The Ninja Academy has six grade levels. Each school year starts in April and ends in March of the following year.
The year is divided into three terms: the first term runs from early April to mid-July; the second term runs from early September to late December; and the third term runs from early January to the end of March.
In this era, the Ninja Academy's official enrollment age is five to six.
Konoha Year 28. Nawaki—five years old, the younger brother of the Fire Country's princess and the First Hokage's grandson—steps into the Ninja Academy founded by the Second Hokage. The true "crown prince" officially begins school.
…
Konoha Year 30, July 18.
Today is the last day of the first term for the entire academy.
For third through sixth years—students who have already undergone second- and third-stage training—their end-of-term exams started in the daytime and included academic subjects, combat classes, and the Three Basic Techniques.
By contrast, first and second years—kids who still use pebbles instead of real shuriken—had the single most meaningful assessment, and the only one where they might actually get hurt: taijutsu duels.
And that exam was saved for last.
In the afternoon, on the school field, in the area for First Year, Class 1.
The boys and girls stood or sat in a circle, watching a fight that, for children their age, was brutally intense.
At the center of the ring, two little boys with different hair colors were freely showing off their talent.
While their peers—and even many upperclassmen—still only knew how to brute-force with raw strength, these two had already learned to use chakra to weave speed into their fighting. And with unusually mature composure, they were reading each other through their eyes and their brains—predicting the next move, dodging, baiting, countering.
It was the kind of visual spectacle you rarely saw even in the higher grades. Their classmates were left slack-jawed—and even the chūnin teacher acting as referee looked stunned.
When he was little, he never understood why he couldn't measure up to the so-called geniuses.
Now, as a grown observer, he finally realized just how massive the gap had been between "ordinary" students like him and real prodigies.
The two boys in front of him were unquestionably the type who had already left everyone their age far behind!
And unlike most fights, which ended quickly due to unbearable pain or a total mismatch, this battle dragged on for a long time.
Only when the blond boy began to run out of stamina—his reactions and speed dropping sharply—did the white-haired boy, who was doing slightly better, seize the advantage. He created an opening: slipping to the side to evade a straight right, catching the other boy's arm, and throwing him hard with a shoulder throw. He then finished with a grappling hold to restrain him.
Seeing that, the chūnin teacher immediately announced, "Match over. The winner is Gojo Yoru. Form the Seal of Reconciliation."
As the teacher's voice fell, the stunned students—eyes wide like bells—finally snapped back to their senses.
Then the place erupted.
"So… so amazing!"
"Is this Minato and Gojo's real strength? They were seriously hiding it this whole time!"
"Maybe it's not that they were hiding it—maybe we just never pushed them hard enough to make them go all out. If they hadn't been matched up this time, we'd never have known they were this scary!"
"What a shame for Minato. If he'd developed as well as Gojo, he might've been the one who won."
"Hey, keep your voice down. Don't say that next to me—I don't want Gojo to lock onto me."
"Crap… he didn't hear that, did he?!"
"…"
"Minato-kun and Yoru-kun are both so handsome… I didn't even know who to cheer for."
"Yoru-kun is better. That cold, icy vibe is too cool—and he's strong. He beat up an upperclassman the moment he enrolled. That's so reassuring."
"I think Minato-kun is easier to talk to."
"…"
Amid the chatter, the two boys—one about half a head taller than the other—completed the Seal of Reconciliation.
"Thank you for the lesson, Yoru-kun. You're really strong," Namikaze Minato said with a gentle smile, sincerely.
"You're not bad either."
Gojo Yoru looked at Namikaze Minato's bruised face. Yoru himself was bruised too, but a complicated look flickered through his eyes.
He didn't feel the joy of victory at all—only pressure.
Because only he knew the truth: he wasn't a genius.
They were both "otherworldly little supermen" with 130 trillion cells—yet no one knew that inside Gojo Yoru was the soul of an adult in his twenties.
An adult taking this long to barely beat a real six-year-old… what was there to be happy about?
If anything, this fight let Yoru witness the potential of the "perfect ninja": that terrifying reaction speed. No wonder Minato could become Konoha's second person to master the Flying Thunder God Technique.
And this was only the first term!
At this rate, wouldn't he be left behind soon?
That thought sank his mood again.
On the surface, he stayed expressionless as he returned to his spot.
Because of his "cold and untouchable" and "school boss" persona, neither boys nor girls dared to go over and bother Gojo Yoru.
It stood in sharp contrast to the other side—where Minato returned to his group and was immediately surrounded by classmates of both genders, all trying to comfort him.
The exams continued. As one taijutsu duel after another ended, the first term came to a complete close.
When the teacher announced the start of break, Gojo Yoru was the first to leave the academy and head home.
Yoru's home was a three-story western-style house with a small courtyard, located on Konoha's central street. In both location and value, it ranked second only to the major ninja clans' compounds.
It was obvious his family background was extremely well-off.
He changed his shoes in the entryway, cut through the living room, and went straight to the bathroom—passing a household shrine that held two memorial portraits.
Warm water sprayed from the showerhead's tiny holes, raising a thin mist that fogged the room.
Gojo Yoru tilted his head back under the pounding water, slicked his white hair back with both hands, and only then did the white brows that had been knitted all day slowly relax.
He stood there under the shower, lost in thought for a long time, before finally opening his eyes.
They were blue eyes—just like Namikaze Minato's.
But unlike Minato's clear azure, Yoru's were an icy, pale blue with a hint of white. Paired with his blank expression, it gave off a chilling vibe.
After a quick rinse, Yoru came out in a bathrobe.
Standing before the mirror and drying his hair, he stared at the little boy reflected there and muttered in his hometown language, mocking himself: "Heh… same surname, same hair and eye color, and we even look alike—so why don't I get some broken overpowered cheat? If I had invincible strength, I could live it up for a few decades, and even if I end up snapped in half in the future, it'd still be worth it."
After drying the water from his hair, Yoru checked the time. Instead of cooking dinner to fill his starving stomach, he went to the storage room on the first floor, lifted an inconspicuous tatami mat, and climbed into a basement hidden underneath.
As the flame of an oil lamp lit up, the basement came into view.
It was a small room whose walls were covered in tadpole-shaped spell markings. There were only two rows of bookshelves, filled with scrolls and books, plus several boxes.
Below these items were labels dividing them into categories: ninjutsu scrolls, secret history from the Warring States period, all kinds of ninja tools and pills, and a massive amount of gold and silver treasure.
This was likely the Gojo family's foundation—an inheritance left to him by Yoru's parents.
And it was also the greatest source of leverage Gojo Yoru, the transmigrator, currently had!
(PS: The Naruto world's chronology is a mess, with several versions. This book uses the version where the Nine-Tails incident happens in Konoha Year 48, the year Naruto is born.)