If Uzumaki Karei's personality is good enough, Kushina feels she can try pairing the two of them up.
...
It was almost dinner time by the time Obito finished his cultivation and left the Southern Border Forest with Shisui to head home.
"I'm back." Before he even got to the door, Obito couldn't wait to shout.
"Oh, it's Obito." Hearing her grandson's familiar voice, Grandma showed a kindly smile and slowly walked toward the door.
"Grandma, how's your health been lately?" After entering the house, Obito walked with Grandma back to the living room, asking with concern.
"I'm not senile yet. This mission of yours didn't even last that long, what could've changed?" Grandma laughed and told Obito not to worry.
It was that time at the East Coast Battlefield that Obito had really been gone for a long stretch; she remembered it was over half a year and he only came back once in the middle. Most of the time he wasn't in Konoha.
Obito scratched his head with a silly grin. As long as Grandma stayed healthy, he didn't mind being nagged a bit.
"Grandma, where's Charmander, did it go out to play?" Obito thought of the Summoning Beast he was raising at home.
He had high hopes for Charmander, hoping that one day it could become even stronger than Jiraiya's Toads.
"Isn't Charmander right there?" Grandma pointed at the sofa.
Obito followed the direction of Grandma's finger and saw a tail burning with flame sticking out from behind the sofa.
"Charmander, what are you doing sleeping at this hour? Get up." Obito called.
A nap at noon was understandable, but sleeping all the way to dinner time—Obito had every reason to suspect that while he was gone, Charmander had been slacking off.
Hearing Obito's voice, Charmander wobbled over toward him, its body swaying; it'd been eating a bit too much lately, enough to make it drowsy.
"This is Charmander?" Obito stared at Charmander's round little belly, his expression full of existential doubt.
He remembered that before he left it was still a Charmander, so how did it turn into a chubby little dragon after just one mission?
"Aw!" Charmander let out a displeased cry.
What's with the dragon slander now? If it isn't Charmander, then who is?
Obito's mouth twitched. He grabbed hold of the scruff that decided Charmander's fate and lifted it up to look it in the eyes.
"Charmander, did you not train at all while I was gone? How did you get this fat all of a sudden?" Obito couldn't help asking.
Charmander shook its head. It would slack off a bit when it rained, but it wasn't like it hadn't trained at all.
The reason it turned out like this was entirely because the meals with Grandma were way too good.
Obito couldn't tell if Charmander was telling the truth. After thinking a moment, he said, "Forget what happened before. From now on you've got to increase your training load and slim down."
Charmander hadn't looked all that imposing to begin with; now that its belly was all round, it had even less intimidation factor.
"Char-don." Charmander shook its head in dissatisfaction. It felt perfectly fine as it was now; there was no need to lose weight.
"You're saying just a little increase isn't enough, we need to add a lot more training?" Obito guessed.
Charmander: ...
If its flames could beat Obito's, it really wanted to give him a faceful right now. Bullying it just because it can't speak human language, huh.
"What do you think of this training plan?" Obito used Mokgetsu's previous training plan as a reference and drew up a cultivation schedule for Charmander.
Charmander turned its head away in silence. Until it saw a translator, it wasn't going to give Obito another chance to frame it.
On the other side, the Zorua that Charmander had been thinking about day and night was enjoying the dinner Shisui had prepared for it.
Because Zorua displayed the most unusual intelligence among all the Ninja Beasts, and on top of that had its utterly unique Genjutsu, Shisui didn't leave Zorua in anyone's care. Instead he prepared a large amount of food and money so Zorua could manage on its own.
If it felt lazy at home, it could just eat the Inuzuka clan's special dog food in the house; if it wanted a hot meal, it could use Genjutsu to transform into a human and go buy some.
"How does living on your own feel?" Shisui took off his apron and asked.
"At first it was kind of novel, but later on I started missing Shisui a bit." Zorua thought for a moment, then raised its head and said.
For Zorua, it still preferred the atmosphere of the Southern Border Forest.
Even though cultivation there was a bit tough, the chatting and horsing around during breaks was really fun. Without the entertainment of tricking Obito anymore, its life had gotten a lot more boring.
"Once you're a bit stronger, I'll bring you along when I go on missions in the future." Shisui patted the fiery-red fur on Zorua's head in comfort.
Since the Ninja Beasts had only just been born not long ago and were still very weak, none of the disciples had brought theirs along, not even Kakashi, whose beast hatched the earliest.
After all, the missions they were performing were top-level wartime missions, and on such missions the chances of running into powerful enemies were extremely high.
After dinner, Shisui took Zorua for a half-hour walk around the Uchiha Clan Land.
After sending Zorua back home, Shisui went alone to attend the Uchiha Clan Council. Today happened to be the day of the Uchiha's regular clan meeting.
Because Obito didn't like clan meetings, and because Shisui's previous actions had helped him establish a certain degree of prestige within the Uchiha Clan, Shisui hadn't called Obito along.
"Shisui, long time no see. You've been out on missions again?" Just before reaching Nankai Shrine, Shisui ran into Uchiha Inabi.
Shisui nodded.
"I've run into a bit of confusion with Fire Release lately. Shisui, will you have time later?" Uchiha Inabi asked.
Although Shisui was quite a bit younger than him, Uchiha Inabi was a pure-blooded Uchiha who believed in strength above all, and he didn't feel there was anything wrong with asking Shisui for guidance—Shisui was, after all, the powerhouse who had one-shotted him in battle.
"Let's talk after the clan meeting's over." Shisui agreed.