Chapter 174: Going Straight
"To actually take you directly to the hospital... no matter how you look at it, Naruto went too far."
On a quiet little river at the edge of Konoha Village, a wooden bridge spanned both banks. Kakashi leaned against the cool bridge railing, and after hearing Satsuki's account, helplessly scratched his silver hair. He was trying to express sympathy for his student and "condemnation" of Naruto's behavior.
Meanwhile, Satsuki gripped the railing on the other side tightly, desperately suppressing the urge to jump into the river and end it all.
Hearing Kakashi's words, she didn't feel much comfort, only speaking slowly in an unusually flat tone: "Kakashi, that book... do you still have it with you?"
"Oh?" Kakashi's visible eye curved slightly. "You still haven't given up? How persistent! Well, failure is the mother of success, so let me give you a few more ideas! That book actually has more..."
Faced with Kakashi instantly entering "romance master" mode again, Satsuki whipped her head around.
Those eyes, still red-rimmed with dried tear tracks, now stared at Kakashi with an extremely cold gaze full of enormous resentment.
"Give it to me. I want to burn that broken book... to ashes."
She paused, then corrected: "No... perhaps the one who should be burned to ash... should be you, Kakashi."
"...Huh?" Kakashi was completely thrown by Satsuki's sudden enormous hostility clearly directed at him, instinctively backing up half a step and laughing dryly. "Heh... heh heh... young people's thoughts these days are really hard to understand..."
He tried to redirect the fire back toward Naruto: "But speaking of which, that Naruto kid really is a bit ungrateful. Having such a cute and excellent girl harbor such feelings for him, making so many attempts for his sake, yet he reacts like this and even takes you to the hospital... truly too much."
However, this "united front" speech had no comforting effect whatsoever. Satsuki still looked furious enough to fight him to the death the next second.
Kakashi could clearly feel that while Satsuki wouldn't actually burn him to ash, her resentment at least wanted to throw him off the bridge into the river.
Kakashi immediately wisely changed his approach: "Ahem... but then again, you don't really need to be that angry, right? After all..."
"It's all because of your terrible ideas!" Before Kakashi could finish, Satsuki interrupted him emotionally. "Now... after what happened... how am I supposed to face Naruto?!"
Kakashi: "..."
He was momentarily speechless. After all this, the root of this girl's explosive resentment wasn't about her own embarrassment or being treated as mentally ill, but worrying about not being able to naturally face Naruto anymore?
What exactly did Naruto do? Kakashi mentally questioned. What kind of spell did he cast on the Uchiha family's second daughter to bewitch her to this extent?
"So that's what you're worried about," Kakashi said, seeing Satsuki's expression like the sky was falling from resentment, trying to defuse it with a light tone. "Just face him like before. Don't worry, Naruto is very understanding of others."
Seeing the resentment in Satsuki's eyes hadn't subsided, Kakashi continued analyzing, trying a different angle: "Besides, think about it carefully—the person Naruto has always cared for and been most tolerant of has always been you, hasn't it?"
"If it were someone else doing those... uh... rather unusual things to him, with Naruto's personality, he'd probably find it troublesome and might even instinctively keep his distance. But with you?"
Kakashi spread his hands: "He immediately worried whether you were 'sick' and even disregarded your wishes to anxiously rush you to the hospital, wanting to find the best doctor to 'cure' you. This reaction precisely shows that your position in his heart is unique. His care and tolerance for you has long surpassed the scope of ordinary friends."
Though it definitely can't compare to your feelings for him... Kakashi silently added in his mind.
However, in the next moment, Kakashi was surprised to see the almost materialized resentment and anger in Satsuki's eyes rapidly fading at visible speed, replaced by bewilderment and... weak hope?
"Surpassed... ordinary friends?" Satsuki murmured quietly.
Kakashi immediately keenly caught this change and decided to press his advantage, using more direct words to consolidate the result: "That's right! In the eyes of almost everyone familiar with you two, you and Naruto are practically bound together, right? That special treatment between you... honestly, it would be strange if you two don't end up together."
The moment he finished speaking, almost all the resentment and anger in Satsuki's eyes instantly vanished! Her previous terrifying expression of wanting to immediately throw Kakashi into the river quickly transformed into a more common girlish demeanor that was somewhat angry and awkward. Though still a bit unhappy, she at least looked normal now.
"I see..." Satsuki lowered her head slightly, her voice returning to its usual tone, just with some lingering confusion. "Then... what do you think I should do to explain today's... strange things to Naruto!"
Watching Satsuki who had been instantly appeased and was now thinking about practical problems, Kakashi mentally complained: "Way too easy to coax..."
On the surface, he cleared his throat dramatically and assumed an instructive posture: "Well, it seems the 'channel' between you two is rather special, so you can't use those ordinary, roundabout methods."
He offered his final, and possibly most irresponsible suggestion: "Therefore, if you want to completely solve this problem, in my personal opinion... just go directly tell Naruto the truth!"
"...Eh?!" Satsuki's head shot up. "Di-directly tell the truth?!"
Seeing Satsuki's instantly reddened face and panicked eyes, Kakashi continued with a tone of resigned frankness: "Indeed, given your image as a 'cool Uchiha genius' in other people's eyes, doing today's things was way too strange and completely inexplicable. So beating around the bush would actually be more troublesome."
He looked at Satsuki, his visible eye curving with what seemed like mischievous amusement, offering his final suggestion:
"So why not just go find him directly and honestly tell him: 'The reason I did those strange things was because I like you and wanted you to pay more attention to me.' How about it?"
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