I pointed at each of them one by one. "You're outsiders to the current recognised system. This is literally a new setup and I don't know what it will mean for you. I can guess that it will mean some degree of ostracism, however."
Han frowned and mouthed "ostracism?" under his breath.
I tapped my foot with a finger. "Ostracism is the act of excluding someone from society, friendship, conversation, privileges or other benefits. This might mean that some of your friends won't want to hang out with you anymore. Your clans? I'm not sure how they're going to treat this," I admitted.
Han bristled. "I knew what it meant!" he snapped.
I levelled a look at him. This kid was going to be trouble, I could already tell from the brief minutes we'd been talking.
He looked away.
I hummed and decided to get us back on track. "So, in the interest of developing a common understanding of who we are, let's share some basic information about each other."
I put a hand on my chest. "As I said, I am Matsu Uzumaki. I am currently the youngest chunin who has graduated from the modern shinobi system with Hidden Villages, though I won't fool myself into believing there weren't younger shinobi during the warring clan era. I am skilled in bukijutsu with staff and kunai," I stated misleadingly. I was good at those but they were far from my best abilities. "I like my friends and want to see them all live until we're old and grey."
I snapped my fingers and pointed at Kuroiwa Karatachi. "Your turn, state your name, rank, likes, and anything else you wish to share."
"Kuroiwa Karatachi… Mudanin of Kirigakure," she grimaced, "I like bargains and swords," she said succinctly.
She was exactly like the file I'd gotten from the administration team after turning in my mission reports from Nagi Island.
Short, black of hair and frugal with her money. Extremely mercenary in behaviour but also lacking in true motivation to improve. She wasn't considered exceptional in any area of being a shinobi.
Which was about what I'd expected from Gengetsu's assignment of my team, except for her being part of a Clan. That I hadn't accounted for. I had no idea how things were going to go with the clans. Would they roll over and take this new development? Some of their kin were being shamed.
I held back a yawn, not wanting to appear rude even as I fought through the fatigue from completing three missions and travelling to and from Nagi Island.
Damn, those missions had been annoying even as I'd had to rush through them.
They'd all been extremely manageable for a shinobi at my level, except that they'd been stacked on top of each other. I'd basically had to speedrun my sabotage of the Wasabi, Watanabe, and Wotona racers for the shrine race.
Thankfully it hadn't taken much. In the end, I'd gone for a simple solution by using a well-timed illusion over a pothole in the road. Three turned ankles that delayed their ability to race and we had a sudden, shockingly clear favourite.
Who I'd made sure to bet big on before the race.
From there it had been the Wagarashi racer's race to lose, which… I still had to save him from himself twice during a section of crumbling road and once when he'd stopped to share a drink with an obvious honeypot trap that one of the other families had arranged.
The investigation into the families for the Minister?
That was easy.
The family heads and high-ranking members had practically crowed their corruption and tax evasion the minute they'd returned to their own holdings after the race was done.
I'd written a long report detailing everyone's crimes and handed it off without a single care given about the firestorm I had likely unleashed with said report.
Which only left the Shrine Maiden's tour which started the hardest part of the trip by a literal country mile.
The Shrine Maiden, one Padme Dendenrashi, had about as much self-preservation as your typical lemming. She would demand food or drink and walk into the local bar of thugs only to throw cash around.
To get her out without massacring the residents of the bar I'd ended up throwing some money into the air and carrying her out of the building as a bar fight broke out.
Things did not improve from there with her seeking out the worst parts of every town we stopped in.
I suspected she had a problem… or a fetish. I wasn't sure I wanted to investigate which and I ended up simply stealing all her money and holding onto it for her so she couldn't cause as many issues anymore.
She hadn't liked that, given the raging and wailing, but tough luck for her.
She got her money back when we made it back to her father, who ended up giving me a bonus after I explained what had been going on.
The damn girl had continued to glower at me throughout the explanation but I was so done with her she couldn't affect me.
In the here and now I didn't show any reaction to Kuroiwa's words. I merely nodded and directed my finger onto Midori Terumi.
"Midori Terumi! Mudanin of Kirigakure! I like a lot of things like my friends, my family, my mother! I also like punching people in the face! I don't really like cold noodles or when my shoes get wet! It always feels a bit ick you know? I just hate the way it squelches. Or well sometimes I like it but only when I want to bug my little cousins who have to clean the floors at home…"
Again, the file matched. Terumi girl with a single mother, no father listed, which meant there might be a story there but I wasn't going to pry unless it became relevant.
The girl herself was auburn-haired which she wore in a short bob haircut. She seemed to have a good degree of muscle on her which led me to believe she favoured taijutsu.
"—I also used to have a pet fish but she died and since then every fish I get seems to die until my mother barred me from having anymore cause I forgot to scoop the last one out and it caused the house to stink!" Midori announced.
I nodded. "That's more than enough sharing," I said before she could keep talking.
Hmmm, she was a bit of a motormouth and not really aware of herself. It was all good and well to share something small but sharing all that information made it much easier to antagonise her.
Something I noted which the next kid, Idate Hozuki, looked to be considering, with how he had a calculative gaze while looking at Midori.
"Your turn," I said, skipping Idate and moving on to Han, something that the others noticed but I had reasons for this.
I could feel the agitation leaking out of Idate. The kid was close to blowing his fuse. My skipping him wasn't going to help matters but I could read the room and predict how things were going to end.
"Han," said the only civilian in my group of students. And wasn't that a quiet fuck you from Gengetsu which opened a whole can of worms for me. I wouldn't just have to juggle the kids, but also their clans.
Talking with anyone from the Terumi was going to be fun.
Han himself had closely cropped brown hair and a scar running over his nose that was slightly bent. The kid must have taken the edge of a kunai in class for something. From the small file I'd been handed detailing my students I knew this one didn't have a good family situation with only an uncle still alive.
"I'm a Mudanin but not for long!" he boasted. "I actually like cold noodles over warm," he said, shooting Midori a stare only for her to gag and shake her head.
I grunted and signed for him to stop as that was enough. He glowered but listened, apparently also able to tell that Idate was about to blow up.
I turned my attention to the final student who I'd deliberately skipped.
"Idate Hozuki… Mudanin," he spat, baring his perfectly white teeth at me while twitching in a way that sent his long white tresses fluttering about his head. "And I shouldn't be here with these losers!" he ground out.
"Hmmm but you are," I said with a shrug.
"I shouldn't! My clan head is the Mizukage, I shouldn't be forced to slum it with you!"
"Heh, I think you might have a skewed idea of the Mizukage." I said aloud, pointing at him. "Why would he care about you?" I asked.
"I'm one of his clansmen!" he announced.
I had to strongly resist the urge to dare the kid to say that to Gengetsu's face. There were kinder ways to kill a child and sending him off to volunteer as an example for Gengetsu to use wasn't one of them.
"Well tough, you've been put here and I can assure you that it might be in your best interest to put your head down and get on with becoming a proper shinobi rather than bringing to his attention how you besmirched the name of your clan."
That got Idate to shut up but he gained a glimmer of hate in his eyes. Yeah, that tracked, kid wouldn't like the truth.
"And what? You're supposed to get us up to chu—" he caught himself as he said it only for annoyance to flash over his face. "Genin?" he asked.
I hummed. "Something like that," I said, hedging my bets for now. He didn't know it but his first assessment was right.
"You don't look that tough!" he growled.
I propped my chin up in my hands and sighed.
Was I going to do this? I weighed up the pros and cons before nodding to myself.
Yup, I was.
"I think a demonstration of my skills is in order then. There's a training field to the north of here. I want you all there within five minutes. I will conduct an assessment of your skills from there so we can see what we're working with."
"What if we decide we don't—" Idate started to say only for me to hit him with an illusion where the wall ominously took on the texture of the Skull Cliffs.
"You don't want to go that route," I said carefully before I flexed my chakra and vanished in a replacement jutsu that got me out the door. I then leapt onto a rooftop to watch as my quartet of students bumbled their way north.
They barely made it within five minutes and I arrived before them to set myself up so that I was lounging against a training post with a kunai out.
I must have looked like a relaxed, if lazy shinobi, as I twirled the kunai about in my hand like I'd spent the last few minutes playing around.
All warfare was based on deception, though. Hopefully, by the time I was done with them today, they'd understand that.
When they marched up I put the kunai away. "Alright, time for me to see what you've got, we'll all fight and then we'll go from there," I said.
I was met by three blank looks and one gleeful expression from Han. Damn, kid really thought he was going to impress me, didn't he?
"Aren't you worried how much a disadvan—" Midori started to say only for me to blur forward and slam a fist into Han's gut.
He was launched into the air and when he landed he did so heavily.
He staggered to his hands and knees and disgorged everything he had in his stomach.
The others had all turned to watch his discomfit. I held back a sigh and instead grabbed Midori by the ankle before whipping her off to the other end of the field. She flew through the air screaming and flailing like a rag doll in shock.
"I said we were going to fight and you didn't get in a defensive position? Sloppy!" I roared before I shot into Kuroiwa's guard and hammered her with a one-two punch that made her expel all the air in her lungs. I then kicked out her feet from underneath her.
When I turned back to Idate he was running through a series of hand seals.
I felt no need to oblige him so I raced in and punched him in the head. He fell to the ground only to go still. I frowned and nudged him with my staff.
Huh, alright kid's got a glass chin apparently. That could be an issue. I tilted my head. Or was the term glass skull? I hadn't broken anything, just knocked him out with a well-placed punch.
I looked around at the groaning, whimpering kids.
My first thought was that I was way too good at beating up children.
The second was that I had my work cut out for me here, didn't I?
"We have a long way to go," I said aloud.
Midori was the first to stagger to her feet. "What? What was that! You didn't give us any time!" she shouted.
"Midori, you won't get time to prepare yourself when facing an opponent that wants to take you out. You are out of the academy now. No one is going to set up friendly spars where you get to have the start of the fight announced, often it will be one side attacking from ambush or a position of strength. Deception is one of the best tools in your arsenal. If you want to survive you need to be ready all the time," I lectured.
"I—I didn't get to show you anything impressive though! I can do better I swear!" she said.
I hummed. "I do need to see how you fight and not just get beat on," I said, rubbing my chin as though I needed to actually be convinced about this. Midori flinched at my words which I pretended to ignore.
"Yeah! I can do way better! Trust me!" shouted Han.
"I would hope you can't do any worse," muttered Idate who ignored the pointed look I gave him. Pot calling the kettle black much?
I grabbed a kunai. "When it hits the ground we start," I said, tossing it up lightly into the air.
That got them to fall into fighting stances at least, which merely made me roll my eyes.
Before the kunai hit the ground, Idate was furiously running through hand seals.
I didn't countermand him and instead watched. When he finished the sequence of hand seals his body shifted and I felt his chakra turn more watery as it expanded all over his body. It basically consumed him.
It was rather interesting to witness both visually and through my chakra senses.
"Ha! Now you're screwed!" he crowed, only for the kunai to thunk into the ground before I pointed a finger at him.
"Zap Jutsu," I drawled, making a point of actually announcing what was coming.
Idate had enough time for his eyes to widen before the small lightning jutsu, the only one I knew, lanced out and shocked him.
His watery body broke and returned to normal. He fell to the ground where he proceeded to twitch in pain.
I crouched. "If you hadn't learned about it, the Water Body Jutsu has several weaknesses, the primary one being that lightning jutsu breaks it up." I poked his head. "You should have learned this when you learned the jutsu."
With Idate out of commission once more I stood and gave the remaining trio a pointed look. "Well?" I asked, making it clear I was waiting.
Midori obliged me by charging with a battle cry and a fist pulled back that was too obvious for me to fall for. I spun out of the way, expecting a feint, only for her to barrel past me.
Oh, nope that wasn't a feint, just a very straightforward attack.
I stepped in as she spun around, allowing her to pull me into a trade of blows as Kuroiwa tried to move into my blind spot. Hmmm not terrible but also extremely basic.
When Kuroiwa lunged with a sword, which I noted was merely half a blade, I stepped out of the way and swatted the sword into the ground so she didn't end up impaling Midori. I gave the broken blade a lingering look. There was a story there but it would have to wait for later.
Han, who'd been standing off to the side performing hand seals suddenly thrust his hands at me. "Fake Surroundings Jutsu!" he called and I waited for it to take hold.
I "saw" a small pond form off to the side and I gave it a blank look before glancing around, looking for anything else he'd changed. When nothing shifted I nodded.
I then marched up to him and punched him in the face.
"Eh? My genjutsu?" he said.
"Was bad and you should feel bad for doing that so poorly. What the hell was a pond appearing out of nowhere supposed to do?" I asked.
Damn, these kids had somehow done worse than my first beatdown had shown!
"Eh? You were supposed to think you were in the depths of the ocean and had to swim to the surface to breathe? That's what the scroll I found said it would do!"
"Don't trust random scrolls you find," I said.
"It was given to me by the Senior Instructor!" Han claimed.
I sighed. "Yeeeeeeeah, that's even worse," I said, knowing that the Senior Instructor would have sabotaged Han deliberately.
I was going to have to go through what this kid knew, and what he thought he knew with a fine-tooth comb I suspected. If I'd ever felt bad about killing the Senior Instructor, learning about this would have made me feel better.
"For now just… try and punch me?" I suggested.
Han did that with a gusto and soon I had three kids up and fighting. Interestingly enough it was Kuroiwa that tried her hand at a jutsu next with this being a rather weak Water Bullet Jutsu.
I let it slam into Midori this time and kicked Han only to hear a crack as I applied a touch too much force and broke his arm. "Argh!" he screamed, holding his broken limb.
I sighed and grabbed him. "Here, let me straighten that for you."
"What? No that'll—" was all he got to say before I numbed his arm and straightened it. I then fused the bones back together quickly. "Eh?" he muttered. "You just… like that?" he asked.
I nodded. "Right, you can keep fighting but know that your right arm is going to be weaker and might break again," I said casually.
"Eh? I don't get a break after… breaking my arm?" He waved his arm about only to blink when it failed to flop around.
"Nope, if anything this is a precious learning experience for you to learn to fight when sore and injured," I said.
I then pointed at the ground. "Also, Zap Jutsu," I announced as I once more zapped Idate who'd been trying to be clever and catch me with his body pretending to be a puddle.
"Care to join us?" I asked as Idate twitched at my feet.
"Fuck you!" he screeched as he threw a kick at me.
"Much better," I said, merely ignoring the weak attack before replying with a kick of my own, which punted him into Kuroiwa.
By the end of the beatdown, my students didn't have the strength to stand and had all collapsed. "Alright, I think I have a baseline to work from!" I announced with a fake happiness that I couldn't match internally. "You're all quite terrible!" I said with a smile.
"Fuck you!" growled Idate.
"Pass on that," I replied, "Now, the good thing I have to announce is that you're not all completely hopeless. We will be working on several things with you. Training will begin early tomorrow before we run a few missions."
Han tried to sit up only to greatly regret this. "Ohhh, ow," he growned, collapsing on his side.
Kuroiwa glanced at him and then at me. "What sort of missions?" she asked.
"D-ranks!" I said with a fake cheer.
"Aren't they only given to punish people?" said Midori. "I'm pretty sure we heard about those in the academy?" she added.
I nodded, amused that in Kiri, D-ranks were considered wastes of time if not punishment details for most of the lower ranked—read civilian-born—shinobi.
"So what? We're going to be cleaning canals or something?" said Idate indignantly.
"Or something!" I replied with the same faux cheer I'd used earlier. We had a mission to go through some storm drains and kill the rats along with cleaning said drains, thus securing some meat for a cheap butcher.
Reading between the lines when I noticed he'd put in missions for both the eradication of the rats along with the meat mission, I vowed to never eat anything from said butcher while also warning off my friends.
I'd tell my four students what missions they got to do tomorrow.
For now, I knelt down next to Kuroiwa and helped fix up any bruises she might have from the fight. "Here, let's get you all on your feet. We've got a long road ahead of us," I repeated.
Midori chuckled. "First you beat us up and then you heal us? Should I be worried, Sensei?" she asked.
"Yeah, you probably should," I replied honestly. These kids weren't going to have an easy time of it. I had less than six months now to whip them into shape and win or, at least, impress at the Chunin Exams that I had little doubt most Villages were going to attend and try to wow potential clients.
I healed up the kids only to push the trio of clan kids off to their homes. Hopefully, they wouldn't have anything done to them but I wasn't confident in that.
Sadly, it was out of my hands. I hoped things worked out for them...
I watched them go with a sigh. Hopefully, the clans were all too caught up in shock about the new state of affairs with the creation of Mudanin and wouldn't act rashly.
Somehow I knew they'd care more about the apparent stain on their honour than the previous issue of a kid not making the cut and dying.
I looked down at Han. "Your uncle an alright sort?" I asked.
"Yeah? He's cool?" he replied and I relaxed.
"Good, cause I saw those extra bruises you had over your body and was worried," I pointed out.
"Ah, no, that's something else. I have this girl I like, see? But she's a Kaguya!" he said.
"Ah, say no more," I chuckled. I repeated my healing of him then lifted him to his feet. "Get home, get some food into yourself, stretch and go to sleep," I ordered.
With my student's seen to, I rolled my shoulders as my own sensei announced herself.
"Cute kids," Akiko said.
I grimaced. "Gengetsu sure thinks so," I replied.
"Hmmm it warms my heart to see that you've learned how much of a headache you cause me with your antics," she said with a large smile.
I pointed at her and found I had no response to that. "Alright that's fair, and I'm sorry," I admitted.
"Ohoho, not yet you're not, wait until you take them on a mission and they run off on you on some strange tangent. Then you'll be sorry," she replied.
"Urgh I hate that you're right," I said. I gestured at the training field. "What do you think we should work on tonight?"
"Let's work on your genjutsu skills some more. I heard what you said about that boy's efforts and it is one of the few areas I can assist with."
"Awww," I pretended to whine, "No cool jutsu?"
"You don't want a jutsu that can potentially trick a dojutsu?" Akiko said with a teasing smile.
I blinked. "What? We have such a jutsu?" I exclaimed. How had we possessed this and not run riot over Konoha with their Byakugan and Sharingan?
"Because this is only a very recent development. By which I mean it was developed and released last week."
I frowned. That… sounded too good to be true. There had to be a catch. No one just gave out jutsu unless you were their student. In Kiri? Some people wouldn't even get that. You had to earn your keep.
Akiko continued before I could ask about the catch. "It turns out that Lord Gengetsu had the Byakugan that you helped secure in Suna which Wano claimed for himself. It was implanted into a member of the Yuki Clan that has proven their loyalty. Gengetsu then turned around and began… limit-testing various genjutsu theories he had on the eye. Supposedly the Chakra Ghost Technique he created is most effective and is something that Gengetsu wants to spread around."
I blinked as the implications of what Akiko had just said began to unfold.
I'd indirectly made Gengetsu stronger by capturing that Hyuga woman.
With her eye, he'd been able to test stronger illusions until he found something that helped fool the eye.
"Does it work on just the Byakugan, or does it work on the Sharingan as well?" I asked.
"There is an A-rank mission to test this in the field," replied Akiko and I realised then what the catch was. "The first ten people who can write detailed reports about using the jutsu correctly on a lone Uchiha will have it paid out to them," she added.
She pointed at me. "Only those with good enough chakra control are even allowed to attempt the mission however," she stated firmly.
"Am I considered good enough?" I asked.
"You are," she replied. "If you get the chance, be extremely careful about it, and also? Make sure you kill the Uchiha after testing the illusion. Gengetsu wants to get as much impact with this jutsu as he can should we end up fighting Konoha again," she said.
"During peace prepare for war," I mused, quoting an adage from my past life.
"Exactly," said Akiko. "Now the jutsu will focus chakra into the eyes to allow the trick to work, there are however caveats. The jutsu can't slip in if their dojutsu is already activated as they will most likely see the chakra and know to break it. If you can stealthily slip your chakra in, however? You will be able to create a small number of illusions of yourself or others around the affected target and should they activate their eyes then? They will even see chakra networks in the illusions, making it harder for them to realise they're in a genjutsu."
I spent the next hour working on the jutsu with Akiko and it wasn't until she was satisfied I had a grasp of the technique that she tested me physically. When we were done she sat with me as I healed my aching body.
"So, any advice for me on how to be a good sensei?" I asked.
Akiko hummed and looked me up and down. "You know, when I stop to really consider it? I don't think you'll make for a bad teacher. You care too much to be anything but good," she said with a faint smile.
I blinked, having not expected such an answer. I almost blushed but I controlled it and instead made to bow my head to Akiko. "Thanks, that means a lot coming from you," I said.
"So how long will you have to work with them?" she asked. "I know a few other Chunin that got put onto this duty and they're all oddballs or people on the outs with Gengetsu. Some of them have various terms with needing to finish up a few months before they can move on. That or their team dies. It's up to the chunin in charge."
She said that last line so casually that I just knew before tomorrow was out there were going to be a bunch of kids not ready for it to be thrown into a thresher.
I held back a sigh. What had I expected of Kiri? Better? Hah! What a joke. I began to pull out the mission file I'd gotten. "Oh, they have that sort of arrangement, do they?" I asked. Akiko merely nodded and gave me a pointed look, waiting for my answer.
"Lord Gengetsu… wants me to take these kids and… win the next Chunin Exams that are run," I said, offering her the mission scroll.
"Well Kiri isn't going to be doing that for a year or so," Akiko said with a grimace. "That's not ideal."
"Ah, no, not Kiri's next Chunin Exams. The upcoming one which will soon be hosted."
Akiko stared at me. "That's…" She shook her head. "That's insane! Those kids? They suck!" she said.
I nodded. "They really do, but if I can do this... It will prove that the new system is better and instead of killing off the rejects we'll train them like we should have in the past," I said.
Akiko put her hands up to her face and sighed loudly. "Why did I expect it to be simple with you involved?"
"Heh, sorry?" I offered only to get a snort in reply.
"Never do anything the easy way, do you?" she said as she stood.
I smiled and offered a shrug. "You know they say the measure of a man is the burdens he carries, right? I'm just trying to be great."
Akiko stared at me for a moment after I spoke only to shake her head. "Don't let yourself get too big a head lest the weight crush you."
"I won't, not when I have friends like you standing with me, helping to ease the burden," I said before she could leave. "Thank you, Sensei, for all that you do," I said formally.
Akiko gave me a heartfelt smile and vanished a moment later.
I made my own way back home with thoughts of training programs in my mind along with what I could do in certain scenarios. I needed to get these kids up to scratch and I had less than six months to do it.
The mission statement that had been among the files I'd gotten about my new students detailed that they wouldn't be considered as Genin viable for competing at any Chunin Exams until they completed one hundred D-rank missions, and three C-rank missions.
Anything greater would lower that number with additional C-rank missions counting as six D-ranks, while a B-rank counting as twenty D-rank missions.
Completing an A-rank was tallied in as the person having at least the equivalent of one hundred D-rank missions under their belt while an S-rank just had a line through it as the clerks who tallied such results obviously thought it impossible.
From what I could recall Gaara was considered a hotshot after completing a B-rank mission, meaning a mission where combat was expected against another ninja.
In the manga, it had been impressive that he'd done this without an injury only for his gimmick to be later revealed: he had the sand protecting him constantly so he couldn't be injured without serious power behind an attack.
I entered the Okiya and waved to some of the ladies who weren't working today as I slunk into my room. "Anything kept warm?" I asked Hanaa, who was considered a particularly graceful Geisha.
"There should be something warm on the stove," she replied.
I nodded and swept past the kitchen to grab a bowl before heading for my room.
When I got there I paused in the doorway. "Can I help you?" I ground out.
Rei, who was lounging on my futon—a sadly all too common event, despite having her own room these days—was happily flicking through one of the scrolls I'd made up about the fuinjutsu notes I'd gotten from my mission to the Land of Vegetables.
"This is really interesting stuff!" she said with a grin. "I particularly like how the meanings can shift depending on where you place the emphasis!" She then noticed my annoyed expression. "Sorry! I got bored and I found this while looking for your inkwell and brush! Please let me keep reading it! It's super interesting!"
That brought me up short. "You can understand what I wrote down?" I asked.
"Hmmm?" Rei cocked her head to the side like a perplexed dog. "Oh yeah, it seems like it's missing a lot but your breakdown of a basic explosive tag was enough for me to make up a few of my own!" she said.
She pulled out a small stack of tags that I gave a cursory glance over. They looked alright…
Rei sat up. "I got Shoto to get me a few different examples and I wrote my own thoughts down about them from what I could see and decipher from your notes. There's still a ton that I don't understand but… this is a fun puzzle! I wish we'd had this in the academy!" Rei gushed.
I sat down and ate my dinner slowly, thoughts whirling as I processed this revelation.
I kept my voice as casual as I could. "If I get a teacher for this, think you could help me study it?" I said. I still wanted to be strong but if Rei had the natural talent that Hiroshi spoke about?
Holy hell, did some serious doors just open up for me that had previously seemed out of reach?
"Talk me through this?" I asked, knowing that I needed to keep what I'd learned at the front of my mind to have any chance at becoming skilled with fuinjutsu.
Rei beamed at me and rolled out three scrolls with her own, notably neater handwriting, upon them. I narrowed my eyes only to relax as the most logical answer presented itself. "Has the madam been teaching you calligraphy?" I said as I realised why she would have such better handwriting all of a sudden.
"Yeah! It was a pain until I found your fuinjutsu scroll hidden away and suddenly calligraphy seemed really fun!" she chirped.
I could only nod.
While I'd never regretted saving Rei, I hadn't been expecting such a potent payoff, either. I'd never really expected any sort of payout, if I was honest, beyond not killing my friend.
This.
This moment right here and now exemplified how terrible it was to kill off kids before they grew into themselves. I would never have known Rei was a natural at fuinjutsu without her getting exposed to it.
Kiri didn't just waste potential soldiers, they wasted potential and a future that was so much brighter for a shortsighted approach to stronger shinobi.
I smiled as Rei babbled about a small squiggle that I couldn't recall the meaning of without consulting my notes.
Rei, happy and full of life having a talent for running and apparently fuinjutsu, showed that my way was better.
"Sensei? Why do you always have us running chakra control exercises?" asked Midori after the fifth day of training.
"Yeah! I have good enough control!" said Han.
I sighed and stabbed a piece of trash that blew its way past me with a touch of anger bleeding through my typical stoicism.
Today's third D-rank mission was to clean up a training field that had been wrecked last night when a pair of drunken Chunin got into some squabble with a Jonin. This would have been laughed off, if it wasn't for the fact that the Chunin were Hozuki clansmen, and the Jonin was a Terumi kunoichi.
The Chunin were in hospital while the Jonin was being sent off on a mission in the Land of Tea to help keep things cool off, according to the rumour mill that was the Mission Administration Team.
"What do you think chakra control is?" I asked in reply.
"Urgh! He's trying to teach us stuff!" Kuroiwa groaned.
I shot her a flat look. "That is sort of my purpose within this team, yes," I said drolly.
"My body is sore, my spirit is broken, and my mind hurts with all the training you get us to do! Can't we just have the D-rank missions as a time to relax?" whined Kuroiwa.
I held back a snort of amusement. I might have been running them into the ground every morning in an attempt to drag them, kicking and screaming, into a semblance of competency. Kuroiwa just wanted to complete the missions quicker so she could get to "the good bit" which for her was where she got paid.
"Nope!" I replied cheerfully. "You won't grow as fast as you have to that way," I said. I then snapped my fingers. "Now, I want you to think about the question I asked. You have ten minutes," I added charitably.
That got them to shut up and, if not think about what I'd said, then at least not bother me for ten minutes.
While they did that, I worked on extending my chakra puppet strings from my fingers to act like tentacles that I used to pick up any trash or debris I came upon.
Midori paused to watch me for a moment.
"Is it so we can perform more jutsu than just the basic ones?" she offered.
I hummed. "It's part of it," I said, "But not the deeper truth of what chakra control is."
"Deeper truth?" Midori asked. I watched her struggle with this. Over the last few days, I'd started to get a better feel for the four students I had in my team.
So far I'd worked out that Midori was a very… simpleminded girl. She was as straight a shooter as they came and didn't like hypotheticals. When I gave her puzzles or scenarios to solve she usually picked the most direct option to deal with them.
Such as a locked door scenario. How would she get through it? She'd smash it down.
Idate had the opposite issue. He was constantly trying to prove how clever he was by overreaching. A locked door would see him casing a building out, working out a schedule of when people went in and out. Yet, he would end up attempting to henge as one of the people and walk right in, causing internal disruption before getting back out.
I had stared at him after he'd given me that explanation and nodded slowly.
Kuroiwa suggested knocking on the door as the easiest way of getting it open, while Han said he'd lockpick the door.
This resulted in Idate claiming Han wasn't very good and it would take too long. I'd set both boys to sparring together to let them get that out of their system.
I'd found that it wasn't a terrible option to have the two fight things out in as controlled and safe a setting as possible. They usually tired themselves out and that led to better training for the rest of the day.
"Because it improves how many jutsu we can use, therefore allowing us to train longer?" suggested Han.
"Again, part, but not the point I'm aiming for," I said cryptically.
As we finished the cleaning part of the mission, I pointed to where the destroyed training posts were. "Alright, we need to dig those out and then replace them," I said, waving towards some stripped, bare posts waiting off to the side.
"Urgh!" groaned the kids as they got to work.
Idate shot me a look when the final training post was packed into the ground. "So, are you going to tell us the answer?" he prompted.
I hummed. "I could always assign it as homework to make you think more," I said suggestively before shaking my head. "Actually, nah, I have something harder for you to work on," I said.
The group's shoulders slumped at this. I'd come up with the idea of assigning homework to them during the second day with them and it was a good way to force everyone to interact and work on what amounted to a group project.
Yesterday I'd asked them what they would pack for a trip to the desert for the five of us before an extended mission.
I'd then merrily torn their answers to shreds the next morning for failing to consider a lot of points that were important when surviving a desert.
Sadly, it seemed no good deed went unpunished.
I'd certainly been less amused when Akiko dropped in and told me she had her own homework for me, which was to start establishing feelers in the various departments of Kirigakure.
I'd quickly found that most of the mission admin staff were terrible gossips which was one angle that worked out pretty well for me.
I'd then gone for a walk and found where shinobi liked to eat when not at home. I'd found a handy food alley where things were loud and chaotic, but the food was top-tier.
Also, if you honed your sense of hearing well enough you could eavesdrop on a hundred little conversations.
"Chakra control does improve the ability to perform more jutsu and allow for longer, harder training sessions. It also allows a wider variety of jutsu to be performed as more control is always good, but the truth of the matter is that chakra control is a measure of your talent," I said.
"If you can't control your chakra well you are going to struggle for longer than others, resulting in time being wasted compared to your more talented companions and foes," I continued.
"One of the most finite resources we have is time, and having poor chakra control will mean you are more likely going to waste more time and not have as wide a repertoire of skills, which means you might die on a mission earlier than others would have," I stated.
My four students blinked at this and all gained contemplative expressions.
"There are also certain tricks you can do with good chakra control. Now if we use the opening of the 'going through a locked door example' I asked a few days ago I will have more options available to me, such as unlocking doors with nothing but a chakra thread. Or I might pick the door off its hinges and open it that way. Or I might be able to henge and trick people better as I can listen more sharply, or I can bash the door in with a reinforced body." I said, pointing to Idate and then Midori.
"So, in conclusion, improving chakra control is directly improving your talent as a shinobi and giving you more options," I said, directing a serious look at them. "I never stop trying new things with my chakra just so I can continue to eke out more from it."
"Mine always feels sluggish," Han said dejectedly. "Like I'm pushing it uphill."
I hummed before recalling a small fact that got mentioned all of once in the manga by Jiraiya of all people. I'd used it briefly for a few of the kids in my year's cohort but otherwise hadn't considered it again.
I waved Han over and put my hand on his head. "Are you spinning your chakra clockwise or counterclockwise?" I asked as I inspected his hair whorl.
"What does chakr have to do with our hair?" said Kuroiwa.
I raised an eyebrow only to find that all four kids were staring at me like I'd just said something strange.
I tilted my head. What was going on here?
I stared right back at the kids.
Did they not know about this?
I'd told all my friends during our training sessions when we'd been in the academy.
But… now that I thought about it, did they ever teach this during class?
Wait, was this information not known by the clans?
I made a circling gesture. "So the way your hair whorls spiral indicates which way your chakra coils spin and therefore the way you should move your chakra to get it moving correctly," I said, watching as the kids drank this information in.
The kids put their hands on their heads only to realise they couldn't judge it.
They shared a look and then presented their heads to me, causing me to sigh.
Huh, turned out it wasn't that well-known. Heck, I'd always assumed it was something pithy that Jiraiya threw out to Naruto 'cause Naruto wasn't so academically gifted when he was young.
Then again, with how Jiraiya was, perhaps it was something only he worked out?
"Oh, this makes no difference 'cause that's how I've been circulating my chakra," said Idate while the others merely nodded. They then looked at Han. "You really just kept pushing against the grain?" he asked.
Han didn't give that a response and I hummed. "Well, change things up occasionally," I said, marking this down as another reason that the Senior Instructor hadn't been good at his job.
With the idea of swirls on my mind, I made a detour past a toy shop where I made a purchase. "Heh, sure like those don't you, kid!" said the clerk as I bought a small sack of water balloons.
I merely smiled enigmatically and split them up for my students to carry. The first stage of the Rasengan would be a good long-term project.
When we reported the mission as complete, one of the clerks waved a hand at me. "Chunin Matsu! Good news, you've gotten your first specific request from a client to take up a mission for them!" they announced.
I perked up. Had Mara Uzumaki finally married the Heir? Was I going to get an easy mission in the Land of Vegetables? If so, hell yes!
"Padme Dendenrashi has requested another mission with you as her bodyguard!" announced the clerk as if he hadn't just lit my hopes on fire.
"Oh… the Shrine Maiden? Again?" I asked.
"Yeah, the mission's a C-rank and should be easy enough for you to clear solo."
I instantly had a quartet of pleading eyes around me.
"When do I need to head out?" I asked the clerk, ignoring the looks directed at me.
"Not for another week yet, she just wants to tour the Land of Water so it should be straightforward enough."
I sighed. Straightforward was good, even if I doubted Padme had any intention of allowing it to be that way. I nodded and accepted the scroll to read over the fine details.
It would be an easy enough mission, if extremely vexing. Perhaps it would be easier with some extra hands to share the burden?
Then I spotted the cities she wanted to tour in the Land of Water.
Urgh. Damn, that prideful priestess! This was going to be so annoying to have lingering over my head! Then again, maybe it would be fine… I knew her tendencies, as long as I didn't curse myself or cross a black cat I should be fine, right?
"Matsu! There you are! Ready to fight?" shouted Kitoma Kaguya with a bloodthirsty grin.
Huh, if this was the universe trying to pull a fast one on me then I didn't actually mind this. I grinned back at Kitoma. A bit of gratuitous violence against a peer was just what I needed.
I cast an eye behind me at my students only for them to be as pale as Kitoma as he stalked up to me. When he towered over me I blinked.
"Huh? You've had a growth spurt?" I said, gesturing for my students to follow.
They did, albeit I could see they were reluctant.
"Huh, yeah! I've grown finally!" Kitoma grown before glancing back at my students. "Huh? The Mizukage saddled you with a team of rejects?" Kitoma considered them. "Want me to kill them for you?" he offered.
"Nah, I'm enjoying tormenting them," I said jokingly. When he grinned at me I realised the joke had very much shot over his head. "By that I mean I see some potential in them. I'm gonna train them up and make them proper ninja."
My team exhaled in relief at this but I ignored them.
"Huh, one of my cousins got assigned a team," Kitoma said. "He just took 'em along on a B-rank mission the first day. They worked as good meat shields to protect the client but that was it," Kitoma snorted.
I sighed. Yeah, that tracked for Kiri's way of thinking.
I waved for my students to come closer. "I'm going to spar with Kitoma and some of his family, pay attention and you'll learn a thing or two, yeah?"
Just 'cause this was a spur-of-the-moment event didn't mean I couldn't make it achieve multiple objectives.
The kids all nodded, eyes still locked on the berserker Kaguya boy.
Hmmm, at least they had good enough instincts to keep watch on a known threat.
Still, awfully silly of them not to realise I was the bigger danger. Time to educate them.
Midori Terumi trudged through the arch that served as a gateway for her clan's compound in a daze.
She made sure to angle herself so that she was sweeping around the main building.
Whenever Midori encountered another adult of the clan, she made sure to step out of their way and bow her head.
It was like Sensei had said on the first day. They were to be ostracised for their failure to graduate to the rank of Genin.
Becoming a Mudanin had taught her a lot about her clan.
When the adults changed course slightly so they'd clip her… it was all she could do not to fall.
"Tch, clumsy fool!" spat her cousin at her.
Midori had learned things like how some of her family could be jerks. They made a point of demanding that she bowed, or ran into her, or blamed small problems on her.
She continued on her way and was only jostled once more. "Kill yourself! Stain!" snapped one of her aunts.
She'd never liked that woman. Before becoming a Mudanin, it had just been a vague sense of discomfit around her. Now, it was odd to have an actual reason to point at for why.
Midori kept her head down and didn't respond.
She usually didn't have to encounter her family as much as she was always quick to exit the compound or stay in her mother and her set of rooms.
They weren't bothered there.
It was her own small island of peace these days, with everywhere else causing other people to look down on them or sneer when they walked around.
Well, nearly everyone. Matsu had never sneered at them, merely given them a sad pitying gaze, sometimes even as he beat them to a pulp during a spar. There wasn't ever any malice there, even when Han or Idate spat insults or demands at him.
He just let it roll off his back and calmly went about teaching them.
Midori made her way into her home, coming into the rooms from a back entrance where she went through the usual changing of footwear before she entered.
"I'm home!" she announced.
Her mother padded out to greet her, her eyes sweeping up and down her form.
"Welcome home," Mother said with a relief that almost pricked tears into Midori's eyes.
It was enough to make Midori feel that tolerating all the humiliation of being a Mudanin was worth it.
When Midori had staggered home that first night after becoming a Mudanin, the clan compound had been celebrating some of her cousins' success. Her arrival caused an odd silence. The Clan head had observed her before humming and dismissing her pointedly.
That, had changed something. She wasn't sure, but she'd been approached the next morning with the list of orders she had to follow, such as not entering the main house, or using the clan grounds.
Not wanting things to remain awkward, Midori had made a beeline for her home.
She'd walked in and said her usual greetings, only for her mother to emerge and look like she'd seen a ghost. She'd been so careful with her that first night, hugging her softly like Midori was made of glass.
Midori hadn't liked seeing her mother like that.
That moment, more than any other, had stuck with Midori.
Her mother seemed better each time she came home these days.
Seeing her mother so… fragile, had helped motivate her to try her hardest.
It was something her new Sensei seemed to at least appreciate.
At the end of each training session when he'd kneel next to each of her teammates, he'd heal them and slowly talk to them about how they did.
He was… an interesting guy.
He was smart, that was for sure. He always seemed to be working on something or having some new lesson he wanted them to consider. Those lessons always made her feel like steam was blowing out of her ears, but she'd still try.
Also, she wasn't any good at the Terumi Clan's signature jutsu, nor did she have the kekkei genkai that sometimes manifested itself.
She still had a throbbing head, though.
"How was today?" Mother asked.
Midori considered how today had gone. There was one thing that was still hurting her head. "Sensei dragged us into the Kaguya battlegrounds," she said with a shudder.
She'd heard about the battlegrounds, like any clan kid worth their salt had.
It was literally a place where the Kaguya fought and proved themselves to their own clan. Outsiders sometimes made the mistake of training there only to get dragged into vicious fights.
One did not train in the Kaguya battlegrounds.
One only fought.
There was more than one story floating around of a brave—or foolish—shinobi fighting there. Often the stories resulted in the shinobi being gutted, or crippled from the brutality of the fights.
To enter there willingly…
Her sensei was a bit mad.
But also amazing.
Her mother instantly stiffened and began fussing over her. "Did they hurt you? Did… no, what happened?" she asked frantically.
"Sensei is apparently friends with some of them?" Midori said, still in a daze over this knowledge.
"Friends? Some of them?" her mother shouted, only to take a deep breath. "Alright, so… what does that mean for Kaguya?" she asked.
"Sensei fought like three of them before an older shinobi showed up and he and Matsu got into a fight with sensei having to use jutsu and his staff and… it was awesome!" Midori grinned. There had been so many cool moments!
She had no idea her sensei knew how to open the Gates! Those were supposed to be only for master Taijutsu users!
"What… happened?" her mother asked carefully.
Midori grinned and the story spilled out of her. "So our team were handing in our final D-rank mission for the day—" she ignored the flinch from her mother at the perceived punishment of completing a task considered beneath a shinobi and continued her story, "—and sensei was requested for a Mission which is super cool 'cause it means he did such a good job last time they are requesting him again! Sensei walked outside and this Kaguya kid, older than us and waaaaaaaaay taller, marched up and demanded a fight from sensei!
"And Sensei was all like, okay! And he led us to the battleground and ended up fighting Kitoma and then a team of like three Kaguya Genin all at once! That was crazy cool! But then this old guy named Gantu showed up and said something about Matsu only having two fights and Sensei was like 'Whatever let's fight!'"
Midori took a moment to take a breath before plunging on with her story. Her mother, who usually stopped her bad habit, could only stare at her as the story unfolded.
"So they were trading blows and Gantu kept trying to gut Sensei but Sensei has this trick jutsu that makes like an armour around him that you can't get through, which I didn't even know about until today! But he was having to use it a lot and—" Midori started telling the story about how Sensei had been on the back foot for most of the fight despite using nin, tai, and genjutsu compared to Gantu's singular use of his bones.
"Gantu started off rather amused but after failing to stab Matsu he'd gotten kind of annoyed. Then he'd started getting angry only for Sensei to step things up by activating the Gates and returning his strikes."
When Midori mentioned that her mother had stopped and stared at her.
"In the end, Matsu had needed to stop using the Gates and had been exhausted but Gantu had been flat out as well! They ended up calling it a draw! They were fighting nonstop for twenty whole minutes!" gushed Midori.
Midori grinned, remembering how her sensei had led them out of the Kaguya battlegrounds after that and given them homework.
"And then I came home!" Midori finished casually.
Her mother continued to stare at her.
Midori blinked, only to cough. "Oh, Sensei also had us running up and down trees for the first bit before he made us fight on them. I fell off the tree like three times!" she said with a laugh and rub of her head.
Mother twitched and Midori quickly spoke up to show she was fine.
"Sensei caught me most of the time though!?" Midori added.
"Ah, that's good," replied her mother with an odd tone. "Your sensei beat three Kaguya shinobi?"
Midori frowned and counted. "He actually beat four 'cause that Kitoma guy fought him one-on-one, then Sensei fought three at once, and then Gantu showed up which was a draw," answered Midori only for her stomach to announce itself with a powerful roar. "What's for dinner by the way?"
Her mother stared at Midori, before laughing and shaking her head. She rose. "We're having beef," she answered and Midori pumped her fist.
"Oh!" Midori reached into her bag and drew out the day's pay. "My earnings for today!" she announced.
Mother took the money with an odd look on her face. Midori hadn't questioned this in the last few days but today, she felt like she should. Something about asking questions being good for her, like sensei had said.
"Mum? What's up? You get this weird look on your face every time I give you my mission pay?"
"Hmm?" Her mother glanced up. "It's just that… most of the other Mudanin sensei… they haven't been letting their students have as much. How much is your sensei taking out of your pay?" she asked, weighing up the bag of money.
"They are? Those scumbags! Sensei is giving us all the money from our missions! They're our earnings!" Midori said. She then coughed. "It's also… one of the best ways to motivate Kuroiwa," she muttered.
Her mother blinked. "Oh… your sensei is, a very interesting man. Perhaps I can meet him one day?"
"Oh, you can cook dinner for him!" Midori said. "You always make a great dinner!"
Her mother regained her smile. "That… might not be such a good idea. Perhaps we can eat out sometime in the future?" her mother suggested.
Before Midori could ask another question about the odd smile and why it would be better to not host Sensei, her mother gestured to the kitchen. "Help?" she said simply.
Midori leapt to help her mum make another of her favourite dishes.
She had been getting a lot of her favourites lately and Midori found that it helped. She worked hard and got to come home to a great dinner.
As they cooked, Midori went about listing out how the rest of her day went while her mother listened on patiently, not at all bothered when Midori went off on a tangent stating what happened almost word for word during lunch with Idate and Han's latest argument.
"—then sensei must have gotten annoyed with them 'cause he did something and they spilled all their food and broke a plate! Then the server came around and Sensei said he wasn't paying for it and that the boys could work in the back cleaning dishes to pay off the cost of the bowl!" she said with a laugh.
Mother laughed along with her. "Sounds like you had fun. You mentioned a mission coming up?"
"Uhmmm, sensei got requested for a C-rank that should be easy enough for us to accompany him on? A trip around the Land of Water with some Priestess he knows? We'll be gone for a week or two?" Midori said carefully.
Instead of reacting poorly, Mother merely sighed in relief, "Good… That's good, he's giving you chances to take on tougher missions, which means you have a chance of being promoted out of Mudanin like the Mizukage promised," she said.
"You make it sound like the Mizukage would have lied about that?" Midori pointed.
Her mother gained the odd smile once again and Midori made a note of it before a yawn overtook her. She was too tired to question it.
"Do you have any… homework?" her mother asked, a more amused smile slipping into place at the word "homework."
Midori groaned and dragged out the bag of water balloons. "He wants us to practise more chakra control," she said.
Mother gave the bag of balloons a confused look before shrugging it off. "Must be a new trick that he's worked out for some sort of water jutsu," she remarked. "Give it a few minutes and then off to bed after dinner. You'll need to get ready for your mission," she said.
Midori perked up. "Yeah! I hope it's going to be way cooler than a boring D-rank mission!"
Mother laughed. "Ohoho child! You'll one day hope for a straightforward boring mission!"
Midori shook her head and pretended to kneel by the window. "No way! I wish upon a star and everything!" she said, enjoying the way her mother giggled at her antics.
The rest of the night passed quickly after that with fatigue making her "homework" tough, but she kind of got the water balloon to squiggle a bit? Maybe? Eh, she'd ask Kuroiwa about it tomorrow. She'd just need to offer her some money for the advice.
When it was time for her to bunk down in bed she wasn't surprised to find her mother had once more set up her futon next to Midori's. When Midori went to sleep she barely registered her mother coming in and brushing her hair.
She'd been doing that ever since Midori made it home, Midori thought as she fell asleep to her mother singing her a lullaby.
This life of a Mudanin… She didn't hate it.
It had all started so well, I lamented.
I'd confiscated Padme's purse, along with her "hidden" purse of cash which she was going to use to incite fights that I'd have to deal with on day one.
This had resulted in a positively depressed Padme who'd grumble and grizzle with each town we visited. Thankfully, with four extra hands, it was child's play to keep her entertained in other ways by having her watch my students spar with each other.
Then we'd made for the final part of the mission with the last town being a port town on the western coastline of the Land of Water.
We were half a day's walk, at a civilian's pace, from the city, only for disaster to strike.
I'd felt a few chakra signatures moving about quickly only for two signatures to vanish in a manner that was all too sudden to be anything but violent.
I'd instantly gone on guard and signalled for my team to do the same. Sadly I'd had to use a very direct sign to tell them rather than doing anything subtle.
They'd all fallen quiet and begun observing their surroundings while I took up a conversation with Padme to keep things as unassuming as possible. Internally I could only pray that whatever I'd sensed wouldn't involve us.
Sadly, my luck wasn't that good.
"Looky looky what we have here!" cried a brown-clad, dark-haired Iwa shinobi.
"Oooooh! Whatever will we do, Sensei?" chimed a Iwa teenager who had to at least be a chunin.
"Maybe we should just give them our papers?" suggested the sole kunoichi in their group.
I stared back at them, my muscles tensing up. Papers? What did they think? That I was going to be that gullible?
I hadn't heard anything about the various nations opening up to each other, especially Kiri opening its borders to Iwa.
When we'd covered this in the academy it was always assumed that you were to fight the other group. If they were fleeing or too fast you were to alert the closest shinobi patrol.
No, they were muddying the waters. They knew I was just a Chunin and the kids were Genin. We shouldn't be confident enough in our actions to start a fight with them.
Sadly, I knew for a fact they'd just killed some people on Kiri territory. That meant they had malicious intentions.
Alright then, violent response it was, I thought even as I pretended to walk up to "accept" their papers.
The kunoichi held out some papers while the others attempted, and failed, to hide their anticipation.
I touched my hand with hers and started things off with an old classic of mine.
Her eyes widened and she had just enough time to attempt one kunai throw at me before I clamped down on her hand with mine and flooded her system with the coma jutsu.
"Shit! Shibito! The brat got Izumi!" shouted the younger of the two.
I drew out my bo staff and locked eyes with the now-identified Shibito, who I noted was a Tokubetsu Jonin. With a twirl of my wrist I deflected a cluster of kunai he'd lobbed to get me away from his fallen teammate.
Hmmm, Tokubetsu Jonin and a Chunin against a Chunin as well as four Genin.
Time to see who would come out on top.