Chapter 67: Funeral
October 12th.
Ren stood in front of his bathroom mirror, aggressively adjusting the collar of his pitch-black mourning suit.
He looked terrible. The dark circles under his eyes were prominent, but the real issue was the right eye itself. The once blood-red iris was currently a clouded, milky grey. Pushing the Mangekyō to its absolute limit had completely fried the optic nerve, leaving the right side of his vision a wall of pitch-black static.
"Eighteen years old," Ren muttered to his reflection, "and I’m already taking prescription drops for magical glaucoma. Fantastic."
He reached onto the marble counter and picked up a small, heavy glass vial containing a glowing blue liquid.
Ocular Stasis Serum.
He had bought it from the System shop at 4:00 AM. It wasn’t a cure—a true fix for Mangekyō blindness required a genetic miracle—but it forcibly halted the cellular degradation, preventing his working left eye from going blind too.
And it had cost him exactly 50,000 BC.
"Fifty grand," Ren grumbled, tilting his head back and squeezing two drops of the freezing liquid into his blind eye. He hissed through his teeth as the localized numbness washed over his optic nerve. "If this keeps up, I’m going to go bankrupt just trying to maintain my vision."
"Brother?" a quiet voice called out.
Ren blinked the remaining tears from his left eye and turned around.
Twelve-year-old Itachi stood in the doorway, dressed in his own traditional black mourning robes. His dark hair was neatly combed, and his large, innocent eyes looked up at Ren with quiet concern.
"It’s time to go," Itachi said softly. "Father is waiting."
Ren looked down at his little brother. As he stared into Itachi’s perfectly healthy, pristine dark eyes, a highly intrusive, ruthlessly pragmatic thought suddenly forced its way into Ren’s capitalist brain.
The Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan requires the eyes of a close blood relative, Ren’s inner monologue calculated coldly. Technically, all I have to do is heavily traumatize Itachi, wait a few years for his eyes to mature, pluck them out, and I’ll have permanent, invincible vision with zero overhead cost...
Itachi tilted his head, blinking. He reached out and innocently tugged on the sleeve of Ren’s expensive suit jacket. "Brother? Where are you lost?"
Ren violently shook his head, instantly disgusted with himself.
What the fuck is wrong with me? Ren thought, mentally throwing his own devilish business plan into an incinerator. I am a tycoon, not a snake-pedophile. He’s twelve.
"Nowhere, Itachi," Ren sighed, reaching out to gently ruffle his brother’s neatly combed hair, earning a mild, indignant pout from the prodigy. "Just tired. Come on. Let’s not keep Father waiting."
The air in the Uchiha compound was violently cold. The thick, choking scent of ash and burnt pine from the ruined commercial districts still drifted over the high walls.
Over five hundred clansmen had gathered in the grand courtyard of the Nakano Shrine.
The atmosphere was suffocatingly heavy. In the center of the courtyard sat forty wooden caskets. Forty elite Military Police officers were dead. Dozens more were currently recovering in the triage tents.
Ren stood silently beside his mother and brother in the front row. He didn’t speak. He didn’t plot. He just watched as Fugaku, his right arm heavily wrapped in burn bandages, delivered a stoic, traditional eulogy honoring the profound sacrifice of the men who had laid down their lives.
The funeral was brief, solemn, and strictly traditional. There were no politics, only a family mourning its dead.
Later that evening, the heavy atmosphere shifted to the main Uchiha estate.
The traditional post-funeral mourning dinner was underway. The grand sliding doors of the main hall were open to the courtyard, where dozens of the grieving widows, fatherless children, and surviving clan elites sat in quiet conversation over warm tea and rice.
Ren sat near the head of the room, sipping a cup of green tea.
Fugaku was sitting across from him, reading a small, official scroll bearing the Hokage’s seal. The patriarch’s jaw tightened, his Sharingan briefly flaring to life in pure irritation before he forcibly suppressed it.
"What is it, Father?" Itachi asked quietly.
"The official death stipends from the village administration," Fugaku muttered, tossing the scroll onto the low wooden table. "They are recognizing the Military Police’s heroism with medals. But the financial compensation... it is a standard Class-B casualty payout."
Ren’s working eye narrowed. "Class-B? That barely covers a year’s worth of living expenses."
"The village treasury took a massive hit during the attack," an older Uchiha elder sighed from down the table. "They say it is all they can afford. After this year, the widows will be left to scrape by on their own."
A quiet, desperate murmur rippled through the families sitting nearby who had overheard. The crushing reality of their profession was setting in. Konoha was offering them spare change for the lives of their husbands and fathers.
Ren slowly set his teacup down. The ceramic clicked sharply against the wood, silencing the immediate area.
Fugaku noticed his son’s shifting posture. "What are you doing, Ren?"
"Payback," Ren said simply.
Ren stood up. He didn’t pull out a checkbook or speak like a CEO. He looked out over the grieving families, his posture radiating the absolute, unyielding pride of the clan’s eldest son.
"Konoha is offering us spare change and hollow medals," Ren’s voice carried across the room, steady and firm. "But those men did not die for the village’s spare change. They died for the glory and survival of the Uchiha. They died to protect their family. Will there souls be able to rest in peace if their families will be struggling behind them."
The room went completely silent, every eye turning to the eighteen-year-old.
"And as an Uchiha, it is my responsibility to honor their sacrifice," Ren declared. "I announce right now that whoever lost a family member in this attack will receive a lifetime pension from my estate. Your children’s education, housing, and training will be fully subsidized. You will never have to beg Konoha for scraps."
A young widow in the front row gasped, tears welling in her eyes as the terrifying weight of her family’s future was instantly lifted.
But before the widows could bow, an older, battle-scarred clan elder sitting near the middle of the room slowly stood up.
"The boy is right," the elder said, his voice thick with emotion and fierce clan pride. He looked at Fugaku. "We are the Uchiha. We take care of our own. I pledge a portion of my forge’s profits to the families of the fallen."
Another veteran stood up across the room. "And I will donate the surplus from our district’s supply lines."
"My family will contribute as well," a third elder declared, standing tall.
Fugaku watched in absolute awe as a ripple of unity washed through the entire hall. The elders weren’t just bowing to Ren’s wealth; Ren had ignited their pride. The Uchiha were standing together as an unbreakable family, completely isolating themselves from the Hokage’s financial leverage.
Ren offered a small, respectful bow to the elders, his single working eye gleaming. The clan was finally unified.
The oppressive, highly emotional atmosphere in the main hall eventually became too overwhelming for Ren. He quietly excused himself, sliding the paper doors shut and walking down the dimly lit wooden corridors of his childhood home to clear his head.
He rubbed his right temple, feeling the dull, freezing ache of the serum.
He pushed open the sliding door to the private family parlor, intending to sit in the dark for a few minutes.
"Oh."
Ren froze in the doorway.
The room wasn’t empty. Mikoto Uchiha was sitting on the traditional tatami mat, bathed in the soft moonlight filtering through the paper screen. Her black mourning robes were pulled down past her shoulder, fully exposing her bare breast as she quietly nursed a newborn, fussing baby Sasuke.
Ren’s working eye widened. The ruthless, untouchable mastermind instantly vanished, replaced by an eighteen-year-old boy whose brain completely short-circuited.
"Ah—apologies," Ren stammered, his cheeks instantly burning a bright, furious red. He averted his eyes to the ceiling, grabbing the edge of the sliding door. "I didn’t know you were in here. I’ll just—"
"Ren," Mikoto called out softly, a distinct, deeply amused lilt in her voice.
Ren stopped, his hand still gripping the doorframe. He kept his eyes locked on the wooden beams above. "Yes, Mother?"
Mikoto let out a quiet, elegant laugh. She adjusted Sasuke slightly, making absolutely no move to cover herself. She looked at her oldest son, noting the bright red flush spreading across his pale neck.
"What are you getting so embarrassed about now, hm?" Mikoto teased, her dark eyes flashing with a dangerous, playful intelligence. "You used to suck on these tits too, you know."
Ren choked on a breath, his grip on the doorframe tightening. "I was an infant."
Mikoto smiled—a warm, completely wicked, knowing smile.
"Perhaps," Mikoto mused softly, leaning back slightly. "But as I recall, your suckling wasn’t exactly like an innocent kid hungry for milk. You had quite the shameless grin on your face."
Ren’s heart completely stopped.
He slowly, mechanically turned his head to look at her. The blood drained entirely from his face, leaving him paler than a ghost.
She knew?! Ren’s mind screamed in absolute, unfiltered horror. She remembered that?!
Mikoto just offered him a sweet, innocent hum, gently stroking Sasuke’s hair as she bathed in the moonlight, looking entirely too entertained by her eldest son’s mental collapse.
Ren swallowed hard, the atmosphere in the room suddenly thick, heavy, and wildly taboo.
"I’ll... I’ll leave you to it," Ren managed to squeak out, his voice cracking slightly.
He violently slid the door shut and power-walked down the hallway, dragging a heavy hand down his face. Between the blinding eye, the clan politics, and his mother’s devastating memory, Ren came to a singular, undeniable conclusion.
Life was definitely getting complicated.
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