NRaO Chapter 49

Naomi Uzumaki’s Point of View

I was grocery shopping at the moment. Gin went on his first mission outside of the village without his sensei as backup. It should be fine, I’ve seen the changes in him since he began his training. Each one of Orochi’s students is about the same level as another team, so unless they massively underestimate their enemies no one should die.

Even now we are still very poor. It was slightly cheaper to make the ramen myself than to go to the ramen shop, I just wish I could get the taste as good as the shop owners. I could only get the taste at about seventy percent of Ichiraku but even at that level, I was still one of the most skilled ramen makers in the entire village.

As I’m walking I see someone I recognize hiding behind some bushes looking at the entrance to Ichiraku. Orochi is writing on a piece of paper and I walk towards him and greet him. “Hello there Orochi. What are you doing?” He jumped like he had been caught committing a terrible crime as he tried to hide what he was doing. The hand with the paper and pen going behind his back as he stood up and awkwardly walked out of the bushes.

“It’s nice seeing you Naomi. I was… Fuck it, I was spying on Ichiraku.” I questioned him again because I didn’t understand. “Why?” He just looked at me like he wasn’t sure he should tell me the answer before he finally decided to. “I am the most successful restaurant business in the entirety of Konoha. Not only do I create new foods but also challenge the current leadership in every type of food inside the village… Except for ramen!”

He kept going clearly upset. “I still don’t know how he does it. I tried to copy his techniques and my ramen still comes up far short of his. The price he makes the ramen for is lower than the cost of the ingredients for most of the bowls of ramen. It’s not that he’s the best, it’s that he has no competition, and no matter how much I struggle to find out his secrets I’m still stuck at half of his taste at twice the price!” 

Orochi was normally a cool-headed individual but talking about Ichiraku had him wildly gesturing with his hands and yelling loud enough to draw attention from passersby. She couldn’t help but chuckle. Of course, someone who didn’t love ramen but viewed it in those terms would fail to reach the same levels. I off-handedly asked. “How early do you think he wakes up to make his noodles?” 

He just looked at me confused as I told him. “He wakes up at three in the morning… Two days before he serves the noodles to make and age them. The ingredients he gets are grown locally in small quantities specifically for his ramen and the way he can sell it for so cheap is because each family who supplies him ingredients gets a lifetime voucher for ramen and they do it because it’s so good. If you’d have just asked him instead of creeping around his building he’d have told you all this, you weirdo.”

We kept talking and it came out that I knew more than he did about making the noodles. I made my way home and began to roll out the dough for my noodles. I was doing the hand-pull and age method for the kansui noodles and knife-cutting soba noodles for tonight's ramen. Orochi watching literally over my shoulders as he asked. “Why are you using soba noodles instead of kansui?”

I answered him with a smile. “Ahh, these are for tonight. I tossed the hand-cut soba noodles into the water to begin cooking as I took the lid off my pot and strained out all the bones before adding back in the vegetables. Orochi asked again. “Aren’t you supposed to throw out the vegetables after you make the broth?” I sighed as I spoke again. “Normally you would but we’re poor so the ramen might not be filling enough if we don’t include the vegetables. 

I waited for Gin to get home as Orochi kept asking a thousand questions before I finally snapped. “The answer to all your questions is we’re poor. I do it this way because it’s either cheaper or easier for a single mother to do. I don’t have all day to hand-pull noodles and sit over a pot making sure the ingredients get added at the right time. The substitutions are made because my son or I prefer them over the costly ingredients. That’s why I’m only adding in a single piece of beef and a single egg to each bowl because we can’t afford any more than this.”

It frustrated me to know this rich man was looking down on us because we were poor. So much so that my passive, try to keep everyone happy smile falls off my face as I ask. “Why does one of the richest people in Konoha care about the only restaurant business he’s not winning in? Everything you can do and you spend your time creeping out in front of a noodle shop to learn his secrets. Why? Are you a moron?”

Instead of getting mad like I thought the man was going to do he just began chuckling as he explained. “I may be rich now but I was originally an orphan. I’ve gone through hunger and this meal you prepared for you and your son would be considered lavish compared to what I had to eat in the orphanage or shortly after graduating. It has nothing to do with money and everything to do with taste. I could easily make the food taste better and be cheaper than any other restaurant except his so my curiosity got the best of me.”

I hadn’t really thought about it before but from what I understood he did strive to be the best. He could possibly have become Hokage but I heard him and his sensei had a falling out. That would doom his chances but, I also got the distinct feeling he didn’t want to be Hokage. Gin entered and yelled out. “I’m home…” It sounded off but I couldn't help but smile as he had come back just in time.

As he entered the kitchen I looked at him and my smile fell from my face. “Your eye! What happened?” He looked up completely distracted by his thoughts as he responded. “Huh? Oh, we freed a bunch of hostages and one of them was a hidden ninja. I was the one who freed her so… I was the one who got the kunai shoved in his face.”

It was at that moment the table Orochimaru was standing near exploded. I didn’t even know what happened as Gin turned towards him in shock and fear. His new shallower vision hid Orochi in a blind spot until he turned to see Orochi. Gin looked on in even more fear as he stuttered out. “S-sensei! W-w-w-what are  you doing here!?”

“I’m learning how to make ramen from your mother. How the fuck did you manage to get a permanent injury on a fluff mission. I guess I was being too lenient on you all if one of you can be injured by a normal shinobi. I’ll have to tell the rest of the group we’re going back to training so this never happens again.” Gin gulped as I didn’t know why he was so afraid. It was only training after all.