# Chapter 3: The Bronze Chest
"Finally…"
Rock Lee let out a relieved sigh, watching his "father" head off on a morning C-rank mission — the kind handed out to perfectly average Chunin, which was exactly what Son Lee was.
The Lee clan wasn't known for any particular strength, to be honest. The head of the family was a Tokubetsu Jonin with no special reputation to speak of, specializing in reconnaissance. Accordingly, the family's territory wasn't anything impressive.
It took Lee only a few minutes of light jogging — and a couple of friendly waves to the people living nearby — to walk the full length of the Lee clan's tiny grounds, allotted to them by some Hokage in ages past. Not that he was complaining. Not that he was particularly bothered.
Truthfully, he couldn't care less about any of that. It was a "small matter," as far as he was concerned. It wasn't like he had any grand ambitions to become a noble clan leader and help his newly acquired family expand its influence. The only thing connecting him to these people was blood, and nothing more. Rock would rather focus on his training than spend his energy building up others.
*In about a year and a half, Orochimaru will attack Konoha together with the Village of Sand. After that it only gets worse — the Akatsuki, a powerful organization of rogue shinobi, and especially Obito, who's going to drag these lands into another full-scale war. Oh, and then there's Kaguya. Fantastic.*
So what was all this talk about clans, exactly, when he needed to be getting stronger himself — urgently?
"Alright! Time to deal with the Bronze Chest!"
He clapped his hands together and headed back inside the two-room apartment he shared with Son Lee — though the latter was rarely home. With no one around to interrupt him, Rock relaxed and sat down on the floor, ready to finally dig into the system that had come with his arrival in this world.
*Status.*
The digital interface materialized before his eyes in an instant:
*[Name: Rock Lee]*
*[Shinobi Rank: Academy Student]*
*[Health: 100%]*
*[Stamina: 30%]*
*[Chakra: 100%]*
*[Taijutsu Rank: C]*
*[Ninjutsu Rank: —]*
*[Genjutsu Rank: —]*
*[Inventory]*
*[Hell's Training List: 3]*
*Stamina's recovering slowly. Health too. The dashes on Ninjutsu and Genjutsu are probably there because this body literally can't use them. Unfortunate, but nothing to be done about it. Taijutsu, though — Rank C. Most likely because the original Rock Lee poured enormous time into physical training. Inventory's self-explanatory. But the Hell's Training List… 3? So a fresh batch of absolute suffering is already queued up and waiting for me…*
He shuddered, the memory of those monstrous push-ups still fresh enough to make his skin crawl.
Still, he pulled himself together and mentally reached into his inventory, withdrawing the so-called Bronze Chest — or rather, what turned out to be…
A card. With a worn bronze chest drawn on it.
*Huh. That's unusual.*
Lee ran his fingers along the sharp rectangular edges, then closed his round eyes, exhaled, and snapped the card in half. It crumbled apart in a shower of brown light, and the rewards unfurled before him:
*[Bronze Chest Rewards]*
*[20,000 Ryō]*
*[10 Military Ration Pills]*
*[Healing Salve]*
*[Rokushiki Style: Rankyaku]*
The physical items dropped into his inventory. The Rankyaku technique, on the other hand, imprinted itself directly into Lee's mind — giving him a complete, step-by-step training regimen for the full mastery of this move from the manga and anime *One Piece*. Quite a respectable haul.
*As a mere academy student, money is far from useless. Twenty thousand ryō is equivalent to four completed D-rank missions. With that I could not only eat well, but pick up some training weights — cheap ones, at least. That is, if I've completely lost my mind and decided to make self-torture a full-time hobby.*
The other items opened up even broader possibilities. The Military Ration Pills could push a shinobi's capabilities in a short burst. The Healing Salve would close wounds and accelerate natural recovery. And the Rankyaku technique…
Honestly, there couldn't have been a better reward than that.
---
There was, however, a more immediate problem standing in Rock Lee's way.
The Shinobi Academy. Which was starting in approximately fifteen minutes.
Right — that place. Where children were trained in the arts of the ninja: reconnaissance, sabotage, assassination for hire…
But did he really have the right to condemn the Hidden Villages' policies? It was a young army, nothing more, with countless roles to fill. And knowing what was coming — knowing the events that would unfold sooner or later — Lee would be genuinely glad if as many talented students as possible graduated from that academy. Sure, you could always count on Naruto and Sasuke to carry things, but wasn't relying on that just… boring? And a little stupid?
*I can't become a Taijutsu master if I stay on the sidelines.*
That was the conclusion Rock reached. He changed into a fresh set of clothes and headed out for school.
The weather in Konoha was lovely, as it usually was. Bright sunshine without a single cloud, and a calm, refreshing breeze that sent the tree branches swaying in a slow, easy dance. Walking past buildings and shops full of smiling residents, Lee couldn't help but feel his mood lift — losing himself, just for a brief moment, in the warmth of it all.
And the Hokage Monument was enough to blow your mind entirely.
A magnificent mountain with the faces of every leader of the Village carved into its face — from the First Hokage all the way to the Fourth, who had died fighting the Nine-Tails, sealing it afterward into his own son, Naruto. A sprawling history spanning at least fifty years, possibly closer to a hundred. Rock wasn't sure — his knowledge of the timeline leading up to canon was, to put it charitably, shaky.
The Shinobi Academy itself, toward which the round-eyed boy was now hurrying, sat at the foot of that very same magnificent mountain.
*It never would have occurred to me that someday I'd personally confirm the theory of soul reincarnation after death. And on top of that — everything I only ever saw in anime has suddenly become real…*
Rock was still quietly marveling at this unexpected turn of fate.
"Hey! Why are you late?"
Surprisingly, waiting at the main doors of the academy — or rather, having coincidentally arrived at the same time — was none other than his classmate, Tenten.
Tenten was a pretty girl with chestnut hair done up in two buns and dark brown eyes framed by a short fringe. She wore a pink jacket and dark green pants. Her skin was fair, and the look she was directing at the bewildered boy in front of her was stern and reproachful. Rock genuinely had no idea why the proud Tenten had suddenly decided to meet him at the entrance like this — and why she was making it so distracting.
"Hm? Oh — h-hi, Tenten!"
Flustered but not entirely thrown off, Lee managed to pull out a polite smile — that particular easy, guileless grin he'd copied straight from the leftover memories of the original.
"Are you serious, Lee? I never said you could call me by my first name…"
Tenten shook her head with clear disapproval, turned her back on him in one swift motion, and tossed her final words over her shoulder as she walked through the academy doors and disappeared inside.
Rock was left standing on the front step, blinking.
*Well… that's quite the reputation I've got. The one girl in the whole class who could actually be called beautiful, and she's ice-cold toward me. On top of that, when I pass the Genin exam, there's a 99% chance she ends up on my team. It would be very bad if we couldn't get along. Though, to her credit — unlike the others, Tenten never once told the original Lee he was weak or a failure…*
Carrying those thoughts with him, he made his way to his classroom — and remembered, as if on cue, that today's lesson would include practical sparring.