Sunday morning.
When it hit seven o'clock, Obito's biological clock woke him up naturally.
Obito quickly changed his clothes, getting ready to wash up.
"Grr-ow." Charizard, rudely awakened by Obito, let out a disgruntled cry.
First thing in the morning and he still can't move more quietly.
"All you know is sleeping. No wonder you can't get Milotic to like you." Obito complained.
Charizard's drowsiness vanished in an instant. If they weren't indoors, it would've already let loose a Flamethrower.
"Grr-ow!"
Charizard's eyes flared with a vicious light as it glared fiercely at Obito.
"Want to train with me?" Obito cracked his knuckles with bad intentions.
Charizard couldn't help but think back to a few days ago.
Obito suddenly said he wanted to train with it, and ended up beating it up.
This evil little Uchiha brat somehow had a sudden power spike; it simply couldn't beat him now.
"Grr." Charizard snorted coldly and went back to sleep.
Endure!
It was going to secretly work hard, become stronger than Obito, and then "help" Obito train.
After venting a bit on his rebellious dragon, Obito was in a great mood, humming some unknown tune as he walked into the bathroom to wash up.
"Breakfast is ready on the table." Grandma reminded him when she heard the sounds of Obito washing up.
"Got it, Grandma." Obito replied.
After washing up, Obito sat at the dining table and started eating breakfast.
Breakfast was a piece of grilled salmon, a piece of tamagoyaki, and a steaming hot bowl of miso soup.
Since Obito's biological clock was very accurate now, Grandma had gotten used to preparing breakfast for him at this time.
As for Grandma herself, she got up at six, so she ate even earlier.
"Bye, Grandma, I'm going to train."
Obito waved his hand to say goodbye to Grandma, then met up with Shisui, and finally headed toward the Southern Border Forest, face full of excitement.
To him, today was an extraordinary day.
Because there was a good chance that today he would achieve a breakthrough from zero and become the strongest disciple of the past half year.
The morning forest was shrouded in a faint mist; sunlight filtered through the treetops, dappled across the damp soil and bright green ferns.
He didn't know if it was because of his good mood or because the morning scenery really was nice, but Obito took out his camera and snapped a photo.
"Shisui, do you think I can win today?" Obito put away the camera and turned back to ask.
"From an overall capability analysis, your odds of winning are higher." Shisui thought for a moment and answered.
In terms of raw strength, Obito was stronger than Kakashi; that much was undeniable.
But whether he could win in the end was hard to say; real battles depended on on-the-spot performance and combat sense.
"Heh, that's indeed the case, but we still can't underestimate Kakashi." Obito smiled, then put on a serious expression.
This battle meant everything to him, so no matter what, he wasn't going to take it lightly.
On the road, the two ran into Kakashi and several other disciples, and together they went to the training grounds.
"Get ready and we'll begin." Mokgetsu called over Kakashi and Obito.
The two both nodded, checked their gear, and did some warm-up exercises.
Until the moment they faced each other and took their fighting stances, they hadn't said a single word.
Might Guy had dominated the ranking matches for too long; both Kakashi and Obito wanted badly to take first place this time.
"Begin!"
"Fire Release: Great Fireball Jutsu!"
Obito ran through Hand Seals at high speed, converting his gathered Chakra into Fire Attribute Chakra and exhaling it in a single breath.
A mass of blazing orange-red flames rapidly formed into a gigantic fireball more than four meters tall.
The Great Fireball had low cost and high power; as an opening move it was just too suitable.
Even though Obito had now mastered quite a few powerful Fire Release techniques, he still liked to use Great Fireball.
"Earth Release: Earth Flow Wall!"
Kakashi, expressionless, flew through Hand Seals. With a rumble, a thick wall carved with a dog-head statue shot up.
Boom!!
The giant fireball smashed into the thick wall and exploded violently, sending dirt, stone, and flame flying.
When the dust cleared, a slightly damaged earth wall came into Obito's view.
Obito wasn't surprised by this.
Kakashi's Earth Release wasn't weak; a single Great Fireball couldn't destroy his Earth Flow Wall.
"Going to play that old trick again?" Obito gathered Chakra, activated his Sharingan, and carefully scanned his surroundings.
He'd fought Kakashi many times. A lot of the time, when he lost, it wasn't because his strength lagged far behind Kakashi's, but because he lost to Kakashi's Shadow Clone tactics.
Obito had to admit that, in terms of tactics, he really couldn't beat Kakashi before.
But now, he was no longer who he used to be. Now, he was Obito with a steadfast Hokage's heart.
Swish, swish, swish!!
A white-haired figure leapt out from behind the Earth Flow Wall, flinging a barrage of Shuriken at Obito while sprinting toward him.
"Fire Release: Fire Dragon Bomb!"
Obito focused his Breath of Flame, entering Breath of Flame Chakra Mode to boost his Fire Release, then converted the large amount of gathered Chakra into Fire Attribute Chakra and exhaled it in one go.
Whoosh, whoosh!!
Sheets of high-temperature flames turned the area around Obito into a sea of fire, burning the nearby trees to ash and charring the ground black.
At that moment, another Kakashi burst out of the ground near the running Kakashi.
Obito showed a "just as expected" expression; there had to be a Shadow Clone or the real body underground.
When the enemy vanished before your eyes and reappeared later, you had to be doubly cautious—this was a lesson Obito had learned from fighting Kakashi.