At this moment, Tetsuo and the others respectfully approached Shintaro from behind, bowing and saying, "Thank you, boss, for helping me."
Shintaro waved his hand, indifferent to their gratitude.
In fact, the reason he acted was simply out of interest, and he was intrigued by his opponent from the Hyuga Clan.
The Gentle Fist and Byakugan indeed interested Shintaro, but the strength of those people was not praiseworthy.
However, he noticed that the attitude of some people towards him seemed much more sincere this time. Not to mention Hamasu, who was already moved, even the shrewd Tetsuo seemed more genuine towards Shintaro, and the others were the same.
There was no harm in Shintaro accepting these young men, so he accepted it calmly.
"Alright, if there's nothing else, I'll be leaving." He said.
Tetsuo asked, "Boss, are you interested in having dinner with us? I'll treat you."
Shintaro declined Tetsuo's offer, "No, I have someone else to dine with tonight."
After saying that, he waved his hand and left.
After a while, Tetsuo clapped his hands and said with a sudden realization, "If someone can have dinner with the boss, their relationship must be extraordinary. We should go and find out so we can build a good relationship with that person."
Hamasu and the others also felt that what Tetsuo said made sense, and it was clear that they had reached a consensus to cling to Shintaro tightly.
❀❀❀
At the Yuhi house, Kurenai was setting the table, which was filled with delicious food, seemingly not homemade but taken from a restaurant.
As the only daughter of a Konoha Jonin, she had ample savings.
Kurenai sat alone in her chair, twirling her fingers somewhat bored.
At that moment, the doorbell rang.
Kurenai immediately stood up happily, but she quickly realized that such a reaction was too excessive, so she patted her cheeks twice to calm herself down, then walked to the door and opened it.
As expected, it was Shintaro standing outside the door.
Shintaro entered and asked casually, "Isn't your uncle here?"
Kurenai explained, "My father is on a mission and might not return to Konoha this month, so he left some money for me to pay for our food this month."
She explained in great detail, while Shintaro nodded calmly.
As a ninja, the time spent on missions was generally longer compared to the time spent idling at home, especially since Shinku was still a Jonin.
At this moment, Shintaro put on his shoes and looked at Kurenai, saying, "Your face seems a bit red."
After that, he went to the bathroom. His hands were a bit dirty after the earlier fight, so he needed to wash them in this situation.
Kurenai remained where she was, touching her slightly warm face, feeling annoyed inside: 'Why do I act like this every time I'm alone with him?'
After washing his hands, Shintaro came to the dining table and said, "Did you buy this from outside?"
He had come to Konoha and had never eaten out.
He usually bought food at the Uchiha Clan station and cooked it himself.
After all, both his parents had died, which made the already poor family even worse off.
Only then did Kurenai react. She walked closer and answered, "Yes, I brought it home from a new barbecue restaurant called BBQ Q."
"Don't you like barbecue? There's also sugar." She said while walking to the kitchen and bringing out a plate of white sugar.
Shintaro smiled, took the sugar, and said, "Thank you, I like it."
The two of them sat together. The barbecue restaurant had provided them with a simple wooden oven, and the charcoal fire inside was burning brightly.
Shintaro took the rack and placed pieces of meat on it one by one, waiting calmly for the barbecue to cook. The sight of sizzling oil was a beautiful scene he hadn't seen in a long time.
While waiting for the barbecue to cook, Kurenai asked what had happened earlier, "What did you mean when you said you had something to do after school?"
Shintaro didn't avoid anything and answered honestly, "I went to fight."
Such an understated statement scared Kurenai.
Fighting could easily remind people of some violent incidents.
Kurenai immediately lifted Shintaro's clothes to see if he was injured.
To her surprise, there were no scars on Shintaro's body, only smooth white skin.
She quickly realized the impropriety of her actions and hurriedly put her hands down, lowering her head and mumbling in a mosquito-like voice, "Sorry."
Shintaro smiled indifferently and said, "Those opponents wouldn't be able to hurt me."
After that, he saw the barbecue was ready, so he gave Kurenai two pieces, "Eat."
He himself put sugar in his hand, took a slice of meat with chopsticks, and dipped it in the sugar to eat.
Two great hobbies in life merged into one, making it difficult for the usually calm Shintaro to control himself.
Seeing this, Kurenai also shifted her attention to the barbecue and started eating.
Whether it was due to the barbecue's heat or for other reasons, her face remained red until Shintaro left the house.
Another day passed.
❀❀❀
The next day, Shintaro came to school as usual, but he heard many rumors about him along the way.
"Is that Uchiha Shintaro? He's so handsome."
"Hey, don't look at how handsome and gentle he is, but he's now a bully at our school."
"Really? What happened?"
"I heard he led some Uchiha Clan members to beat up a group of Hyuga Clan members yesterday. Among those beaten were seniors about to graduate."
"Very strong, but then the Hyuga Clan will deal with him."
"Hahaha, I heard the Hyuga Clan sent people to the Uchiha Clan for an explanation, but they were sent away. You see, the Uchiha Clan is protecting him strongly. Don't you know how powerful he is?"
"Wow, that's really amazing."
Under various rumors, for some reason, Shintaro's image in the minds of the students became higher and more unapproachable.
Shintaro didn't pay much attention to this, only considering it as children's play.
When he came to class, he thought that with his current reputation, the little fans would calm down.
But he didn't expect girls his age to be so fanatic.
Shintaro was so annoyed that he had to scare the girls who came around him with a cold face so that he could attend class normally.
During the class break, Kurenai took Anko out to use the restroom.
When she returned, she was different from her usual self and angrily said to Shintaro, "Go out and take care of your friends, don't let them talk nonsense."
Shintaro was confused, but seeing Kurenai's reaction and the funny expression on Anko's face beside her, it wasn't hard to conclude that they must have heard something outside.
So he left the classroom and saw Tetsuo and the others.
Tetsuo approached him with a smile on his face, giving a thumbs up and saying, "Boss, sister-in-law is very pretty."
Shintaro immediately understood why Kurenai had reacted the way she did earlier, so he slapped Tetsuo's head, making him shrink his neck in fear.
"Don't shout that again, we're just friends."
Only then did Tetsuo realize he had been careless.
Seeing Tetsuo's expression, Shintaro probably remembered it. He was about to turn and leave, but suddenly he turned back and said as if remembering something, "Also, there are a lot of rumors recently. Control yourself; I don't like hearing these rumors."
Tetsuo nodded repeatedly, and Shintaro returned to his seat in the classroom.
"I already told you they won't brag randomly in the future."
Kurenai hummed softly, and it was unclear whether she was happy or not.
After some advice from Shintaro and whatever method Tetsuo and the others used, the rumors about Shintaro and Kurenai at school did die down, at least they didn't reach Shintaro's ears anymore.