"People talk about the Will of Fire like it's something only we do, too, but they're bad at explaining it. It's this complicated philosophy thing. And I know lots about the forest, less about clans? Sasuke's my only family... Though I guess you too now! What're guilds?"

"Groups of people who fight the same way and want the same kinds of things. They share techniques and pool influence."

"Huh! I think clans are kind of like that, except they're blood related and only pretend to want the same stuff. Guilds sound like less drama..."

(Dissolving clans would be one solution to the Hyuuga enslaving their branch members problem. He suspects it's a solution that'd piss people off, though. Still, learning about how other villages do stuff is good...)

"Not if someone is denied membership to a guild they wanted to join."

"...Ouch, yeah. Guildless probably ends up like clanless sometimes does here..."

"How is that?"

"Lack of safety net's a big one. Like, when our neighbor Tanaka-san lost her leg, she technically had some benefits but not, like, housing help and medical help and family members whose only job is helping other family members. And non-clan kids do worse in the Academy, I think 'cause they don't have as many people helping them at home? And at least there's a perception clan shinobi are more likely to get picked for promotions. Plus clan genin have someone else to learn from if their jounin-sensei's not very good, and non-clan chuunin are basically on their own for instruction most of the time. Course, I'm technically from a clan, and Sasuke's from a clan, and basically the only thing we got was reputations 'cause both the Uzumaki and Uchiha are dead."

Teasing out all this required a lot of talking to random people, though Tanaka-san told him bunches when he and Sasuke volunteered to help her out.

(Sasuke had been the one to tell him about the Uzumaki even existing, and Sasuke apparently only learned anything from Iruka-sensei after trying to adopt Naruto into the Uchiha.)

"That sounds right."

"It's on my list of things to fix when I'm Hokage!"

"...You have a list?"

"Yeah! It's written out, too. It's getting kind of long, though that's half because Sasuke keeps adding footnotes... Also got a list of solution ideas and what I need to learn to figure out more solutions."

"That's... thoughtful."

"I'm planning on being the youngest Hokage ever. Figure starting on all the thinking now'll make it easier then."

"I see."

He hums, and meanders through explaining more cultural stuff - like the Will of Fire (basically 'the village is your family', which includes stuff like 'the future generation are the most important' and 'your comrades come before yourself' and 'having a person you protect is important', though there's kind of a split between 'the greater village comes before your comrades' and 'your comrades come before your mission', which is basically a bigger argument of do you take care of your siblings or your wider clan first...). 

Elieyha is somewhat skeptical of the practicality of such a concept, but it is useful contextual information.

Yeah like real families it's sometimes really fucked up. But it seems to work decently for the culture Konoha has. Just. Needs a lot of patching.

He would know better than her, at this point.

Yeah. Sorry, he's rambling.

There's not much more culture highlights? He goes over stuff likely to be relevant soon - and also mentions off-handedly that people'll be suspicious of her for longer if she's seen with Naruto a lot. Though maybe that's changing?

She doesn't much care what people think of her, as long as they aren't sending assassins.

Yeah that's not historically been a problem here; only one in-village person's tried killing Naruto, Naruto beat the asshole up, and now far as he knows the guy's still in T and I.

That must be nice. Elieyha's been fighting assassins since she was eight.

...Yeah that sucks. He doesn't think Konoha's above ever deciding one of their own needs to be removed, and there's fucked up stuff on that scale buried deep in the system, but...

He's glad she's out of there.

...Thank you?

He shrugs and grins and finishes off his plate. (He even ate the vegetables Sasuke insisted on putting on there.)

"Sasuke, you think they're gonna have her staying with us?" he asks, casting around for a different topic.