“Starting today, you’re officially assigned to Konoha Hospital. I sympathize with what happened to you, but I imagine you understood the risks when you became a genin.”
Inside the director’s office of Konoha Hospital, Yuya Kudo sat behind her desk in a white coat.
Exhaustion was written across her face, but she still offered a few words of encouragement to the fifteen-or-sixteen-year-old genin standing before her.
“Understood, Director. I won’t let my emotions interfere with my duties.”
The genin nodded respectfully, then waited in silence for his next instructions.
“Good. If you want to remain at Konoha Hospital, you’ll need to learn the skills expected of a medical ninja as quickly as possible. Otherwise, you’ll end up doing nothing but menial work.”
Koji’s calm reaction satisfied Yuya.
Three days earlier, the ninja team he belonged to had been carrying out a D-rank mission when they were attacked by an unknown force.
Koji had been the only survivor.
Yuya sympathized with what he had experienced, but sympathy did not mean leniency.
This was the cruelty of the shinobi world.
Or perhaps it would be more accurate to call it the fate of anyone who chose to become a ninja.
Countless shinobi died on missions.
Even Konoha, the strongest of the hidden villages, could never completely avoid such losses.
Yuya had seen far too much death to lower the standards expected of a shinobi simply because tragedy had struck.
“You have six months.”
Her tone became noticeably firmer.
“If you still haven’t become a qualified medical ninja after six months, then this path clearly isn’t suited to you. At that point, you can report to the Logistics Division.”
Her words were blunt.
Koji, however, barely reacted.
Become a qualified medical ninja in six months?
Was that supposed to be difficult?
All he needed to do was learn basic wound treatment and master the Healing Jutsu.
Those were the minimum requirements for becoming a medical ninja.
Naturally, anyone who wanted to operate independently would need to learn more advanced medical ninjutsu.
For an ordinary person in the shinobi world, perhaps six months really was a demanding deadline.
For Koji, a transmigrator?
It was almost laughably generous.
This was what having a transmigrator’s cheat was for.
Did they have any idea how valuable something like that was?
Once I get what I came to Konoha Hospital for, I’ll show you what ruthless really means.
After all…
How did they think those two genin and their chunin captain had died?
“Come with me.”
Yuya’s voice interrupted his thoughts.
She rose from her chair, opened the office door, and motioned for Koji to follow.
As the director of Konoha Hospital, she obviously had no intention of personally teaching some civilian kid.
Still, since he had been assigned here, arranging his training fell under her responsibilities.
Koji followed her through the hospital until they reached a fairly spacious training room.
More than a dozen genin were gathered inside.
Only three people wore the white clothing associated with Konoha’s medical staff.
“Director!”
The moment Yuya entered, the three medical ninja who had been wandering around the room immediately approached her.
“Thanks for handling this. The sooner these students are properly trained, the sooner everyone’s workload becomes a little lighter.”
Yuya first swept her gaze across the room.
The genin were practicing the Healing Jutsu with varying degrees of concentration.
After confirming that no one was obviously slacking off, she gave the three instructors a brief word of praise.
Konoha Hospital received new trainees every year.
Medical ninja did not simply appear out of nowhere.
They had to be trained.
Unfortunately, their position within Konoha’s shinobi system remained somewhat awkward.
Tsunade’s proposal that standard ninja teams should generally include a medical ninja had been accepted long ago.
Even so, medical-ninja training had never received the attention one might expect.
The assessment given to Ninja Academy graduates still had very little to do with Konoha Hospital.
As a result, most people who came here were either genin sent by their teams for additional medical training or those who had already washed out once and were searching for another path.
“Of course.”
The three medical ninja nodded.
Training newcomers benefited them personally as well.
The sooner these trainees became competent, the sooner the hospital staff could share some of their workload.
And even if some of the students eventually returned to their original squads, teaching them was hardly a waste.
Connections mattered in the shinobi world.
At the very least, a favor given now could become a favor owed later.
“All right. I won’t waste any more of your time. Starting today, you have one more student.”
After exchanging a few pleasantries, Yuya finally turned the conversation toward Koji, who had remained silently behind her.
“No problem.”
The three medical ninja looked him over.
The moment they saw his face, recognition dawned.
So this was the lucky survivor from three days ago.
His captain and two teammates had all been killed by an unknown enemy.
Koji had supposedly escaped only because he had been away preparing food at the time of the attack.
The medical ninja here had personally examined the three corpses.
All of them had been horribly burned by Lightning-nature chakra.
The preliminary conclusion was that a Kumogakure spy had been responsible.
The incident had placed Konoha on heightened alert, and ANBU had already been dispatched to investigate the mission site.
When the bodies had been recovered, this boy had simply stood beside the three charred corpses in a daze.
“Work hard,” Yuya told him.
“Do your best to become a proper medical ninja.”
With that, she turned and left.
Once the director was gone, the three medical ninja exchanged glances.
The two men quickly wandered off, leaving the youngest-looking woman behind.
Koji had no idea what sort of silent agreement they had reached.
Nor did he particularly care.
His expression remained calm.
Coming to Konoha Hospital had never been some impulsive decision.
What he needed right now was a relatively stable environment.
His cheat certainly gave him an advantage, but improving himself still required time.
In simple terms— he had a lot of grinding to do.
“If you want to become a medical ninja, the first thing you need to learn is the Healing Jutsu. It’s the most basic requirement for entering this profession.”
The woman picked up a scroll from a nearby table and handed it to him.
“This scroll contains the technique.”
“Thank you.”
Koji accepted it with a somewhat wooden nod, found an empty spot, and immediately opened the scroll.
The young medical ninja had apparently intended to say something else, but his reaction made her pause.
The new trainee seemed surprisingly mild-mannered.
If Koji had known what she was thinking, he probably would have smiled.
His former chunin captain and two teammates had thought exactly the same thing.
Then he had killed all three of them with Lightning Release.
Koji lowered his gaze and carefully studied the Healing Jutsu scroll.
This was how ordinary ninja learned most ninjutsu.
Of course, there were better methods.
One-on-one instruction, for example.
But for a civilian orphan like Koji?
That was nothing more than a fantasy.