On the screen…
Dream-Naruto stared at this "father" who had the same hair color and the same eyes as him, looking both shocked and strangely familiar.
Huh? Who's this uncle…? Feels like I've seen him somewhere… He looks really familiar…
Naruto was a dead-last loser who never read textbooks.
As for the Hokage Rock… asking him to match statues to real people was way too much. He usually remembered classmates by nicknames, not faces.
So when he saw the living, breathing Minato, he only felt a powerful closeness and a sense of déjà vu—without connecting him to the legendary hero at all.
He just sat there blankly as Minato walked over, washed his hands, and smiled while sitting down between him and "Mom."
"Alright, let's eat."
Kushina picked up her chopsticks and enthusiastically placed a big, glossy piece of braised pork into Naruto's bowl. "Naruto, eat more. Look how skinny you are. Today's a huge day—you became a genin. You have to fill up."
Minato also smiled, adding a golden fried chicken drumstick to Naruto's bowl. "That's right. Becoming a ninja is hard work. You need enough nutrition."
"Mm! Mm!" Naruto looked at the little mountain of food in his bowl, then at the gentle smiles of "Dad" and "Mom" beside him. He felt like he'd been dropped straight into heaven.
He nodded hard and started eating in giant bites.
Even though he knew this was probably a dream…
The food Dad and Mom gave him… tasted so good!
This feeling of being cared for, being loved, sitting together as a family while eating…
It was real.
Naruto ate that meal happier and more satisfied than he'd ever been.
He felt like it was the most delicious meal of his life.
Maybe even a hundred times better than Ichiraku ramen.
The whole time, his face wore a stupid, blissed-out grin, so happy he looked like he might melt.
[Ding! Emotional fluctuation from Uzumaki Naruto detected! Emotion Points +2000!!]
[Ding! Uzumaki Naruto's deep obsession/dream "Having dinner with my parents" has been perfectly fulfilled in this dream instance!]
[Congratulations, Host. Special reward triggered. One-time Emotion Points gained: 10,000!]
…
In the audience seats…
Kakashi watched that warm family scene of the three of them eating together, his eyes complicated beyond words.
If twelve years ago, Minato-sensei and Kushina-senpai hadn't died…
Then this kind of life would've been Naruto's everyday normal, wouldn't it?
He would've grown up like any ordinary kid, loved by his parents, free to whine, to cling, to enjoy everything that should've always been his…
A bitter ache of regret and sorrow surged in Kakashi's chest again.
[Ding! Emotional fluctuation from Hatake Kakashi detected! Emotion Points +500!]
…
In the dream, the cozy dinner time ended quickly.
Naruto sat there giggling stupidly with a round belly, so happy he felt dizzy.
Minato stood up and began clearing the table with easy, practiced motions. Smiling, he said to Naruto, "Naruto, you can't just sit around after you're full. Come on—you're a man now. Let's wash the dishes."
"Eh? Wash dishes?" Naruto didn't quite process it.
Minato winked, giving him a playful grin. "Of course. We can't leave all the hard work to Mom, right? We've gotta share the chores."
"Oh! Okay, okay!" Naruto finally caught on. He jumped off the stool with excitement. "I'll help Mom wash dishes!"
So father and son went together to the kitchen sink.
Minato scrubbed the pots, while Naruto washed the greasy plates and bowls.
Since Naruto had grown up on instant noodles and Ichiraku ramen, he'd basically never cooked—let alone washed dishes. He was clumsy, constantly knocking plates over or getting foam all over himself.
But he didn't find it annoying at all. He was having fun.
Doing chores with "Dad"… felt amazing.
While Naruto hummed off-key and awkwardly wrestled the oily dishes, Minato, who was scrubbing a pot beside him, suddenly spoke in a conspiratorial tone:
"By the way, Naruto."
"Hm? What is it, Dad?"
Minato paused, turned to him, and smiled. "To celebrate you officially becoming a genin today… Dad's going to teach you an incredibly awesome jutsu!"
"Eh? An incredibly awesome jutsu?" Naruto's eyes lit up—then he hesitated, confused.
Can you even learn jutsu… in a dream?
Minato gave a mysterious smile and held back the answer. "Finish washing up, then we'll go to the backyard."
He added proudly, "This jutsu took me three whole years to invent. It's ridiculously strong, and the name is really cool too."
Naruto was even more curious now, but deep down it still felt kind of weird.
Learning Dad's self-made ultimate jutsu… in a dream?
No matter how he thought about it, it sounded a little unreliable.
…
In the audience seats…
"A self-made jutsu?" Sakura perked up at that and asked curiously, "Did the Fourth Hokage ever invent some super impressive technique?"
She looked toward Sasuke and Kakashi.
Sasuke shook his head; he didn't know.
Their ninja academy textbooks mostly focused on the Fourth's speed as the "Yellow Flash" and his heroic sacrifice sealing the Nine-Tails. They didn't go into much detail about the specific jutsu he used or created.
Sakura pouted. "Honestly, this has to be that idiot Naruto fantasizing again, right? How could he be the Fourth Hokage's son? If he were, how could he have lived such a miserable life growing up? The Fourth is a hero who died saving the village. Naruto's just dreaming that he's a hero's kid."
Listening to her confident, logical breakdown, Kakashi could only sigh again.
Naruto's background—and the Third Hokage's arrangements back then—were tangled up in too many difficult, complicated reasons. Even Kakashi didn't fully know everything.
But at this point, he was increasingly certain that what they were seeing wasn't just Naruto's dream.
Minato-sensei… a self-made jutsu… extremely powerful…
Kakashi's heart tightened sharply.
As Minato's proudest student, how could he not know his teacher's signature masterpiece?
Not only did Kakashi know what it was—he could even use it himself, though not perfectly.
And because of it, he had later developed a technique better suited to his own style.
Could it be…
That jutsu?
Kakashi's brows knotted even tighter.
He stared at the screen without blinking.
…
Onscreen, the dream had switched to the backyard of that warm little home.
Could learning jutsu in a dream really work?
But if he was with Dad, anything was fine.
Naruto looked at his father's gentle smile and decided to cooperate wholeheartedly.
Minato raised his right hand, palm up, with a secretive look.
The next instant—
Hummm.
Without any warning at all…
A light-blue sphere of chakra, spinning at terrifying speed, appeared in his palm!
The blue "ball" whirled with a distinctive buzzing sound. The air around it visibly twisted from the force.
…
In the audience seats…
The moment he saw that blue sphere, Kakashi went rigid.
"J-just like I thought…"
He shot to his feet again.
"Rasengan!"
[Ding! Emotional fluctuation from Hatake Kakashi detected! Emotion Points +1000!]
Yes—Rasengan.
The A-rank ultimate technique Minato Namikaze spent three years developing, after studying the principles of a Tailed Beast Ball. The pinnacle of shape transformation fused with ultra-dense chakra, all without hand seals.
This wasn't coincidence.
What made Kakashi's scalp go numb was—
The way Minato formed it, the chakra flow, even his gentle teacher-smile as he prepared to instruct…
It matched perfectly with Kakashi's memory from years ago.
Back when Kakashi had just become a jonin, Minato had called him alone to a training field one evening to demonstrate and teach Rasengan for the first time…
It was identical.
No ordinary dream could recreate that with such precision.
Rasengan was Minato's unique invention. Its concept and training method were extremely complex. Minato's early death meant it was never widely passed down.
In the entire shinobi world, besides Minato himself, only Kakashi and Jiraiya should truly know it.
How could Naruto possibly witness such an accurate, real Rasengan lesson in a dream?
This wasn't genjutsu, and it wasn't a normal dream.
Whoever was controlling this from behind the scenes…
Who were they?
A chill ran up Kakashi's spine.
He'd been planning to observe longer, gather more clues, then report to the Third Hokage.
But now—
No. He couldn't wait.
This had already crossed far beyond his understanding.
He had to report everything to the Third immediately—right now.
Maybe…
Only the "Professor of Ninjutsu," the Third Hokage who knew countless techniques, could find an answer and unravel this mystery.
-------
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