Standing in the hallway, the Third Hokage felt a bit awkward, especially after hearing Kaito’s repeated excuses and the chorus of agreement from the other students.
“Ahem…” Left with no other choice, he cleared his throat and personally walked into the classroom.
The moment he entered, the room fell dead silent.
The students who had been shouting the loudest just moments ago froze completely, cursing their rotten luck.
Kaito was also stunned for a couple of seconds.
Piecing it all together, he realized…
Teacher Daiki was incredibly devious!
“Lord Third…
Greetings, Lord Hokage…”
“Greetings, Lord Hokage!”
The greetings started out sparse, but soon the entire class stood up and bowed in unison.
The Third Hokage smiled kindly and pressed his hands down to quiet them.
“Please sit down, students.
The last time we met like this was when you first enrolled over two years ago, wasn’t it?
It seems I haven’t been a very dutiful principal to this academy.”
It was the exact same opening line as before, but this time Daiki didn’t play the hype man.
When the Hokage’s voice faded, a heavy silence lingered for three seconds.
The students exchanged awkward glances.
A few wanted to speak up but were too nervous and excited to form words.
The atmosphere grew incredibly stiff, and the Third Hokage’s kind smile nearly froze on his face.
Kaito sighed inwardly.
‘These kids have zero social awareness.
I guess I’ll have to step in and save the day.’
“You aren’t just the principal of the ninja academy, you are the Hokage of our Konoha!
You bear the responsibility for all the ninja and civilians in the village and handle countless crucial matters every single day.
Just having your name attached to the principal’s office gives us the motivation to study hard.
We are incredibly grateful to you!”
Daiki was speechless.
The rest of the students stared in dumbfounded shock.
“Kiss-ass,” Asuma muttered under his breath.
The Third Hokage chuckled, his smile much more genuine this time.
He mused to himself, ‘What a smooth talker.
This child seems quite different from the others.’
“Just now in the hallway, I heard quite a few students complaining about the ‘Study of Past Hokages’ Writings’ elective course, expressing a reluctance to take it.
Why is that?” the Third Hokage asked directly.
Why?
Because you’ve written way too many books, old man, and the difficulty of this course is on a completely different level from the rest!
The room remained dead silent.
No one dared to answer like that.
“Obito Uchiha, I recall that on the day of your enrollment, you declared your dream of becoming the Hokage.
The First Hokage, the Second Hokage, and I have all written books detailing the responsibilities and experiences of a Hokage.
If you don’t study them diligently, how can you ever become the Hokage?”
Being singled out, Obito blinked in surprise before suddenly breaking into a wide grin.
‘The Third Hokage wants me to be his successor!
I really am going to become the Hokage!’
“Thank you, Grandpa Hokage!”
The Third Hokage was utterly confused.
For a moment, he couldn’t comprehend Obito’s train of thought.
However, his sharp eyes caught two people in the classroom rolling their eyes at the exact same time—Kakashi and Kaito.
So, he turned his gaze toward…
Kaito.
“Kaito, why are you the only one who didn’t choose this elective?
Do you think it’s useless?”
‘This is a lethal trap,’ Kaito lamented silently.
Since arriving in this world, this was his first time seeing the Third Hokage in person, yet he didn’t feel unfamiliar with him at all.
The Third Hokage was a highly controversial figure in the anime.
On one hand, his power scaling was notoriously inconsistent.
On the other hand, numerous tragedies occurred in the village during his reign, which starkly contrasted with his image as a kindly old man.
Was he a ruthless, iron-fisted leader, or a benevolent, scholarly grandfather?
From this brief interaction, Kaito felt the latter was slightly more likely.
After all, obsessing over an elective course about his own writings felt exactly like the petty grievances of a stubborn old man.
And stubborn old men needed to be coaxed.
Kaito stood up and said, “That’s not it at all, Lord Hokage.
I didn’t skip this course because it isn’t important, but rather because it is far too important.
The writings of the Hokages, especially yours, require a vast amount of time to properly study and comprehend.
With the limited time we have at the academy, we couldn’t possibly grasp the profound wisdom hidden within them.
Therefore, I plan to keep several copies of your works by my side after I graduate.
I will study them meticulously and dedicate my entire life to learning from them!”
Asuma’s eyes widened in disbelief.
Kurenai and Rin stared blankly at each other.
Hizashi Hyuga covered his forehead with one hand.
‘This damn commoner is even more shameless than I thought.’
Shizune covered her mouth, looking back at him in sheer amazement.
Obito nearly slipped under his desk.
Guy gave a thumbs-up.
“Such youth!”
Kakashi…
‘Kakashi correction progress 79%’
Kaito paused, his eyes widening slightly.
‘Even this triggered Kakashi?’
Little did he know, hearing Kaito spout such blatant nonsense made Kakashi realize how embarrassing it was to have been holding a grudge against him lately.
The Third Hokage was also dumbfounded.
No one had ever spoken to him like this before.
At first, it sounded incredibly fake, but upon closer inspection…
it was actually quite flattering.
He turned to look at Daiki.
‘Did you teach him this?’
Daiki’s face darkened as he shook his head repeatedly.
The Third Hokage pursed his lips.
“You may sit down, Kaito.”
“Yes, Lord Hokage!”
The classroom had been prone to awkward silences today, and after another few seconds of quiet, the Third Hokage finally gathered his thoughts and spoke slowly.
“I am very pleased to hear Kaito say such things, and I hope you will all follow through on that in the future.”
As he spoke, he cast a smiling glance at Kaito.
Kaito offered the innocent smile of an honest child and nodded.
“Haha, however, waiting until after graduation to study is not enough,” the Third Hokage continued.
“There is a reason why the ‘Study of Past Hokages’ Writings’ is listed as an elective.
In fact, I originally wanted to make it a mandatory course.
You may not understand it now, but you will eventually realize how precious this curriculum is.
Besides, it’s not overly difficult.
Didn’t Rin score an eighty-eight on it this time?”
‘Rin is a top student who scored over ninety-five in every other subject,’ Daiki grumbled internally.
“Daiki should have told you by now.
Although you only need ten credits from mandatory courses and six from electives to apply for the graduation exam, graduating with different credit totals yields entirely different results.
Super Excellent, Excellent, Good, and Pass.
These are the four graduation ranks.
A difference of just two credits can easily drop you down an entire rank.”
Kaito paused.
There were indeed some vague traces of this in the original Kaito’s memories, but the old Kaito had just been happy to graduate at all and never paid attention to such details.
As a result, Kaito was largely in the dark about it.
Hearing the Third Hokage explain it now, he listened intently.
It turned out that academy graduates in this era were divided into four distinct tiers.
Mandatory and elective courses offered a total of nineteen credits, while the graduation exam offered twelve.
Earning all thirty-one credits resulted in a Super Excellent rank.
Twenty-eight to thirty credits was Excellent.
Twenty-five to twenty-seven credits was Good.
Twenty-two to twenty-four credits was a Pass.
Different graduation ranks directly influenced future team placements and the selection of Jonin instructors.
‘Instructor selection…’ Kaito grew even more focused.
The Third Great Ninja War was only a few years away.
He only knew that Minato and Choza would serve as Jonin instructors for their graduating class.
If Choza Akimichi was there, the other two members of his trio would likely be as well.
At the very least, he needed to secure one of the Ino-Shika-Cho members as his instructor, right?
Seeing that he had successfully captured the students’ attention, the Third Hokage’s smile grew even kinder as he continued to feed them motivational rhetoric.
“Furthermore, students, Super Excellent graduates are recorded in the academy’s history.
Don’t you want to be admired by future generations of students?
Since the academy was established in Konoha Year 6, thirty-five graduating classes have studied here, producing sixty-two Super Excellent graduates.
I hope your class will produce the sixty-third, sixty-fourth, or even the sixty-fifth and sixty-sixth!
And among those sixty-two Super Excellent graduates, seventeen graduated with perfect scores in every single subject.
You know some of them, such as the young head of the Uchiha clan, Fugaku Uchiha.”
Everyone turned to look at Obito.
“The young head of the Hyuga clan, Hiashi.”
Hizashi Hyuga proudly raised his chin.
“My student, Tsunade.”
“Princess Tsunade of the Sannin…” This sparked a much larger reaction.
Kaito, however, was speechless.
‘Did they even have this many difficult writings to study back then?
Even if they did, there’s no way she actually studied them, right?’
“There are even two individuals who graduated with perfect scores across the board and received a highly significant, special reward that influenced their entire ninja path!”
“Perfect scores in everything?”
Gasps of amazement echoed through the room.
Few cared about the special reward, knowing they would never get it anyway.
One student asked, “Who are they?”
The Third Hokage smiled, his face wrinkling with pride.
“My student, Orochimaru!
And the student of my student Jiraiya…
Minato Namikaze!”