A day before present/
"Garou-sama." His voice was rough, formal.
It was a samurai in full armor, crested with the Daimyo's symbol, a scroll in his gloved hand.
We were in my private room at the main Heaven's Feel restaurant.
"Talk." I said boredly with a wave of my hand as I looked at the ceiling.
He stepped forward and placed a scroll on the table with care. "From Date Masamune-sama, Daimyo of the Land of Fire. You are summoned to the capital. So please present yourself in a month."
I looked at the scroll, then at him.
"Summoned?"
"Invited," he corrected, but the way he said it made it clear the difference was meaningless. "The Daimyo wishes to discuss your books and your business. A carriage will be provided at the village gate if you want to de gozaru."
I picked up the scroll, weighed it in my hand, then tossed it back onto the table. "Tell your boss I'll think about it, and no need for a carriage even if I come."
The samurai's eyebrow twitched as he heard thay. "Hatake-sama, I am afraid this is not a matter to think abou–"
I stood up suddenly and he flinched.
"I said I'll think about it, or do you want me to say to tell the Daimyo to come here instead?"
We stared at each other for a long five seconds. Then he bowed stiffly and walked out before I did.
I picked up the scroll and read the content inside. It was basically the Daimyo wanted to meet the guy who wrote some shitty books and and see the owner of these restaurants he had a share in himself.
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______________
Hiruzen was reading a mission report when an ANBU materialized in front of his desk.
"Hokage‑sama. A samurai bearing the Daimyo's crest has entered Konoha and is currently at the Heaven's Feel district. He met privately with Hatake Garou."
Hiruzen set down his pipe.
"Sighhhhh, alone?" No shit, of course.
"Yes."
Hiruzen nodded slowly.
The Daimyo had been watching Garou for years, ever since the books started becoming a trend.
Hiruzen stood up and walked to the window.
He could see the Heaven's Feel district in the distance, its rooftops gleaming in the afternoon sun.
That district was a symbol of somethings that had changed Konoha.
Not ninja power, and definitely not the Will of Fire. Just... money, money, and more money.
And money sometimes was more important than personal power when used smart as you can see.
"Inform me when he departs, and send word to our spies in the capital's palace. I want to know everything the Daimyo discusses with that boy."
The ANBU vanished after a nod.
Hiruzen stared at the district a little longer.
"I feel something really bad will happen.
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__________
Present time/
After walking for some time through the bustling streets together with the gang, we talked about many useless things with the boys like always until slowly, I could see the quite small and unassuming appearance of the Ichiraku Ramen shop.
"Eyy, you sure this is the right place?" Ken asked with a hint of doubt.
"Let's find out if it's." I replied with a shrug and continued walking in.
"It better have something not toxic to eat. I heard unhealthy stuff shrinks the thing down there." Ken said and followed me.
"You still got it? If it shrinks more than it already is, then might as well cut it off." I replied which made him put a hand on his heart as if in sudden pain.
I was inside and my eyes fixed on the picture of a teenage Teuchi, sleeping on the counter with his hand supporting his head.
*Cough cough.*
"Wake up, Teuchi," I called out loudly, which made him flinch, but he still didn't wake up.
"So is this the guy you talked about?" Tsunade asked from behind me.
"Yes," I replied.
*Grumble!*
Our stomachs made a sound.
"Damn man wake up! I am hungry as hell!" Ken shouted with irritation, which made Teuchi wake up abruptly and hit his head on a hanging pan above the counter.
*Bam!*
"Owww!"
He rubbed his head and wore a pained expression. "How you doing Teuchi?" I asked with little concern and slowly sat on a chair in front of the dude.
"Oww, oww... w..who ar— GAROU-SAMA!" Teuchi yelled at the top of his lungs in shock as he realized who I was.
"Calm down, Teuchi. No need to be surprised," I said while giving Tsunade a glance and pointing at the seat beside me.
"Hop hop hop!" Ken suddenly exclaimed while pointing at Teuchi, which made us confused.
"What?" Yuji asked tiredly and slowly sat down on my left without paying much attention to Ken.
"This dude was sleeping, right?" Ken asked us weirdly as he pointed at a nervous Teuchi rudely.
"Yeah," I replied in amusement, knowing what he was surprised about.
"Then why are his eyes still closed even after waking up? It doesn't make sense!" Ken said with exaggerated surprise, which made the gang think for a second and look at Teuchi's eyes, clearly making the guy uncomfortable.
*Bam!*
"Aghhhh!"
Ken's wife hand chopped the top of his head, making him yell in pain and let out a tear as he touched the now bump on his head. "Quit being rude idiot! And don't point at people like that, it's not nice," his blonde wife said in an ominous tone, and he fearfully nodded many times quickly.
After all of us sat down, I focused on the bewildered Teuchi, who was shocked to see me after many years. "You got a nice shop, Teuchi. I am happy to see you are doing well," I said with a genuine smile.
"T..thanks, Garou-sama! Thanks to you, I was able to have this. It's all because of you," he said loudly with a huge smile and a tear running down his face while bowing repeatedly, making me and the gang uncomfortable for a second.
"It's alright, my guy. You don't need to mention it. So what do you have to eat? We are quite hungry, you see," I said, pointing at the gang.
"Ahh, I am so sorry for making you wait! We have Miso ramen, Shoyu ramen, and Shio ramen, Garou-sama," he said politely and waited for what we would choose.
I turned to look at Tsunade. "So which one do you want?" I asked.
"Hmmm, maybe the Miso ramen? Anything will do, I guess," she said with a hand on her chin.
"You heard her, Teuchi. I want the same too," I said, and Teuchi nodded happily as he wrote down our order.
"Can you get me two Shio ramen?" Yuji asked while scratching his chin lazily.
"Miso ramen like Daifuku-kun for me and my wife, please!"
"Miso ramen here."
"Shoyu ramen."
After taking all of our orders, Teuchi's demeanor changed to a more serious one, and with a smile, he diligently started to prepare what we wanted.
As he started doing his stuff, I noticed that he has improved a lot in his cooking, more polished, and nothing like years ago.
I didn't interrupt the guy and turned to look at Yuji.
"You took care of that thief nicely. Really good to have that shadow jutsu, right?" I said and opened up a topic to talk about, since Tsunade was already talking with the girls about women things I didn't understand.
"It's just some secret technique of our clan. Nothing much, I guess," he replied nonchalantly.
"What can you do with it, though? Can you manipulate shadows at will or what?" I asked, not caring if it was something confidential.
"Pretty much yes, but it's limited. You can't really call it manipulation at will because hand seals are still needed to do the job," he replied.
"So binding and grabbing people is all it can do?" I asked with some hidden disappointment.
Yuji turned to me and shrugged. "Except for a few other things, then yes, I guess," he said.
"Well, that's disappointing. I thought you could teleport from shadow to shadow, or use the shadow of your fallen enemies to fight for you, creating shadow walls or shields, sharp projectiles like kunais, night vision, a shadow domain where you are god, a shadow sword or a shadow sharp enough to cut things, and many other things like that, you know," I said with a disappointed tone while throwing some ideas at his face.
Yuji was a genius if not for his laziness, all Naras are, so maybe he will succeed if he put his kind in creating similar techniques.
"..."
I turned and looked at Yuji, who was staring at me as if I was stupid or something. "Do you take me for a one-in-a-million genius or what? Do you even realize how hard it is to come up with a new jutsu? Creating a jutsu needs many years to come up with its theory alone, and then many other years to create it. Most times if not all you won't even succeed," he said with a tired expression while rubbing his forehead.
"Hmmm, well I don't have chakra anyways, so whatever, you do you." I said with a shrug.
"Now that you brought this up, how are you still becoming stronger? I thought you will hit your physical limit long ago, but even now, after years, I doubt I can stand a minute against you." he said with a frown.
"If you really wanna know, then don't be lazy, get on the ground and do some push-ups," I said nonchalantly, not wanting to really answer that, so I focused back on Teuchi, who was about to finish mine and Tsunade's order.
"..."
"Ayo, what are you two talking about?" Ken suddenly said as he put his head forward.
"Yuji wants to know the secret of muscles," I replied with a smirk and flexed my bare arm, which was filled with bulging veins that were twitching.
The gang gulped as they looked at my arm, which was two times the size of baby Shikaku.
"Quit being a show-off. The order is here," Tsunade said in irritation with her arms crossed.
"Don't act like you don't like them." I said with a smirk, which made her glare at me and the other women giggle at her.
"Here are your orders, Garou-sama and Tsunade-hime!" Teuchi said with a warm smile as he put the bowls of ramen in front of us as if he were carrying babies.
"Thanks." ×2
"Please wait, and I will get your orders in no time," Teuchi said to the gang and started to work again.
As the steam rose from the bowl of savory ramen, my eyes lit up with anticipation.
I wanted to know if Teuchi has reached my level of cooking.
Taking the first slurp, a burst of heavenly flavors immediately hit my taste buds.
"Shit, this is actually good!" I muttered in surprise with my eyes closed to savor every last bit of the ramen with my enhanced taste buds.
I opened my eyes and looked at Tsunade, who happily ate hers.
'Was this fucker grinding ramen to the max level all these years or what?' I thought as I gulped down the whole bowl without caring if it was hot or not and hit the bowl on the table, then sighed in delight.
Tsunade was still busy with her ramen, so the whole gang looked at me with raised eyebrows.
"So how was it?" Ken asked with anticipation. I guess my reaction had piqued his curiosity.
"Equal to what I cook." I replied calmly and looked at Teuchi, who smiled brightly at my huge compliment much to the surprise of the gang.
"Really?!" Ken asked in surprise and I nodded.
Everyone knew who Garou was beside being one of this era's great philosopher.
He was the owner of the Heaven's Feel and producer of many top tier recipes that even now, after years since their creation is still making waves everywhere. And they have tasted his personal cooking which were levels above whats sold in the restaurants.
Chefs around the fire country often come to the district to have a chance to meet him and learn something from him.
At some point, Garou even thought of creating an academy like the one from Food Wars world specifically to teach his cooking skills.
So a compliment from him is like being called an idiot sandwich from Gordon Ramsey.
"Thanks for the compliment, Garou-sama! It means a lot to me," he said, then started to distribute the finished bowls of ramen to Yuji and the others.
"Teuchi..." I called.
"Yes, Garou-sama?" He replied and listened to what I had to say.
"Bring me a pen and paper," I said.
"Right away!" He quickly took out a paper and pen from inside his chef's clothes.
I grabbed the tools and, under the curious gazes of the gang, I started to write down whatever ramen recipes I still remembered from Miller's and my world and gave the paper back to him folded.
'If I can, then why shouldn't I?' I thought.
"Don't look at what's written inside until we leave, and..." I said, then put my hand in my underwear, which made Ken make a disgusted face, then pulled out a stamp of the Hatake clan.
"Give me another paper," I said, and he gave me another one, on which I wrote something about business or whatnot, then marked the paper with the stamp.
"Teuchi..." I called again while checking what I had written on the paper.
"Y..yes?" He answered nervously.
"I know that because of me you have few customers, so as the major shareholder of the Heaven's Feel food company, I will sponsor you and give you the right to put up my banner on the walls of your shop, but in return, I want 10% of what you get. Do you agree to this?" I said, with Teuchi listening to me attentively while the gang were enjoying their food and listening to us.
"..."
"So?" I asked the now quiet guy.
"Garou-sama... everything I have now is all because of you, and I still don't know how to repay you enough. So consider this shop as your own and me your employee. I agree to everything," he said with a warm smile and a tear running down his face, which put a genuine smile on my face.
'This dude is too good for this world. Don't worry, when your daughter is born, I will make a Chun-li out of her.' I thought.
"Then sign this paper and give it to my friend Yuji here," I said and pointed at Yuji beside me, who raised his head from his bowl of ramen and smiled lazily at Teuchi.
Teuchi nodded and, after signing the paper, he gave it to Yuji. "Send that paper to your father and let him take care of it Yuji." I said and he nodded with a dismissive wave of his hand.
As I was about to tell Teuchi something, "You look down bro. If you need anything just know we got your back." Ken suddenly asked without looking at me.
Tsunade stiffened a little beside me but said nothing.
This dumbass sure has a keen eye. Is this some Yamanaka trait or something?
Years of mind raping people really made them good at reading people even though I looked fine and didn't show anything unusual.
"Just eat your Ramen. Don't be weird." I replied nonchalantly.
"Welp, just sayin man. Since I saw you today, I have observed that your right butt cheek being more stiff than usual– Okay! Sheeshh I will shut up! Sit down man!" Ken shouted at the end for me to sit back down and not hand his ass to him.
I slowly sat down as I glared at him with the others.
I take it back, he wasn't perceptive. And he wasn't mind raping people but the opposite, he was being mind raped.
"It's my fault for caring." Ken muttered beneath his breath.
Even so, Tsunade held my hand with worry hidden in her eyes which made Yuji give a silent stare and not say anything.
Yuji knew that Garou wasn't the type who appreciated extending your hand to help unless he asked for it, so he kept quite. But even so, Ken saying that was for better and made Garou aware that we cared about his well-being.
"I want another fifty bowls of ramen, Teuchi," I said with a wide grin that made Teuchi go pale and sweat fearfully at my request.
And feeling competitive, Satoshi also yelled, "And a hundred for me!"
_______________
45 Minutes Later/
After putting the money inside the pocket of the exhausted and passed‑out man, we got out and started to bid our farewells.
"Thanks for the treat, man. Next time, it's on me!" Ken said while rubbing his stomach in delight.
"Thanks for the treat." ×5
"It's no big deal," I replied and dismissed it with a wave of my hand.
"Then this is goodbye, I guess," Yuji said tiredly as he looked at the sleeping Shikaku in his arms enviously.
"Then see you guys soon, I guess," I said and grabbed Tsunade's hand after she bid farewell to the girls.
"See you soon." ×6
And like that, we separated and left the place.
"Should we go back home too?" Tsunade asked me after a while.
"The sun is about to set. Wanna watch it?" I asked but didn't get an answer.
With her quietness as an answer, I just continued on my way toward one of our favorite spots in the Forest of Death that we often came to, where it was quiet and high above the ground, making it easy to look at the beautiful scenery from a cliff.
After arriving there and sitting on a spot that was perfect for quietly relaxing and looking at the beautiful nature and the orange sun, we stayed like that for some time.
"You don't need to worry. I will check on your mother regularly and try to come up with a cure. You know I am a genius medical ninja, so don't worry too much. I have become a full time doctor in the hospital and I will dedicate my time for your mother. It's not like you to be like this, you know, so cheer up a little." Tsunade said softly while hugging my arm beside me.
I looked at the ground. "I always thought that my mom was acting weird these past years. And I thought she was pregnant or going through that time of the month, but I didn't know it was this severe. I should have known sooner," I said with my teeth and fists clenched, which made her hug me tighter.
"Don't blame yourself for this. It was out of your hands, hubby. I will study her disease and find a cure. It won't be hard, I promise," she said in my ear, and I calmed down a little.
"Thanks," I said.
"Don't mention it, hubby. Muah," she said and kissed my cheek, which lifted my mood.
We then sat there quietly for some time, waiting for the sun to set. "I need to tell you something, by the way angel," I said, and she hummed for me to continue.
"Over the next few years, I may be away from Konoha," I revealed to her, and she immediately moved away from me and stared at me intensely.
"Explain!" she said in a cold tone.
"The Daimyo has requested my presence for some matters in the capital. After that, I don't plan to come back immediately and explore the region a little while also checking my restaurants in various cities." I said while ignoring her angry stare.
"When will you go?" she asked with a shadow over her face.
"Maybe next week or this–"
*PAW! BAM!*
"Shiiiit!"
I was hit with a sudden unexpected punch out of nowhere and was thrown toward a tree behind where I was sitting. My back hit it strongly, making it dent and cracks spread across the trunk.
I sat in front of the tree in a trance for a few moments, thinking what happened, before realization hit me. Then every vein in my body started to bulge and twitch from anger. "FUCK! TSUNADE! WHY DID YOU HIT ME, HUH?!" I yelled in anger as I slowly stood up and looked at Tsunade, whose fist was emitting smoke with a shadow hiding her face.
"Leaving Konoha to meet the Daimyo? Alright, sure. But leaving and not coming back?? Who decided that?!" she said and looked at me with a calm indifference.
"Fuck...! I will fucking come back shortly after. I want to explore and see the world outside, you wench!" I shouted at her.
*Crack crack*
She cracked her fingers. "Seems the disease of your mother is running through your veins hubby. Where in the world some YEARS is a short time?! I need to give you a proper beating to bring your 3rd brain cell back to work." she said as she slowly walked toward me with a grin, which pissed me off even more.
'Fuck this shit. She needs a fucking spanking!' I thought as I stretched my shoulders and started to walk toward her slowly too.
*Crack crack.*
I cracked my neck. "And it seems I need to remind you who is the boss of the house. So get your fat ass ready bitch!" I said in anger and looked at her with veins filling my eyes.
"Ohhh, how cute. Ready my fat ass for what? My ass has always been ready but the cowardly weeine isn't." she came back with an angry grin, which made me bit my lips in rage with an ugly face.
And like this, under the watchful gaze of the orange sun in the sky...
We started to fight for dominance.
The End.
[Just throwing some meat at ya cuz some are starving.]
[I could post a chapter everyday... but I won't.]
[Nahh but seriously, the quality will go to shit if I did post everyday. Those who don't write these stuff just don't know how absolutely exhausting writing can get if you continously did it. So we ain't fully back yet.]