Why stopping Orochimaru from placing a cursed seal on Sasuke could be classified as an SS-rank mission was something none of them understood.
At that moment, Orochimaru let out a cold, sinister smile and slowly unfurled the scroll he had deliberately left unopened.
"This is—!"
As the scroll continued to open, Minato Namikaze, Jiraiya, and Naruto Uzumaki saw another newly revealed task—
[Mission Rating: A-Rank]
[Mission Objective: Prevent Orochimaru from killing his master.]
Almost the instant the scroll was fully opened—
"Thud!"
Jiraiya seized Orochimaru by the collar and slammed him hard against the wall. His back crashed into the stone of the detention cell with a dull, heavy impact.
Orochimaru narrowed his golden, serpentine eyes dangerously.
"Jiraiya. I've already gone easy on the kid. Do you really expect me to go easy on you too?"
Jiraiya was so furious he could barely speak. His chest rose and fell violently as he glared at the man before him—his former comrade, his ally from the Second Shinobi World War, his classmate from the Ninja Academy…
Naruto looked completely confused. He barely understood what "killing one's master" even meant.
He had no idea who Orochimaru's sensei was either.
But judging from his dad's expression, he could tell one thing clearly—Orochimaru had definitely done something terrible.
The seals restraining Orochimaru had not been fully removed, so his prized ninjutsu couldn't help him break free. But when it came to taijutsu, he had never lost to that dead-last fool!
His arms coiled like snakes around Jiraiya's neck, but Jiraiya didn't loosen his grip. Instead, he drove Orochimaru's chest even harder into the wall.
Orochimaru's gaze flicked downward, locking onto Jiraiya's legs.
Anticipating the move, Jiraiya dodged the leg attack and countered with a sharp kick of his own.
Crack—crack—crack—
In an instant, the two maintained locked upper bodies while their legs exchanged several rapid blows.
They paused for a few seconds, each silently exerting strength.
Then, at the same time, they released their grips and sprang backward about a meter, kicking off the bare walls of the cramped cell and charging at each other again.
Forearms collided, muscle slamming into muscle with a dull, heavy sound.
From a sleeve that should have been empty, Orochimaru suddenly drew a kunai and stabbed toward Jiraiya. Jiraiya grabbed his wrist and forced the blade toward Orochimaru's own throat.
Killing moves appeared everywhere, yet neither could gain the upper hand.
In a flash, Orochimaru suddenly relaxed his resistance, allowing Jiraiya to drive the kunai toward his neck. Jiraiya hesitated for a split second—and Orochimaru's neck twisted away like a snake, narrowly avoiding the blade.
At the same time, one of Orochimaru's arms, flexible as a serpent, wrapped around Jiraiya's head and wrenched violently in the opposite direction.
Against an ordinary person, this would have snapped the neck cleanly, killing them instantly.
But his opponent was Jiraiya, one of the Sannin.
"Ninja Art: Needle Jizō!"
Orochimaru's arm was pierced straight through. Yet even with his entire arm bristling with senbon-like spikes, he still refused to release his hold.
"Pervy Sage!" Naruto shouted in panic.
Minato Namikaze, however, wasn't worried. For Jiraiya-sensei and Orochimaru, a fight at this level was practically child's play. If these two—along with the Slug Princess, Tsunade-sama—ever truly went all out, two or three villages the size of Konoha wouldn't be nearly enough to contain them.
"Wild Lion's Mane Technique!!"
In an instant, white hair erupted explosively, growing like countless white vines that bound Orochimaru's entire body—arms, neck, waist, and legs—locking him in place.
Creak… creak…
The tangled hair dug deep into Orochimaru's skin, crushing muscle and even bone with cracking sounds. Any ordinary ninja would have long since collapsed, perhaps even been crushed outright by the dozens of white tendrils.
Once again, the two were locked in a stalemate.
And yet, in this very position, they began to speak.
"Orochimaru! What exactly are you trying to accomplish by coming to Konoha this time?!"
When Jiraiya grew serious, his expression was genuinely intimidating. He fixed his gaze on Orochimaru, trying to read something from his emotions.
"Do you really intend to kill the man who taught us, Sarutobi-sensei?!"
Naruto tilted his head, the surname Sarutobi sounding strangely familiar to him.
Konoha… Sarutobi…
Konohamaru Sarutobi—wait!
The Sarutobi the perverted sage mentioned couldn't be…
"Don't tell me it's Grandpa Hokage?!" Naruto looked at his dad in shock.
Minato Namikaze nodded. The teacher of the Sannin was indeed the current Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi.
Orochimaru didn't answer Jiraiya's question, still staring at him with the same look of disdain and impatience.
"Why?!" Jiraiya pressed on. "Have you forgotten? Sarutobi-sensei favored you the most! Because of your mastery of ninjutsu and your sheer talent as a ninja, you were always the one being praised!"
He remembered being tied to a wooden post, watching Orochimaru and Tsunade leave first.
Every training session, he was completely outclassed.
Every mission, he was the one dragging everyone down.
He truly couldn't understand what Orochimaru could possibly still be dissatisfied with.
"After you signed the contract with Ryūchi Cave and failed to learn Senjutsu, Sarutobi-sensei told you to focus more on ninjutsu! He even granted you permission to study the Second Hokage's forbidden techniques!" Jiraiya's voice carried a trace of grief. He couldn't understand what had driven them to fall apart like this.
Orochimaru listened quietly, his expression unchanged from beginning to end.
"You've really only grown older, Jiraiya," Orochimaru sneered. "Why do you assume that I harbor resentment toward Sarutobi-sensei? Shouldn't the one dissatisfied with him be Konoha itself?"
Naruto snapped angrily, "You traitor who defected from the village—what right do you have to talk about Konoha?!"
"Heh heh heh~" Orochimaru curled his lips into a mocking smile. "A windmill that can't turn is boring, isn't it? A rotten windmill is a mistake in and of itself. It occupies the best position for catching the wind, yet its gears are rusted solid. No matter how strong the wind is, it will never turn again."
"I seriously have no idea what you're talking about!" Naruto couldn't make sense of Orochimaru's stream-of-consciousness metaphors. Weren't they talking about the mission scroll and Grandpa Hokage? What did that have to do with windmills?
Jiraiya, who seemed to understand, felt indignant but didn't know how to refute him.
Minato Namikaze understood as well. Put simply, Orochimaru wanted to force the Third Hokage to step down. He likely believed Konoha had grown too peaceful, too complacent, lacking fighting spirit, and wanted to shock it awake by crushing it.
A blunt and brutal method, but far too extreme.
In Minato's view, Orochimaru's thinking was dangerously skewed. He hadn't truly seen Konoha as it was now. At the very least, the current Chūnin Exams had already revealed many promising newcomers who could become the village's future pillars.
But the biggest problem was this—his counterpart in this world was already dead. If the Third Hokage stepped down, there were only three likely candidates to take the position.
First, Jiraiya-sensei, one of the Sannin, with countless achievements in the Second Shinobi World War.
Second, another Sannin, Tsunade-sama, the First Hokage's granddaughter, with outstanding military accomplishments.
Third…
The person Minato Namikaze least wanted to mention. Someone who was still in Konoha, yet even worse than Orochimaru.
—Danzo Shimura.
"You want Danzo Shimura to become the next Hokage?" Minato asked.
Orochimaru maintained his inscrutable smile. "Why not? It's better than remaining stagnant."
Naruto didn't fully understand ninja village politics yet, but he knew the name Danzo Shimura.
On the night of the Nine-Tails incident, it was Danzo Shimura who led the oppression of Sasuke's clan.
Let someone like that become Hokage?
Are you kidding me?!
Wouldn't that drive Sasuke and his brother straight into a corner?!
Thinking back to the promise he had made with Obito and Madara, Naruto spoke bluntly, as he always did.
"I don't understand you at all! But someone who turns on their own comrades inside the village will never become Hokage! I don't know why you think Konoha is stagnating, but—"
His thoughts drifted to his classmates from the Ninja Academy.
Shikamaru, Choji, Kiba, Sasuke, Sakura, Hinata, Shino.
He had seen all of them again during this Chūnin Exams.
"But our very births and our growth… aren't they the clearest proof that the village is still moving forward?!"
"!!"
Jiraiya stared at Minato's son, the brat named Naruto, in shock. The words he himself couldn't find to refute Orochimaru had been spoken by a child this young.
And they had actually left Orochimaru speechless.
Minato was already used to Naruto's unexpected remarks, yet every time he heard him speak, his thoughts drifted to that red-haired figure from his own world, and the bright, energetic smile once turned toward him.
He wondered if he might be feeling a little…like he missed Kushina.
Orochimaru was silent for a moment before coldly replying, "You're just a brat who's never experienced anything."
"I have to disagree with you there, Orochimaru," Jiraiya said. "Naruto has endured pain since childhood that we never experienced. That's exactly why he understands people better than you do."
After a brief pause, Jiraiya added with conviction, "As the saying goes, those who win people's hearts win the world. At the very least, I'm willing to believe this child will grow into an outstanding Hokage. As for you… no one would ever accept you as Hokage."
Huh?
Naruto froze, instinctively turning to look at his dad.
Minato Namikaze flashed him a grin. He agreed with Jiraiya-sensei completely.
"Then try stopping me," Orochimaru said.
The Orochimaru who had been tightly bound by the Wild Lion's Mane Technique suddenly slid downward like a heap of mud.
With nothing left to bind, Jiraiya's white hair naturally fell slack.
Clearly, the Orochimaru they had restrained, covered in layers of sealing techniques, was a fake.
Another one of his strange forbidden techniques.
As the mud-like substance dissipated, it delivered Orochimaru's final message.
"Let's see if you can complete those two missions under my interference, Nine-Tails brat…"
Orochimaru had actually issued a challenge to a twelve-year-old.
"That bastard," Jiraiya cursed under his breath. "I knew he wouldn't be caught that easily."
Minato's expression darkened. "He really is as hard to pin down as a snake."
Jiraiya glanced at Naruto. "The scroll is still in his hands. More importantly, those two missions…"
Naruto blurted out, "Is he really going to kill Grandpa Hokage? Didn't you say Grandpa Hokage was his sensei?! Who would ever attack their own sensei?!"
Minato felt a bit helpless at his son's straightforward innocence. Thinking of Obito, he knew nothing was impossible.
"If it's that guy, he really could do something like that," Jiraiya said grimly.
Minato nodded. "Then please protect the Third Hokage, Jiraiya-sensei. As for Sasuke, that was probably a spur-of-the-moment decision on Orochimaru's part. But attacking Konoha may have been planned for a long time. There's a higher chance he'll move against the Third first."
"Got it."
Jiraiya summoned a toad for transportation and rushed toward the Hokage Tower.
With the Flying Thunder God Technique, Minato arrived even faster at the Hatake clan's old residence, which currently served as their base.
Everyone else was waiting there. As soon as they returned, Sasuke immediately asked Naruto, "So? Did you get the scroll back?"
Naruto shook his head. "He just told us about the new missions that appeared on it."
"New missions?" Sasuke paused. "What kind of missions?"
After a moment's thought, Minato decided to have Itachi Uchiha come listen as well.
"There are two new missions," he said. "One is SS-rank, and the other is A-rank."