Hiruzen asked them to wait until the war was over before becoming his true students.
He said he was going to end the war himself.
Suna had recently withdrawn from the conflict, citing internal instability after the Second Kazekage's assassination.
Following the deaths of the eccentric Nidaime Hōzuki Gengetsu, Nidaime Mū, and the Nidaime Raikage, Kiri, Iwa, and Kumo each appointed their third generation of Kage.
Kiri was never fully involved in the war—they took only assassination contracts. Gengetsu fought Mū under those conditions, and both monsters managed to kill each other. The new Third Mizukage had no interest in mainland expansion.
Iwa was different. Ōnoki suspected that either Konoha or Kumo had hired Gengetsu. But regardless of who it was, he saw this moment as the perfect chance to outperform his fellow new Kage and elevate Iwa's position.
Third Raikage Ay felt the same. He needed the war to prove his strength and unify a post-rebellion Kumo. Sending problematic factions to the frontlines also served as convenient disposal.
Hiruzen deduced all this. With intel from Danzō that both Iwa and Kumo were preparing to break through the borders, he decided to provoke them into a three-way battle and end the war in one strike.
That battle earned him the title of the Second God of Shinobi and the moniker of Strongest Hokage—since most living people had never seen Hashirama's true power firsthand.
He went alone to a leaked location and was ambushed by the elite squads of both Iwa and Kumo.
Despite being outnumbered, Hiruzen outplayed and held his own against them.
Though Ay and Ōnoki weren't cooperating fully, they still attacked with elite Jōnin backing them. Even so, they couldn't overwhelm Hiruzen.
Ōnoki grew sick of the endless genjutsu, clones, and slippery evasion tactics. Ay was just as frustrated—every time he found the real Hiruzen, he'd get blocked by Enma or swatted aside by Partial Multi-Size.
He just couldn't catch the damn monkey.
Meanwhile, Hiruzen's relentless elemental barrages kept them constantly on edge.
When reinforcements arrived, Iwa and Kumo's elites began fearing losses.
They debated retreating—none wanted to lose their best in a pointless stalemate.
At that moment, Hiruzen offered peace.
Ōnoki immediately accepted. Ay hesitated, but ultimately agreed—it was the smarter move, they both wanted to use peace time to strengthen their villages for the next war.
The three sides signed the treaty on the spot. Iwa and Kumo claimed it was a diplomatic resolution.
But in Konoha, it was a Hokage's triumph.
Civilians and shinobi alike praised Hiruzen as invincible—the battle that cemented him as the Hokage in both title and spirit.
...
After hearing the news in Konoha, Ieyasu almost didn't believe it, 'Hiruzen soloing Onoki and Sandaime Ay at the same time? How much did age hit this guy? Was Kishimoto on drugs when he wrote his later fights? Damn, he deserved better in his Edo Tensei form at least.'
Ieyasu was also glad that his teacher actually almost lived up to the rumors. If he could get this guy to practice all his jutsu in front of him, his Byaku-Sharingan could record it all on the spot—if he didn't fleece the young Monkey, he'd never forgive himself.
...
A few days after Hiruzen's return to Konoha, in an empty training ground.
Four small figures stood in place, waiting for their teacher.
Ieyasu and Orochimaru were on high alert, thinking this was a test, meanwhile, Tsunade was beating up and yelling at Jiraiya for being useless and goofing around.
It's worth mentioning that this version of Jiraiya no longer had any designs on Tsunade, Ieyasu clearly told him in the Academy that they should duel to the death if he has any interest the first time he saw him ogling her—he only meant it half as a joke.
He was fully ready to reform this poor guy Jiraiya, no matter the methods.
After waiting some more, it turned out there was no test, he was just late, the smoking old uncle in his 20s could finally be seen strutting along to meet his students.
"Hey, guys, sorry for being late, it's just Hokage stuff. How about this, let's first introduce ourselves—names, dreams, likes, dislikes."
The four small figures nodded simultaneously.
"I'll go first, I'm Sarutobi Hiruzen, my dream is to maintain peace and spread the Will of Fire. I like my comrades and learning new jutsu. I dislike war." Young Hiruzen was already quite passionate about peace. "Now, who wants to go first? Ieyasu?"
"Sure. I'm Tokugawa Ieyasu, my dream is, uh, well... it's to become invincible and have a good marriage. I also like jutsu and my comrades, I guess I like ramen too. I dislike creeps and perverts, especially the ones that hide it." Ieyasu cast a meaningful look at Hiruzen and his fellow teammates when he said the last part.
Hiruzen was confused, but before he could ask, Jiraiya said, "Why are you saying teacher is a pervert again? Anyway, I'm Jiraiya the Gallant, my dream is to be a strong and handsome ninja and woo girls all around the world. I like research and traveling. I dislike people who wear sunglasses and snakes."
Orochimaru immediately threw a kunai at Jiraiya, which the latter managed to barely dodge, but Ieyasu already had his knee coming for his liver.
After Jiraiya collapsed, Orochimaru said, "I'm Orochimaru, my dream is to learn all jutsu. I like snakes and knowledge. I dislike fools and having to tolerate fools."
Jiraiya, who was still reeling in pain, glared at Orochimaru for saying that while clearly looking at him.
Hiruzen couldn't help but sigh at their antics, Tsunade then said, "I'm Senju Tsunade, my dream is to save and protect the ones I care about. I like medicine and gambling. I hate idiots."
After saying that, she directly punched Ieyasu and kicked poor Jiraiya who had just stood up—thankfully she went easy on him, but Ieyasu, on the other hand, had a broken clavicle.
"Alright, stop fighting each other, and Tsunade, isn't that too much? Look at the state of Ieyasu now." Hiruzen heard the cracking sound clearly.
"It's fine, he's very sturdy, he's always fine no matter how hard I hit him, at least he's good for that." Tsunade grinned, she also loved to hit things hard.
Ieyasu was inwardly kind of pissed, but he realized this might be a good opportunity to plant the idea of getting the Hashirama cells, "Yeah, I can handle everything, but it still takes time, okay? You can't keep doing this to me arbitrarily. Hey, Hiruzen-sensei, isn't there a method to improve our bodies or to make them heal better?"
Hiruzen was about to say no, but then he remembered what Danzo had proposed earlier, he thought for a moment before saying, "Well, it's really not a simple thing, but if you're truly as resilient as you say you are, then it might be possible."
Ieyasu showed a genuinely excited expression, "Really? Trust me, no matter what it is, it won't do anything to me, I'm certain. When can we use that method?"
Hiruzen put on a thoughtful expression and said, "Well, theoretically, the sooner we do it, the better. But are you sure you wanna do this? I didn't explain it properly, but any normal person would die from this method, how confident are you?"
Ieyasu almost felt like this was too easy, but it really seemed he had struck the perfect timing when they hadn't failed too much yet, "I'm fully confident in myself, nothing can take me down so easily!"
"Alright, come with me after the training, then. Either way, now that we've introduced ourselves, I'm going to test your abilities. Here are two bells, to pass the test, you have-" Hiruzen was interrupted by Ieyasu coming out of the ground and grabbing the bell in his hand—he could have reacted, in fact, he almost struck instinctively, but he decided to let it slide.
"Okay, brat, that's one bell, now you have three minutes to grab the other one. Good luck!" Hiruzen immediately flickered towards Ieyasu, he needed to teach this little demon a lesson, but when he hit him, he dispersed into smoke with a poof—Ieyasu ended up learning the Shadow Clone Jutsu by watching Tsunade do it in the Academy.
Hiruzen immediately turned around, and as he expected, there were several shuriken and kunai coming at him from several directions, he decisively used Earth Release: Mud Wall.
But before he could relax, two figures came at him from two different directions, one was a blonde girl and the other was the little demon that didn't give him a break.
He easily blocked both of their attacks several times, but Jiraiya had prepared a Fire Release: Great Fireball and Orochimaru used Wind Release: Breakthrough to feed the flames.
The resulting Fireball was much larger than normal, but Ieyasu knew the secret no-hit effect of this jutsu, so he immediately took out his Hizakura for the first time and tried to surprise Hiruzen during his escape to create an opening.
It worked! Hiruzen showed an opening and Tsunade snatched the other bell.
In truth, it was jsut because Hiruzen had seen enough, while Ieyasu had blown the whistle, they all worked together well enough and showed good skill and judgement, there weren't any major flaws or arrogance, they seemed to trust each other.
"Congratulations, you passed the test pretty easily, but remember, this was just to see if you were qualified genin, don't get ahead of yourself or go out there gloating about how you defeated the Hokage. Yes, I'm talking to you, Jiraiya." Hiruzen sternly warned idiot number 1.
"I got it, teacher, no need to be rude." Jiraiya had to pretend he wasn't planning to do exactly that.
"Alright, tomorrow at 7:00AM we'll start your real training. Ieyasu, you come with me, we're going to try that method immediately if you're so confident, there's no point in delaying it."
"Alright, teacher." The four answered in unison and all but Ieyasu immediately left after saying goodbye.
"Alright, keep up." Hiruzen said as he flickered away, Ieyasu followed suit.
On the way, Hiruzen asked, "By the way, where did you get that naginata? It looks to be of great quality. Maybe I can teach you my staff techniques, it's not the same, but it might work as a basis for you to understand how to move."
"I found it inside a box that was stored in the hole of a big tree, I've kept it ever since." Ieyasu just gave him a flimsy lie. Who would care?—his mother did, but she easily accepted it.
"I see, you're quite lucky." Hiruzen didn't probe more, it wasn't like it was completely abnormal for Shinobi to stumble upon treasure.
"And I'd like to see your staff techniques, even if they're not quite fit for use with a naginata." Ieyasu was going to have to reveal the Hizakura sooner or later, so he chose to do it sooner, it made more sense as he also wanted to nurture the weapon spirit.
"Alright, I'll show you later. Now, to tell you the truth, what we've been trying to do is to infuse highly active cells into volunteers to see if their bodies can adapt to it. Sadly, the first few experiments have all resulted in desth, so I have to ask again, are you sure about this?" Hiruzen would only mention the fact that they were Hashirama cells after Ieyasu understood the risks and agreed, after all, only some Senju clansmen knew about the experiments, as they were the only group even informed of this up to this point.
"No problem, Hokage-sama! As long as no creeps research my body afterwards, I'm on board." Ieyasu continued treating it like taking a vaccine, nothing much.
"Eh, sure, I'll tell them they can't keep you for research afterwards, but you have to keep in mind that all of this should be kept absolutely secret, alright? Not a single soul should hear of this." Hiruzen emphasized this with a very serious expression.
"Yes, I understand, Hokage-sama!"
"Good, here, we've arrived, now they're going to tell you more details, do some tests and maybe already get started today. Remember, everything you see and hear here must be taken to your grave."
"I understand." Ieyasu nodded vigorously like a good child. 'This was almost too easy, thank goodness they have just started these experiments. Here I come, Hashirama cells.'