Friends

These four guests are all classmates.

However, the relationship among the five of them is somewhat subtle, with Kakashi at the center of this network.

On Kakashi's side are Obito and Rin, forming a love triangle among the three.

Although Obito is displeased with Kakashi, he actually cares about him. Otherwise, he wouldn't follow him home from fishing.

And he is obsessed with Rin, practically never leaving her side.

Rin's affection for Kakashi stems from her childhood admiration for geniuses, similar to Kurenai's early feelings for Shintaro.

This mentality has long been established and wouldn't change even if a genius surpassing Kakashi, like Shintaro, appeared.

As for Rin, she harbors a faint affection for Obito due to their childhood companionship, a sort of gentle concern for the boy next door.

On the other side of Kakashi are Shintaro and Kurenai, and the three are connected through Shintaro.

Shintaro and Kakashi are both considered geniuses and are close friends who respect each other.

Kurenai is Shintaro's childhood friend. After three years of being together, Kurenai and Shintaro have become childhood friends, so Kurenai also has a relationship with Kakashi.

Kakashi looked at the four people and rolled his eyes again, thinking, "Initially, our family was so poor that we had to fish for our own food, but in the end, four people came to help."

Even though he complained like this, his heart still felt warm.

"But this house finally isn't so lonely."

The corners of his mouth lifted unconsciously behind his mask, and his movements became lighter.

Kakashi finished processing the three fish, cooked rice again, then lit the gas stove and took out a pan to fry the fish.

The bottom of the pan, heated by the faint blue flame of the gas stove, quickly caused the hot oil in the pan to steam. He put the marinated fish into the pan, holding the handle with one hand and cooking with chopsticks in the other.

The hot oil in the pan sizzled, and Shintaro and the others were sitting around the tatami.

It wasn't that Shintaro and the others didn't help, but Kakashi himself offered to let them taste his skills.

Therefore, the four could only watch Kakashi cooking in the kitchen, after all, he didn't need anyone to help him.

Shintaro and Kurenai weren't too close to Obito and Rin because Kakashi was between them.

So it was a bit awkward to sit together and say nothing.

Rin broke the awkwardness this time and found a topic to ask: "Kakashi, do you live alone?"

Obviously, this topic wasn't clever, only making Kakashi feel hurt.

But this was clearly not Rin's intention, but rather a lack of understanding of Kakashi's situation. Even though she admired him, her understanding of Kakashi was not even as good as Obito's.

Obito, who had been following Kakashi for a day, knew well that Kakashi lived alone, so he quickly changed the topic: "That's right, the fishing earlier was very interesting."

Rin also realized the mistake she had just made. After all, even though she didn't know Kakashi's situation, she had just heard it outside the window.

After Obito finished speaking, he glanced at her quietly. Rin understood and followed Obito's topic: "Ah, wow, that's nice."

In fact, she hadn't clearly seen Kakashi fishing at that time because she was afraid if she got too close, Obito would notice her spying as well.

"Really?" Kakashi closed his eyes, wondering what he was thinking.

But the topic ended here because Shintaro came directly to the door, and Kurenai followed him quietly, so she couldn't enter the topic.

Fortunately, some people found a common topic.

"Kakashi, is there a difference between life as a ninja and life at school?" Shintaro asked.

This topic interested everyone, except Kakashi, everyone was still studying at the ninja school.

Obito and Rin looked at Kakashi with longing, as if they wanted to hear about the life of a ninja, but Kurenai didn't seem too interested.

'When I become a ninja, you can't sit together with Shintaro every day, unless I'm in the same class...' This was what Kurenai thought in her heart.

Kakashi's answer somewhat broke Obito and Rin's fantasies: "Boring. Every time I catch a cat or dog."

This made Obito very disappointed, he thought that after becoming a ninja, he would do great things every day.

"But after I became a Chunin, I did more missions and faced some dangers."

As soon as Rin heard the word danger, she started to worry about Kakashi and said: "Will being a ninja be dangerous? It seems you have to be careful when doing missions."

Kakashi felt warm in his heart when he heard Rin's concern, and said reassuringly: "But it's okay. Generally, enemies will surrender when they see that we are from Konoha. Unless they are enemies from the other five big villages, even so, the captain and teammates doing the mission together will also prevent the mission's dangers."

"So there are only a few real battles. I have only fought enemies a few times so far."

Kakashi's experience as a ninja far exceeded that of everyone present. After all, including the genius Uchiha Shintaro, none had officially become a ninja and basically had no experience.

Therefore, when this topic came up, it was primarily Kakashi's topic, which also reflected Shintaro's skill in choosing topics.

Since this was the Hatake house, and the four people sitting here gathered because of Kakashi, it was natural that he needed to talk more.

And Shintaro greatly needed Kakashi's ninja experience, after all, he only had two years left to graduate.

In this way, the four of them chatted about the topic, while waiting for Kakashi to finish cooking dinner.

High-quality ingredients often only need the simplest cooking methods. After a busy day, Kakashi finally prepared the three fish and the rice in the pot was also cooked.

He brought the three fish to the table, and a rich aroma filled the air.

Rin looked at the food in front of her and asked, "This?"

"Fried river fish, Kakashi style." Kakashi answered the obvious question.

The surface of the fish was fried to a golden brown, then sprinkled with fragrant ginger and garlic on top.

Kakashi served rice to everyone. Everyone closed their eyes, clasped their hands, and said, "Ittadakimasu."

Then they all picked up their chopsticks and tasted Kakashi's skills.

Rin led by taking a piece of tender white fish and putting it in her mouth. After tasting it carefully, she praised: "Kakashi, this is delicious. It tastes like the one in the shop."

To verify Rin's statement, Obito immediately took a bite, then lifted his head with sparkling eyes: "It is indeed delicious, you're amazing!"

"Really?" Kakashi was quite calm, as if he had anticipated their reactions.

Shintaro and Kurenai looked at each other after tasting it, and they both found it delicious.

"Do you want to become a chef in the future?" Obito asked innocently.

Kakashi showed his typical dead fish eyes and said, "How could that be?"

Obito reacted and laughed: "Hahaha, right."

The whole room burst into cheerful laughter.

❀❀❀

The next day, Kakashi cleaned the big house alone as usual, then went out and said, "I'm going out" to the empty house.

He then went to the Konoha cemetery, where Sakumo was buried like other ninjas who died in battle.

Kakashi placed white flowers in front of the grave.

"Dad, did you break the rules because of your friends?"

"I also have friends."

"But I won't be like you. I will find a way to save my friends without breaking the rules."

"Even so, you're still my hero."

"Dad, I'll see you next time."