BANG!
The door to the Hokage’s office flew open as a one-eyed man with a cane barged inside.
“Hiruzen!
Mirai Uzumaki must be assigned to Root.
I’ll personally train him!”
There was only one person arrogant enough to storm into the Hokage’s office like that—Hiruzen Sarutobi’s dear old friend, Danzo Shimura.
Hiruzen calmly puffed on his pipe and exhaled a ring of smoke.
“Danzo, how many times have I told you?
Knock before entering the Hokage’s office.”
He was starting to get a headache.
Danzo was bad enough, but his three students were exactly the same.
Jiraiya liked climbing through the window.
Tsunade simply kicked the door open.
Orochimaru was even worse.
He appeared without making a sound and suddenly spoke from somewhere behind Hiruzen, nearly scaring years off the old man’s life.
And none of them ever changed no matter how often he complained!
What did they think the Hokage’s office was, a public restroom?
Somewhere they could walk into whenever they felt like it?
“Don’t concern yourself with trivial details!” Danzo waved dismissively.
“We’re discussing Mirai Uzumaki.
He’s only seven and can already use the Adamantine Sealing Chains.
His talent is unprecedented!”
“He must be sent to Root.
I’ll turn him into the strongest weapon Konoha has against the Tailed Beasts!”
Hiruzen frowned.
“Mirai will not be joining Root.
He’s also a candidate to become the Nine-Tails’ next jinchuriki.”
He paused, then continued more seriously.
“And with the talent that boy has shown as an Uzumaki, I’m leaning toward sealing the Nine-Tails inside him.”
“A girl becoming jinchuriki is…
less ideal.”
Not every woman was Lady Mito.
And not every woman’s husband was Hashirama Senju, a monster capable of manhandling Tailed Beasts as though they were pets.
There was one important risk when choosing a female jinchuriki: childbirth.
A jinchuriki was at her weakest during labor, making it far easier for the Tailed Beast to break through its seal.
As Hokage, Hiruzen had to consider such things.
That was why he currently favored Mirai over Kushina as the next jinchuriki.
Danzo immediately agreed—without abandoning his original obsession.
“Then make him the jinchuriki.
But he should still be sent to Root.
I’ll train him into the ultimate Tailed Beast weapon.”
Hiruzen’s headache worsened.
His old friend wanted to drag absolutely everything he liked into Root.
Did Root even have room for all the things Danzo wanted to steal?
“Forget about Mirai.
I will never place a jinchuriki in Root.
A jinchuriki is also a member of our village.
They should be guided through bonds and the Will of Fire, not treated as a weapon.”
“Hmph!” Danzo was clearly dissatisfied.
“Hiruzen, that naive thinking of yours will never work!”
“If my Root weren’t protecting Konoha from the darkness, this village would have been buried alongside your rotten ideals long ago!”
Hiruzen’s expression darkened.
“Get out.”
Danzo turned and walked away, leaving only one sentence behind.
“Hiruzen, you will regret this!”
“Danzo, I am the Hokage!”
BANG!
The door slammed shut again.
Hiruzen sat behind his desk with Mirai’s file in hand, his expression shifting behind a haze of pipe smoke.
After a long silence, he spoke quietly.
“Bring Akaishi Kishimoto to me.”
“Yes.”
A figure vanished from the darkness.
It was a member of the Hokage’s direct covert force—the Anbu.
Kishimoto was brought over soon afterward.
As nothing more than a chunin, seeing the Hokage waiting for him with an unreadable expression made his heart tremble.
“Lord Hokage, may I ask why you summoned me?”
Hiruzen gave him a warm smile.
“Kishimoto, relax.
I only wanted to ask about the two transfer students in your class.”
“I heard there was a fight yesterday?”
Cold sweat immediately appeared on Kishimoto’s forehead.
Good grief.
What kind of background did Mirai Uzumaki have?
When he was told to bring a guardian, Tsunade showed up.
Now even the Hokage himself was personally asking about him.
Those weren’t two students placed in his class.
They were two ancestors sent there to shorten his lifespan!
Hiruzen exhaled another cloud of smoke, which slowly rose through a beam of afternoon sunlight.
“Don’t be nervous.
I simply want the honest opinion of their homeroom teacher.
Tell me what you truly think of those two children.”
Kishimoto swallowed.
He had originally prepared a perfectly safe official answer: “They’re both excellent children,” “They value teamwork,” “The Will of Fire burns brightly within them,” and so on.
But then he reconsidered.
The Hokage had summoned him personally.
Could he really get away with empty flattery?
Kishimoto gritted his teeth and decided to gamble.
“Lord Hokage, to be perfectly honest…
Mirai Uzumaki is a troublemaker!”
Hiruzen raised an eyebrow but did not interrupt.
“Yesterday was his first day in class.
He and Kushina started arguing during their introductions and turned the whole thing into a joke.
Then during the break, several students gave them insulting nicknames, and Mirai immediately started a fight.
With one technique, he tied up more than a dozen students.”
Even saying it aloud sounded absurd.
Kishimoto wiped the sweat from his forehead.
“At the time, I was furious.
A child who beats up classmates on his first day of school?
I thought it was completely unacceptable.”
The corner of Hiruzen’s mouth lifted slightly as he rotated his pipe between his fingers.
“And now?”
Kishimoto took a deep breath.
“Mirai did have a reason.
Several of the more troublesome students mocked him first.
More importantly, he controlled himself.
None of the students he restrained were actually injured.”
‘Come on.
Don’t think I missed that tiny smile, Lord Hokage!’
‘And after seeing Tsunade’s attitude yesterday…
if I seriously start badmouthing Mirai here, I’m going to die, aren’t I?’
‘Absolutely.’
His tone gradually became more earnest.
“And do you know what happened before Mirai attacked?
Minato Namikaze tried to stop both sides, but nobody listened to him.
Mirai only acted after things had already gone that far.”
The more Kishimoto spoke, the more impressed he became himself.
“He’s seven years old, yet he already has that level of chakra control and that much restraint.
Lord Hokage, I’ve been teaching for more than ten years, and I’ve never seen a child like him.”
The wrinkles around Hiruzen’s eyes relaxed, revealing an approving smile through the smoke.
“Anything else?”
Kishimoto was gaining momentum now.
“There’s also Kushina Uzumaki!
Her grades are terrible, and she slept through almost an entire day of theory classes—but when the class mocked her and gave her insulting nicknames, she forced herself not to attack anyone.”
“And both children dream of becoming Hokage.
They must have already been influenced by the Will of Fire before arriving in Konoha.”
“The entire class called her ‘Red Chili Pepper.’ Her face was bright red and her fists were clenched so tightly they shook, but she still didn’t hit anyone.
Lord Hokage, how many seven-year-olds could show that much restraint?”
Hiruzen slowly nodded and tapped ash from his pipe against the edge of the desk.
“You observe your students carefully, Kishimoto.”
Kishimoto quickly bowed.
“I wouldn’t dare claim anything special.
As their homeroom teacher, I simply have a responsibility to pay attention to every child.”
Hiruzen rose and walked toward the window, gazing at the carved faces of the First and Second Hokage in the distance.
His voice became low but satisfied.
“Mirai Uzumaki is impulsive, but he knows where to stop.
His talent is astonishing, yet he doesn’t recklessly injure the innocent.
Kushina Uzumaki has a fiery temper, but she can suppress it because of a promise made to her family…”
“They’re both good children.”
He turned around, the gloom from earlier completely gone.
“Kishimoto, I’ll leave those two in your care.”
“Especially Mirai.
That attitude of ‘hit back whenever someone provokes me’ won’t make it easy for him to form friendships.
Guide him properly—but don’t grind away all his sharp edges either.”
“Konoha needs shinobi who can follow rules, but it also needs those with the courage to break them when necessary.”
“They are both new leaves of Konoha.
Teach them that wherever the leaves dance, the fire burns.”
“Their education in the Will of Fire cannot be neglected.”
Kishimoto bowed even lower.
“Yes!
Please leave it to me, Lord Hokage!”
“Good.
You may go.”
Hiruzen waved him away, returned to his chair, and took another pull from his pipe with the satisfied smile of an old grandfather.
After Kishimoto left, Hiruzen murmured to himself.
“The Uzumaki bloodline, combined with that temperament…
Mirai, I hope you’ll be able to take over Lady Mito’s burden.”
Between Kushina and Mirai, Hiruzen currently favored Mirai.