your own jutsu now."

What.

I blinked rapidly, staring at the taller male as if he was an alien. "Huh?" Standing up, I inch closer with wide eyes, "Wait— really?!" Came my excited shout as I bounced up and down. I get to create all those epic stuff! Ah, but wait. I halted in my steps, falling to my feet with a soft thud. My eyes glanced back at my teacher. "Isn't it too early?"

"It was around this time during teaching that my teacher gave us the liberty to expand our limits."

I puffed my cheek out childishly at the man, hands behind my back. "As I said— you're a prodigy!" Now that I think about it, even if he was, no normal teacher would let their students do something so stupid so— who his teacher?!

"Anyways, I've been practicing genjutsu and stealth for about..." When I counted the months in my head, my eyes widened. "It's been 7 months already?!"

"Yes, is your perception of time skewed?"

"Oh, shush now, you Itachi-wanna-be," I waved a hand dismissively at him, narrowing my eyes before going back to what I was saying. "But I don't think I'm a total master at them yet."

"You will in due time," He signed. "After all, I never learned them myself until now."

I hummed. Ok, that makes— I choked on my own spit. I snapped my head at him, causing my stray hair to harshly slap my face. I shouted at the silent adult, taking a stomp forward. Eh? I raised my hands in the air, stammering on my words as I began my accusations, "I've been learning Genjutsu from someone who's not even an expert?!"

He had the audacity to act confused. "Was that not obvious? I specialize in poisons and stealth."

My back sagged as my arms flopped to my sides, this bitch. "That's not even funny, dude."

"It was not meant to be."

I dropped back to the ground, deciding that we were done with this topic. Settling on the soft, lush green grass. With an exasperated sigh, I looked up at my teacher-that-shouldn't-even-be-my-teacher, "So, Shi-Shi, what are we making?"

With swift yet silent steps against the dirt, Shiori walked, now standing next to me. "It is your jutsu: which means you can do whatever you want."

I beamed, mother of ducklings am I gonna abuse the fuck out of this. Leaning back with my hands on the ground, I stared up to look at the clear, blue sky.

What kind of jutsu do I want?

This was just so sudden that my mind was blank.

I already have the body-flicker to accelerate my speed so no-go for that. There's already a whole bunch of clone jutsu so no.

Ahh... I don't think I'm going anywhere with this.

Ok, let's backtrack.

Well, do I want an offensive or defensive? Hmm... defensive sounds good but I wanna attack my opponents. And while offensive seems tempting, I don't want to be left open and unguarded, despite my sensory skills.

Maybe there's a way to do both... like Shiori's...

And then it hit me.

Snapping my eyes back open, (since when were they closed?) I clapped my hands together with a wide smile. "I got it!"

Shiori beside me glanced down, their arms closed. Despite his poker face, I couldn't help but notice the small amusement swirling deep in his red eyes. "Is that correct, now?"

I giggled, rubbing my hands together gleefully. Oh boy, if it goes well, it's gonna look so cool!