“Has the intelligence been sent back?”
“It was delivered to the village immediately, Lord Danzō.”
“Mm.”
At this moment, Danzō had already left Konoha and arrived at the border of the Land of Fire.
As the leader of Root, he was even busier than Hiruzen Sarutobi.
Friction between the hidden villages had been intensifying, so Hiruzen had ordered Danzō to personally oversee the border.
Since arriving, Danzō had already commanded his forces in intercepting and eliminating several groups of enemy scouts.
He had lived through the Second Shinobi World War and understood very well that this kind of conflict wouldn’t simply disappear.
It would only continue escalating—
Until war broke out completely.
“At this rate, the Third Shinobi World War is inevitable. We should strike first and hit the other hidden villages hard in one decisive blow.”
The intelligence Danzō sent back to Konoha clearly explained the situation along the borders and urged Hiruzen Sarutobi to take immediate action.
But Danzō knew that the weak-willed Hiruzen would only keep thinking about how to calm the conflict.
If necessary, he might even concede some of the village’s interests.
Danzō would never allow that.
His methods were far more forceful than Hiruzen’s.
He even wanted to concentrate Konoha’s forces and launch an all-out offensive to cripple one of the hidden villages!
That way, Konoha could avoid repeating what happened during the First Shinobi World War, when it had been surrounded and attacked by the other four great hidden villages.
But he wasn’t the Hokage.
In the end, he still wasn’t the Hokage!
All because, back then, he had been one step too slow.
He hadn’t stepped forward immediately.
That moment had become a thorn buried deep in his heart.
Danzō’s thoughts returned to that year, when he had followed his teacher, the Second Hokage Senju Tobirama, to Kumogakure to establish an alliance and sign a ceasefire agreement.
On their way back to the village, they were ambushed by the Gold and Silver Brothers.
With the situation growing desperate, Senju Tobirama made a decision.
He asked his disciples which of them was willing to stay behind and hold off the enemy, creating a chance for the others to escape.
Everyone knew what staying behind meant.
Death.
There was no possibility of survival.
At the time, Danzō had repeatedly screamed at himself internally.
Say it.
Say it!
Tell them you’ll stay behind!
Let Teacher and the others return to the village safely!
But in the end, Hiruzen Sarutobi spoke first.
He volunteered to stay behind and die.
And because Danzō had hesitated for that single moment, he lost his chance to become Hokage.
Their teacher had already intended to remain behind by himself.
The question had merely been a test—
A test to determine who was qualified to become his successor.
Deep down, Danzō might not even have desperately wanted the position of Hokage.
What he hated more was the cowardice he had shown back then.
He hated that he hadn’t been as decisive as Hiruzen Sarutobi.
Afterward, Danzō changed.
Meanwhile, the once-courageous Hiruzen Sarutobi had gradually had his edges worn away by a false peace.
Now, Danzō believed he was the one better suited to becoming Konoha’s Hokage.
“Hiruzen, you are no longer fit to lead Konoha.”
“Only I can restore Konoha to the heights it reached under Lord First!”
While Danzō was lost in thought, a Root shinobi wearing a demon mask brought him the latest news from the village.
“That child has consecutively defeated Kakashi, as well as the geniuses of the Uchiha and Hyūga Clans.”
“Hmm?”
Danzō paused.
A trace of surprise flashed through his eyes.
That brat who practiced nothing but taijutsu—
The same brat whose personality Danzō had judged completely unsuitable for Root—
Actually possessed talent of this caliber?
Danzō understood that defeating Kakashi alone could have involved outside factors.
It didn’t necessarily prove that the child named Kazan was genuinely that strong.
But defeating both an Uchiha and a Hyūga was another matter entirely.
That was worth taking seriously.
“What a pity.”
Danzō’s expression quickly returned to normal.
This time, he had misjudged the situation and missed out on the two most outstanding geniuses of the generation.
Still, he had recruited plenty of fresh blood from the other shinobi clans.
A small loss hardly counted as a loss!
….
Meanwhile.
Behind the Hokage Building, Kazan had finally stopped punching the mountain.
Then he sat cross-legged on the ground and created another Shadow Clone.
Neither of them spoke.
They simply exchanged a glance and immediately understood what the other intended.
A moment later—
BANG!
Kazan was sent flying.
He rolled several times across the ground before finally coming to a stop.
Rubbing his face, he winced.
That hurt.
As expected of his own Shadow Clone.
Those fists were damn hard.
“Again!”
Kazan gritted his teeth and continued.
He wanted to master Observation Haki and Armament Haki as quickly as possible.
Kazan possessed Garp’s training memories.
As far as Observation Haki was concerned, Garp’s training method wasn’t much different from that useless teacher Rayleigh’s.
It was the crudest, most straightforward method imaginable—
Get beaten until you figured it out yourself.
At moments like this, Kazan almost wished he had a legendary teacher like Kaido nearby.
One club to learn Ryuo.
Two clubs to learn Conqueror’s Haki coating.
Three clubs and you awaken on the spot!
Absolutely incredible!
Wouldn’t he just get beaten to death?
Kazan wasn’t worried. This chapter is updated first at novelping.com.
He had the Template of the Monkey family.
He knew how to perform the miraculous sit-up resurrection too.
No problem at all.
Still, that was just wishful thinking.
“Again!”
Kazan stood up, closed his eyes, and turned his back toward his Shadow Clone.
Then he continued getting beaten.
There wasn’t much time left before the Ninja Academy’s graduation exam.
In other words, he was about to leave the safe zone and finally experience the outside world.
He needed to awaken Observation Haki as soon as possible.
The Naruto world had that sinister thing called genjutsu.
It was practically the natural enemy of taijutsu specialists.
If Kazan didn’t want to suddenly get killed without even knowing what happened, mastering Observation Haki was an urgent priority.
….
Elsewhere.
With the graduation exam drawing closer, the workload for this year’s students had also become heavier.
Recently, every student had been gritting their teeth and practically transforming into Might Guy.
Most of their spare time was spent secretly squeezing in extra training, all in the hope of safely passing the graduation exam and becoming honorable genin.
The teachers also arranged tests every few days, hoping to identify each student’s weaknesses and help them correct them.
Today happened to be a practical combat assessment designed to evaluate the students’ overall fighting ability.
But—
Before the chūnin instructor could even announce the beginning of the test, the proud representatives of the Uchiha and Hyūga had already stepped forward.
“Kazan, I challenge you!”
“Kazan, this time I’m going to defeat you!”
Uchiha Jō and Hyūga Asuka confronted Kazan almost simultaneously.
Their goal was exactly the same.
They wanted revenge and to wash away their humiliation.
Both of them had a dark history of being brutally beaten by Kazan.
They had even spent some time as hospital roommates.
Neither could accept losing to a civilian.
Especially not to a shinobi who supposedly only knew taijutsu.
Uchiha Jō had taken the loss particularly badly.
After leaving the hospital, he had tried several times to ambush Kazan after school.
But somehow, that damned bastard had suddenly stopped staying after class to train.
Worse still, he disappeared from the Academy so quickly every day that Jō couldn’t even find a trace of him.
Jō considered his previous defeat against Kazan an accident.
He had already acknowledged Kazan’s strength, but he still refused to believe he would lose in a proper fight.
During his stay in the hospital, he had thoroughly reviewed every detail of their battle.
His conclusion was simple.
If he used genjutsu, he would definitely win.
Unfortunately, after waiting for Kazan several times, he never managed to catch him.
When Jō challenged him at school, Kazan refused every time.
There was none of the boldness from before, when Kazan had declared that “a man doesn’t get to back down when someone challenges him.”
And with their classmates mocking him every single day on top of that…
Jō was so furious he felt like he was about to awaken the Sharingan out of sheer rage!