Naruto was curious about this place, and with ten thousand ryo in hand, he was ready to spend big.
But even after buying enough food to stuff himself, he hadn't even spent three hundred ryo!
Looking at all the snacks in his hands, Naruto started doubting the prices in the Leaf.
Was this really reasonable?
At these prices, ten thousand ryo would let him live it up here for a long time. And if he was careful with his spending, he could live here for one or two months without a problem.
Shaking his head, Naruto stopped thinking about it.
Even though things were cheap here, it wasn't a place he could stay for long.
After all, he was still a ninja, and he needed to work hard to get promoted.
He spent the whole afternoon lying comfortably on a rooftop, and later in the day Jiraiya came to find him.
"So you're here!"
Reeking of alcohol and perfume, Jiraiya said, "Why do you always like lying on rooftops? Sunbathing?"
"Yeah."
Naruto nodded, eating the last bite of his creamy potatoes. "Done gathering info?"
Jiraiya glanced at the snack wrappers next to him and nodded. "Got nothing today, so I'll try again tomorrow. For now, let's find a place to stay!"
"..."
"Why can't you use your own money? You obviously have plenty saved up!" Naruto complained.
"I told you already, my money is for something important. I can't just spend it!" Jiraiya said seriously.
"Important for what? To spend on women?"
"You wouldn't understand, kid."
Jiraiya didn't bother explaining, but Naruto didn't believe for a second that he'd use that money for anything serious.
What, did he think he was Konan, saving up six hundred billion explosive tags to blow up Orochimaru?
"Forget it, I need a place to stay anyway."
Naruto couldn't be bothered to argue over a few hundred ryo. He stood up, cleaned up the trash with a flash of light, and headed toward the inn.
Watching Naruto play around with his Light Release like that, Jiraiya couldn't help but admire his talent again.
"You've already mastered the nature change of your release, haven't you?"
"Element change? Yeah."
"Hmm… I've got a jutsu. Want to learn it?"
Jiraiya held out his hand, forming a spinning ball of chakra, smiling. "This was inspired by the Tailed Beast Bomb, created by your father. It's called Rasengan!"
Naruto didn't really think learning Rasengan was necessary. It wasn't going to make him any stronger.
Still, learning a classic jutsu to pass the time on this boring trip wasn't a bad idea.
"How do I learn it?"
Seeing Naruto agree, Jiraiya gave a sly grin. "I can teach you… but you'll need to—"
Before Jiraiya could finish, Naruto cut him off. "Then forget it."
"…"
"Don't you want to hear my offer? Just ten thousand ryo and I'll teach you. That's cheap!"
"No."
"Nine thousand! You make ten thousand from me every day, at least let me earn some back!"
"No. Not even one ryo."
"…"
Jiraiya was speechless. After a long pause, he said, "So you're not interested in learning a jutsu your own father invented?"
"If my dad was the Second Hokage, would I have to learn every jutsu he knew too?" Naruto said flatly.
"…."
Jiraiya thought for a moment and… realized Naruto had a point.
"Ahem, well… I just think learning this jutsu could help make you stronger."
"Why?"
Naruto raised his hand and shot a beam of light, shattering a rock by the road. "I can do that kind of power easily already."
Jiraiya looked at the shattered rock and clicked his tongue. "True, but Rasengan is a non-elemental jutsu. You can combine it with your chakra changes to make it even stronger!"
Add light into Rasengan?
Naruto held out his hand, gathering light energy, and soon a glowing ball that looked like Rasengan appeared in his palm.
"See? Light Release: Rasengan."
Looking at the spinning ball of light energy, Jiraiya closed his mouth. Naruto's control over his element was way beyond what he'd imagined.
Yeah, there was no real need for him to learn Rasengan.
Still… Jiraiya felt like that glowing Rasengan didn't even have chakra in it.
Was it just his imagination?
After getting a room at the inn, Jiraiya slept soundly.
When night came, he went out again to gather intel.
A few days later, he finally got the information he wanted from a man wearing something like an Iron Man mask.
"Finally got news about that woman. Let's move out, little Naruto!"
Hearing Jiraiya call him that for the first time, Naruto almost thought Anko had shown up.
"Let's go."
Naruto's calm face, as if he'd expected this all along or just didn't care, made Jiraiya's excitement over finding Tsunade's trail fade a little.
But there was no time to dwell on such things.
Compared to finding Tsunade, nothing else mattered.
They set out that day and reached Tanzaku Street by the afternoon.
That was pretty fast.
"Naruto."
Jiraiya showed him a photo of Tsunade. "This is the woman we're looking for. We'll split up to search. Once you find her, use the messenger toad to contact me. Got it?"
Naruto glanced at the photo.
Light blonde hair, perfect face—someone you'd notice right away.
"Got it."
Seeing Jiraiya was clearly in a hurry, Naruto memorized her face and headed off in one direction.
Jiraiya went the opposite way.
Not long after, a rumbling sound came from the direction of the Tanzaku Tower, not far from Naruto.
Naruto turned his head and saw a huge snake!
"Orochimaru? If he's here, then Tsunade should be there too."
"Yata no Kagami!"
Forming a circle with his arms, Naruto turned into golden light and instantly appeared at the top of the Tanzaku Tower!
From above, he scanned the area and quickly spotted Tsunade and the others facing off against Orochimaru!
Should he step in?
Naruto didn't think jumping in now to save Tsunade would make her grateful or convince her to return to the Leaf as the Fifth Hokage.
Talking her into it was more Jiraiya's kind of thing, so he decided to let him handle it first.
With that thought, Naruto used the summoning technique to call a messenger toad to contact Jiraiya.
Jiraiya had probably already heard the commotion and was on his way,
but just to be safe, Naruto still sent the messenger to find him.
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