Konoha.
Ninja Academy.
Second Year, Class A.
A red-haired little brat lay sprawled across his desk, completely ignoring the murderous glare from the teacher on the podium.
He had backing above him, so he feared nothing.
His head rested on his right hand, while his left hand was hidden inside the desk compartment, quietly practicing one-handed seals.
A year had passed.
Class A had not changed much.
In last year’s final assessment, Hatake Sakumo had taken first place.
Shanks was still second.
There was no helping it.
As a member of the clumsy-hand party, Shanks still could not properly use ninjutsu.
Practicing one-handed seals was also far more difficult than expected.
His greatest advantage was taijutsu.
In the end, he had relied on overwhelming physical ability to secure second place.
Otherwise, for a man determined to become Pirate King, this would have been a dark stain on his history.
A humiliation in his life.
Take that old fool Hashirama, for example.
To people who didn’t know him, their first impression was simple: incredible, the God of Shinobi.
To people who knew him, their first impression was also simple: loud, childish, and completely unreliable.
What if, in the future, someone who knew Shanks started bragging in front of their son?
“Oh, you mean Pirate King Shanks?
I know him.
We were in the same class at the ninja academy.
Every exam, he ranked below me.”
How proud would that person be?
Every time Shanks imagined that scene, he felt restless.
After all, he was not as shameless as Uzumaki Naruto.
So starting from his second year, Shanks began practicing left-handed one-handed seals without stopping.
Even when he went shopping with Haruko, his left hand kept twitching and moving.
People passing by looked at him strangely.
Even the bookstore owner once gave him a knowing look that made Shanks want to smash the counter.
Although he could now form two seals per second with his left hand, the flow of chakra was still not smooth enough.
“Which author said one-handed seals were easy?
I’ll beat him to death!”
Of course, if anyone asked, the problem was definitely not that his hands were useless.
“Damn it.
In my previous life, I trained my right hand.
In this life, I’m training my left.
If I transmigrate one more time, am I supposed to train my toes next?”
At this rate, how long would it take to reach Uchiha Itachi’s effortless style?
What a waste of this ridiculous mana pool.
As a member of the Uzumaki Clan, Shanks’s current chakra reserves were already comparable to a jōnin’s.
Unfortunately, he had been born with absolutely no talent for hand seals.
Not every shinobi could casually form one-handed seals.
Without talent in that area, even if one trained hard enough to do it, the speed might still be slower than using both hands.
At that point, there was no meaning.
If someone could form seals faster with both hands, why insist on one hand?
Look at Kakashi.
A genius, right?
Even dragged down by the Sharingan, he still managed to earn the title of Konoha’s Copy Ninja and later became known for fighting everyone fifty-fifty.
But Kakashi had no real talent for one-handed seals, and he never bothered forcing it.
Uchiha Itachi, Haku, and Minato Namikaze were different.
They had the talent for it, so practicing it made sense.
If Minato had not lost an arm later, no one would even have known he could form seals one-handed.
Of course, there were also weirdos like Jiraiya, who could use his feet for seals in desperate situations.
But Shanks would rather die than practice forming seals with his toes.
That was too disgusting.
Imagine using a Water Release technique formed with his feet and killing the enemy, only for Shanks himself to be choked half to death by the smell.
No, thank you.
On top of that, Shanks’s two hands had no talent for seals in the first place, let alone one hand.
Just practicing every day was enough to make people look at him like he was insane.
Every time he remembered Hatake Sakumo’s faintly disdainful gaze, Shanks wanted to drag him into the bathroom and beat him up.
He turned his head and glared fiercely at the honest boy sitting beside him.
Ever since Shanks had beaten him once in last year’s assessment, Hatake Sakumo had burned with fighting spirit every time he saw Shanks.
Every day after school, it was the same thing.
Meet in the woods.
Fight.
In truth, Shanks also wanted an opponent.
Training with Hashirama every night was nothing but one-sided suffering.
Shanks had no hobby of being beaten up.
The current White Fang was still a little White Fang.
The “little” part mattered.
His speed was fast, but his blade work was still too rigid.
Every day after school, Shanks and Hatake Sakumo sparred in the small forest.
Their main focus was swordsmanship.
Shanks’s sword style was the Konoha Sword Dance developed by Senju Tobirama.
Shanks did not know whether swordsmanship in the Naruto world could ever reach the destructive power of the One Piece world.
In One Piece, a great swordsman could release a flying slash hundreds of meters long.
That was basically equal to an A-rank ninjutsu.
But the rules of the two worlds were different.
Practicing Konoha-style sword techniques might not be enough.
My body carries part of the One Piece system.
Does that mean I should keep training the basics of swordsmanship instead?
Shanks fell into thought.
Swordsmanship in the Naruto world was not quite the same as true swordsmanship.
Here, sword techniques were often paired with ninjutsu.
In the One Piece world, the way of the sword was far more direct.
Most swordsmen relied on basic sword forms combined with their own understanding of the blade.
The so-called breath of all things, cutting steel, flying slashes—those were the real path of swordsmanship.
One Piece sword techniques were rarely flashy at their core.
The names just made them sound impressive.
So Shanks decided to try both.
After all, the basics of swordsmanship were the same no matter the world.
Clang!
Clang!
Clang!
In the small forest, two young figures moved rapidly.
Every few breaths, their blades clashed once, and after each exchange, they immediately separated.
“Lightning Thrust!”
Hatake Sakumo suddenly accelerated.
The short blade in his hand flashed with lightning as he stabbed forward.
“Hah!
One-Sword Style: Super Invincible Heaven-Piercing Earth-Splitting God-Slaying First Form!”
Shanks gripped his blade with both hands and blocked Sakumo’s Lightning Thrust.
Then his body spun, and he swept out a kick.
“Stinky Foot!”
Sakumo raised his arm slightly and blocked the kick.
Seeing an opening, Shanks immediately used chakra-enhanced strength.
But what he shouted was, “Dry Wood Ignites Fire Fist!”
“…”
Sakumo could not dodge in time and was struck in the shoulder, sent flying backward by the punch.
“Twenty-four to twenty-two.
I’m ahead by two wins.
Tonight, we gather at the Akimichi place.”
Shanks dusted off his dirty clothes after the fight.
“Fine,” Sakumo said, standing up and rubbing his shoulder.
“I’m going home first.
If I don’t go tonight, put it on my account.
I’ll pay tomorrow.”
Although Shanks had not used much force, it still hurt.
“Suit yourself.
I’m leaving.”
“Next time, can you stop shouting those strange names?”
“Tch.
What do you understand?
That’s called style.”
Shanks immediately ran.
If he didn’t run now, once Sakumo recovered, he would definitely ask for another round.
Over the past two months, Shanks and Hatake Sakumo had fought forty-six times.
Shanks had won twenty-four.
Sakumo had won twenty-two.
Basically, they traded wins back and forth.
Never underestimate a native genius just because you were a transmigrator.
This was the man who would later create the name Konoha’s White Fang.
He was a true genius, even stronger than his son in some ways.
“Damn it.
As expected of the man who once stood above the Sannin.
If not for my cheating body and taijutsu, I really might not be able to beat him.”
Shanks stretched his neck and grinned.
“Ha.
Tonight, I finally get to eat barbecue with Haruko.”
Grandma Inoue’s health had not been good recently.
Every day after Haruko finished learning from Koharu Utatane, she had to return home to take care of her.
Because of that, Shanks had not been able to properly spend time with Haruko for a long while.
Over the past year, because Haruko’s talent was truly ordinary, Tobirama had arranged for Koharu Utatane to teach her medical ninjutsu as a favor to Shanks.
She did not need to become especially powerful.
As long as she could handle simple wound treatment and bleeding control, it would be enough.
Later, she could be assigned to work at Konoha Hospital.
Shanks had no objection.
As long as she did not have to go to the battlefield in the future, that was fine.
Haruko’s dream was very simple.
She did not want to become Hokage or anything like that.
If she did, Shanks would have to find a way to pull her back from that path.
Was becoming Hokage really that easy?
Especially for someone close to Tsunade.
Absolutely not.
Look at the original story.
Who around Tsunade dreamed of becoming Hokage?
Her younger brother, Nawaki?
Dead.
Katō Dan?
Also dead.
Minato Namikaze did become Hokage for a while, but he was the protagonist’s father.
And even becoming Hokage did not save him from misery.
The First and Second Hokage both died unnatural deaths.
The Third stayed in office for a long time, but in the end, he was killed by his own student.
The Fourth held the position for less than two years.
Tsunade was even worse.
Her younger brother died.
Her lover died.
In the end, one of her teammates died too, while the other turned himself into a woman.
Kakashi’s father committed suicide.
Two of his teammates were manipulated into tragic deaths.
Even Naruto fell in the Fourth Shinobi World War.
The position of Hokage was clearly cursed.
When Shanks returned home, he saw one-year-old Tsunade lying on the floor, watching Senju Hashirama play dice with complete seriousness.
This was enough.
“Little Tsunade, you can’t learn gambling,” Shanks said as he walked over and picked her up from the floor.
“If you grow up and lose the entire Senju estate, your uncle won’t have anywhere to live.
Understand?”
“Yi ya!
Yi ya!”
Little Tsunade flailed in Shanks’s arms, clearly displeased.
“You little brat!” Hashirama looked as if he had discovered a new continent.
“What kind of nonsense is that?
If little Tsunade learns my gambling skills, how could she lose?”
Shanks gave him a blank look.
“You lost your allowance for the next two years to me last night.
Is that really so strange?”
When it came to gambling luck, the Senju Clan really was hopeless.
Senju Hashirama lost seven or eight times out of ten.
Mokuma was the same as his father.
When it came to Tsunade, things were different.
She would become the female gambling god.
As long as no one around her was about to die, betting against her guaranteed victory.
Tobirama had never gambled.
A rational man like him would never play that kind of thing.
Losing every gamble…
Maybe that was also a talent of the Senju Clan.