Chapter 17 Brother Hug

Iruka ignored him for the moment and walked straight to the classroom, locking the door, thinking about how many people had died because of a personality like his.

Few people can tolerate someone who does things his own way like Kakashi.

But Iruka didn't care, he was just that patient.

When he turned around, Kakashi was next to him, still leaning against the wall, holding a pen that had fallen out of his bag.

He didn't speak, and Iruka didn't expect him to.

He simply took the pen, put it back in his bag, and headed toward the corridor as usual.

Kakashi followed behind him, keeping a few steps away from him, walking on his right side, subconsciously blocking all exits for him. Even with Iruka's eyesight, he could not detect his intentions.

Kakashi was one of the main reasons why Iruka chose to forgo the promotion to jonin, although he never said it.

He preferred to walk freely around the village, rather than instinctively judging the terrain every three steps in order to gain an advantageous position in battle.

As soon as they walked out of the teaching building, Iruka made sure that no one around noticed them. He breathed a sigh of relief and asked:

"I heard there was a little 'accident' at the market. Was it you who did it?"

Kakashi didn't answer right away - for some reason, he looked a little off, his cynical attitude seemed to have disappeared, and even if he was really pretending, it was his worst ever.

"Well, Iruka-sensei, I don't know what you're talking about." His voice was low and hoarse, which was inconsistent with the uneasy feeling he exuded, which surprised Iruka.

He stopped in the middle of the street, turned around and looked directly into Kakashi's eyes. The silver-haired ninja also stopped and looked at him calmly, but the unsettling atmosphere around him did not dissipate, but became even stronger.

"You know you will be scolded by Hokage-sama." Iruka said bluntly.

Kakashi said nothing because he knew Iruka was right, but he did it anyway.

Iruka sighed helplessly and continued walking forward. Kakashi followed him. When Iruka walked into the apartment, he deliberately did not close the door tightly.

He put his backpack down and turned around when he heard the door close and the test paper land on the coffee table.

He stretched out his arms and put them around Kakashi's neck, the closest thing a jonin could do to a hug, and pulled Kakashi close to him, pressing his masked face against his shoulder.

"Thank you."

Kakashi didn't return the hug, and Iruka didn't expect him to, but he could feel Kakashi's eyelashes, gently brushing against his neck, and he knew Kakashi needed this hug, needed to know that what he did was not wrong.

"I almost killed him..." Kakashi's voice was so low that it was almost inaudible, but Iruka still heard it.

Iruka understood how he felt, he had felt the urge countless times before, he knew that dark urge, he couldn't imagine what it meant to Kakashi, because he was different from Kakashi, Kakashi was not used to suppressing his instincts.

Because Iruka only regards Naruto as his younger brother, while Kakashi truly regards Naruto's parents as the most important people to him; Kakashi cannot forgive those who hurt the people most important to him, even if that person is his student.

Iruka doesn't know Kakashi's past, nor does he know what kind of person he was before, but he is the only one who understands Kakashi's heart. He knows what kind of pain Kakashi has experienced, and he also knows what he will do if the people he cares about are hurt again.

He didn't even know that Naruto was Minato Namikaze's son. The Hokage had issued a gag order because he had reason to believe that Kakashi and other people who knew Minato Namikaze and Kushina Uzumaki would not be able to keep the secret if they knew the truth.

Iruka wondered what Kakashi would do if something he truly cherished was hurt.

There was a special bond between them because they had both experienced the pain of wanting to hurt those who had hurt those close to them.

Now, Kakashi had nowhere to go, he needed a place to take off his mask and release his emotions.

The woman across the street thought they were lovers, and Iruka sometimes wished things were as simple as they seemed.

He wasn't sure how to define their relationship.

Friend? That's too distant a word.

Lovers? There was no such relationship between them, and there was no place for love in Kakashi's heart, and he had never expected it, but it was much easier than explaining to others what the relationship between them was.

The truth is so simple yet so complex that it cannot be described in any language.

Kakashi kept taking deep breaths.

He leaned on Iruka, one hand tightly holding his arm, not to restrict his movements, but to seek a little comfort. Iruka said nothing, but just accompanied him quietly, using his steady breathing to adjust Kakashi's breathing frequency. For every breath Kakashi took, Iruka breathed twice.

He knew that Kakashi could not overcome the barriers of responsibility, loyalty and rules to touch those things that were precious to him. This was more painful than killing him. Seeing the villagers treat Minato's orphan like this, Kakashi's pain can be imagined.

"You should go meet Genma," Iruka said after about an hour, when Kakashi finally returned to normal.

Kakashi nodded.

Genma could sense Kakashi's hostility, just as Iruka could sense Kakashi's pain, and although neither of them knew how the other did it, Kakashi needed to vent now.

And Xuanjian is the best at dealing with such things. He can always help those ninjas who have lost their minds to calm down in a way that Iruka cannot understand.

The members of the Anbu always know the demons in each other's hearts, and know how to help their companions climb out of the abyss of pain in a way that outsiders cannot understand.

Despite Iruka's repeated requests that he sleep on the bed, Kakashi chose to sleep on the floor.

He couldn't seem to bring himself to rest after a night like this, so he just laid down next to Iruka's futon, facing the window, staying in the same position all night.

The next morning, Kakashi left to pay respect to a gravestone and pray to the departed souls.

Iruka couldn't help but wonder who among those dead souls took away Kakashi's soul.

He shook his head, forcing himself not to think about questions that would never be answered, then got up and began to correct his students' papers.

When he picked up the red pen and began to mark Naruto's test paper, he couldn't help but frown. Every red cross on the test paper gave him a headache.

But when he got to the end of grading, he was surprised to find that Naruto actually got the last three questions right.

This was unusual, because the three questions he had given were taken from advanced textbooks, and their purpose was to confuse self-righteous students like Shikamaru, Shino, and Sasuke.

He originally planned to count these three questions as extra points.

So far, no student has answered these three questions correctly (he always puts Shikamaru's test paper aside to avoid affecting his grading standards), so he plans to delete these three questions.

But...Naruto actually got the answer right.

That question was about chakra resonance and anti-resonance, about the physical manifestation of Yang attribute chakra in Taijutsu, and the manifestation of Yin attribute chakra in Genjutsu...

And Naruto actually answered all of them correctly.

Although the answer was written carelessly, some words were spelled incorrectly and the sentences were not very smooth, his answer was correct.