Jiraiya bit his lip, the picture of despair. "Fine...! Fifty barbeque meals it is. It's a deal!"
In an instant, his despair vanished, replaced by naked anticipation. "So? When do we start? When are you going to teach me?"
"There's no hurry. Let's see you pay up for the first ten meals before we begin. Even if I taught you now, you wouldn't be able to learn it."
"If it's not too much trouble," Orochimaru interjected, stepping forward and pausing deliberately beside Jiraiya, "I'd appreciate an invitation for Tsunade and myself when you take him. Don't look so defeated. Mission rewards add up. Fifty meals... if you grit your teeth and work hard enough, it's not an impossible sum save."
With that, he continued on his way. "This mission is effectively over. We should go find the other two."
'The young Orochimaru was surprisingly tolerable… He's certainly more talkative than I imagined.'
What would it even look like if Orochimaru could use the Rasengan? A grotesquely elongating arm, clutching that swirling sphere of chakra, flailing toward an enemy... The mental image was both bizarre and strangely intimidating.
'So why had the Orochimaru from the original story never used it?'
The principle wasn't overly complex. For someone of Orochimaru's intellect and affinity for jutsu, learning it should have been simple.
'Was the copyright enforcement in the shinobi world just that strict?'
'Then again, Kakashi was the only one who'd earned a title for copying techniques—'Copy Ninja Kakashi,' the man who had copied a thousand jutsu. That was a line that had always stuck with me.'
But the Uchiha clan members with their genuine Sharingan never seemed to mass-copy techniques, with Sasuke being the only partial exception.
'Perhaps it wasn't about copyright. Maybe Orochimaru simply believed the Rasengan didn't suit his fighting style... or maybe he just had no interest in using a technique pioneered by Minato Namikaze.'
"Hey, Orochimaru! I'm being extorted here, and you're piling on? Trying to bankrupt me completely?!" Jiraiya squawked, darting after his teammate and falling into their familiar, one-sided bickering.
No matter what Jiraiya said, Orochimaru's only reply was a flat, dismissive, "Idiot."
But you had to admit, Jiraiya got a response every single time. Orochimaru, he really... he really listened. It was almost touching.
"Yuta! We're teammates! Surely I get a friends-and-family discount? I shouldn't have to pay the full fifty-meal price, right?" Sarutobi Osamu slung an arm around Yuta's shoulders, his face splitting into a wheedling grin.
Yuta turned and met his gaze with unnerving solemnity. "You're right. For you, it wouldn't be fifty meals."
Osamu's grin widened in victory, but it froze before it could fully form.
"For you," Yuta continued, his tone deadly serious, "it's one hundred."
Osamu's expression shattered, morphing into pure indignation. "You bastard! All you think about is barbeque! You're not even from the Akimichi Clan! What's your excuse?!"
"Perhaps," Yuta mused, a faint, almost imperceptible smile touching his lips, "I simply enjoy the feeling of a free meal. The knowledge that someone else is picking up the tab."
"You...! You have the worst personality!"
—
Tsunade and Meyuri, who had rushed back the moment the civilians were safe, halted at the sight of the four boys returning together.
Tsunade's eyes went immediately to the corpse being dragged behind them—another Suna-nin. She sucked in a sharp breath. The state of the body left little doubt; he, too, had fallen to Yuta's terrifying jutsu.
'So the mission is over? Just like that?'
It had been... almost disappointingly straightforward.
Not that she was complaining. A clean, efficient mission meant a higher success rating, which translated directly into a larger payout.
'Heheh~ More money for the gambling tables!'
A sly, gleeful look flashed across Tsunade's face. But when her eyes settled on Yuta, her expression shifted to one of intense curiosity and scrutiny.
Meyuri, for her part, wasn't particularly surprised.
She had always known Yuta operated on a different level from their peers, and had always sensed his strength. She just hadn't realized the sheer scale of it.
Now, she had a benchmark.
So...
She needed to accelerate her plan to ask Yuta for taijutsu training.
Meyuri shot a sidelong, slightly wary glance at Tsunade, who was standing beside her. The blonde's gaze was locked intently on Yuta.
—
—
Danzo pushed open the door to the Hokage's office, his usual stern composure softened by a barely perceptible air of triumph.
Having witnessed the entire mission, it was a Herculean effort to suppress the smirk threatening to break across his face.
His student had eclipsed all of Hiruzen's pupils. From the flawless infiltration and intelligence gathering to the swift, decisive elimination of two rogue Suna-nin—one of them a Chunin—Yuta's performance had been impeccable.
And that self-created, seal-less jutsu, the Rasengan... It was the work of a true prodigy.
When he had stood before Yuta earlier, Danzo had nearly compromised his stern demeanor.
The constant, internal mantra of 'Hiruzen is the Hokage, Hiruzen is the Hokage' was all that had preserved his teacherly facade.
It was only now, as a teacher himself, that Danzo understood why their eternally stern teacher, Tobirama-sensei, had occasionally allowed a flicker of a smile to show during their training.
'Tobirama-sensei... did you feel this same swelling of pride when your students excelled?'
A pity that in the end, he had chosen Hiruzen.
But it was of no consequence…
'Tobirama-sensei, I will prove to you that I was the most suitable candidate to become Hokage after all.'
'Even in the art of teaching the next generation, I surpass him.'
"Danzo?"
The Third Hokage looked up from his paperwork, his expression one of mild puzzlement.
Decades of friendship—and rivalry—had honed his ability to read this man. Danzo was pleased about something.
"The children's mission is concluded already?" Hiruzen asked, setting a scroll aside and retrieving his smoking pipe from the organized chaos of his desk. He took a long, deliberate puff.
"It is. A perfect success."
Danzo stood straight, his voice rich with vindication.
"Shimura Yuta's performance was exceptional. He not only infiltrated the stronghold and secured all necessary intelligence but also single-handedly neutralized a rogue Suna Genin and a rogue Suna Chunin, ensuring the safe rescue of all civilians."
"More importantly..." Danzo paused, letting the words hang in the air between them, "...during the battle, Yuta demonstrated a self-developed, seal-less ninjutsu."
"In my assessment, it qualifies as an A-rank Jutsu."
"Furthermore," he said, presenting a meticulously detailed scroll, "here is the complete mission report for your review."
"Let me be certain I understand," Hiruzen said, his pipe hovering forgotten in his hand, his eyes wide with disbelief. "You are telling me that your student, a boy not yet seven years old, invented an A-rank, seal-less jutsu? And that he essentially completed a mission involving infiltration, reconnaissance, and the elimination of enemy shinobi—including a Chunin—by himself?"
"Correct."
As he watched the astonishment—a look verging on bewilderment—spread across Hiruzen Sarutobi's face, Danzo felt a sense of vindication wash through him.
This was the feeling.
'Pure satisfaction.'
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