After the First Ninja World War, three of the Five Kage had died.
Even Tobirama had nearly been killed.
Only Sunagakure had managed to preserve most of its strength.
The Second Kazekage, Shamon, had once attended the First Five Kage Summit as the First Kazekage’s bodyguard.
During that meeting, he’d come to a realization.
…Why does it feel like we’re the only village that’s weak?
Shamon was an ambitious man who knew exactly where Sunagakure stood.
After becoming Kazekage, he devoted himself wholeheartedly to strengthening the Hidden Sand.
While studying Shukaku, the One-Tail, he also developed numerous large-scale combat techniques capable of taking on many opponents at once.
Puppet techniques, Magnet Release, and various sand manipulation arts all came from his research.
When it came to scientific talent, he was practically a miniature Tobirama.
While the Land of Wind quietly focused on rebuilding, every other great nation had been battered by war.
As a result, the Ninja World entered an uneasy era of peace.
No matter how you looked at it, there would probably be another twenty years of development before the next generation matured.
And then…
Another great war.
Akira decided he would use that time wisely.
His original plan had been simple: grow stronger, earn distinguished war achievements, and eventually become Hokage through merit.
But after Tobirama survived what should have been his destined death, Akira’s priorities shifted.
He wanted to take advantage of Tobirama’s incredible mind to help develop the techniques he truly wanted.
Things like accelerated thought processing…
Or even electromagnetic manipulation.
Which meant there was only one conclusion.
He had to join the Technical Research Department.
It would almost certainly become Konoha’s most important research division in the future.
With everything he’d learned so far, getting accepted after graduation shouldn’t be difficult.
After more than a year of relentless studying, Akira had already memorized every useful book in the Academy library.
Saying he’d completely mastered all of it would be an exaggeration, but whenever he needed a particular piece of knowledge, he could instantly recall it.
It was as though he carried an internet search engine inside his head.
Meanwhile, after a year of wishing, the system’s featured banner had automatically updated.
The current featured banner…
Sifu banner.
as everyone knows, Sifu is also known as the “Jackie Chan simulator.” ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ [The More You Know] Sifu is a third-person martial-arts action game developed by Sloclap.
You play a young kung-fu student seeking revenge for the murder of their family, fighting through five major locations using hand-to-hand combat, weapons, environmental objects, dodges, parries, and special techniques.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Although this banner did not contain many rewards, it had several valuable ones: the magical pendant that revives its wearer upon death, the Five Talismans, and various Kung Fu skills.
If he’d been reborn into a modern world, this banner alone could have turned him into an unrivaled martial arts grandmaster.
Unfortunately…
This was Naruto.
In a world where ninjutsu flew everywhere, ordinary martial arts seemed rather underwhelming.
Still, after drawing Pak Mei Kung Fu, Akira obediently began practicing it.
Setting combat aside, martial arts strengthened the body.
After training for nearly a month, his Strength, Constitution, and Agility had each increased by one point.
Having the system really was convenient.
Once a skill improved, it stayed improved forever.
There was no such thing as getting rusty after not practicing for a few days.
The same applied to physical conditioning.
His attributes could only increase.
Never decrease.
Just as Akira was completely absorbed in his daily fist training beside the river, Hiruko arrived with someone.
After finishing an entire routine, Akira turned around.
The moment he saw Hiruko’s new friend, he recognized him immediately.
Pale skin.
Long black hair.
Purple eye shadow.
A delicate, almost feminine face.
Young Orochimaru…
Akira immediately walked over and offered his hand.
“Nice to meet you.
I’m Akira.” Orochimaru looked somewhat uncomfortable with such enthusiasm.
At this point in his life, he was still nothing more than a kind, somewhat timid child.
Hiruko gently nudged him.
Only then did Orochimaru react, reaching out to shake Akira’s hand.
“Nice to meet you.
I’m Orochimaru.” Hiruko was delighted that his two friends seemed to get along.
He excitedly began introducing Akira.
“Orochimaru, let me tell you, Akira’s a genius just like you.
He can learn any ninjutsu after seeing it once.
He’s even created several techniques himself.
If you get the chance, you should definitely see them.” “Really?
That’s amazing.” Orochimaru’s eyes widened with admiration.
“I still haven’t created any ninjutsu yet.
Hiruko, have you made one?” Orochimaru was still an innocent child.
He believed whatever people told him.
Unfortunately, that innocent question accidentally stabbed someone right in the heart.
“Of course!” Hiruko answered through clenched teeth.
“Even though I’m only in the second year, I’ve created a ninjutsu too.
I’ll show you someday.” Akira immediately noticed the cold sweat forming on Hiruko’s forehead.
Trying not to laugh, he solemnly added, “That’s right.
Even though Hiruko’s still young, he’s developed an incredible technique.
Based on my analysis, it could probably even defeat the Third Hokage.” More sweat appeared on Hiruko’s forehead.
He hurriedly dragged Akira to one side and whispered, “Too much!
You’re overselling it!
What am I supposed to do if I can’t live up to that?” Akira leaned close and whispered back, “Did you forget about the Sexy Technique?” “Ah!” Hiruko yelped.
His face instantly turned bright red.
He pointed accusingly at Akira, opened his mouth to protest…
…and ultimately failed to say anything.
Instead, he simply squatted on the ground and sulked.
Orochimaru watched the two of them with complete confusion.
He had no idea what they were talking about.
Seeing Hiruko genuinely upset, Akira quickly crouched beside him and began talking him down.
“There are no useless jutsu, only useless shinobi.
I guarantee you, if you master the Sexy Technique, even the Third Hokage wouldn’t be able to handle it.
Trust me.” Hiruko puffed out his cheeks.
“You already told me before that ‘The downside of being a handsome little boy is that you grow up to be an even more handsome man.’ Then you tried to make me practice the Sexy Technique.
You’re obviously plotting something!” ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ [The More You Know] The joke uses a mock-negative structure: it says “the downside” of being a handsome little boy is growing up to become an even more handsome man, even though that is clearly a positive result.
The humor comes from treating a compliment like a problem, which creates playful exaggeration.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Akira stared at him in disbelief.
“…How did you even connect those two completely unrelated things?” Then he sighed dramatically.
“I’m telling you right now, my preferences are perfectly normal.
I’m not interested in you, so stop getting weird ideas.” Orochimaru watched them gesturing wildly in the distance, completely unable to follow the conversation.
Scratching his head, he started feeling a little bored just standing there.
Eventually, Akira succeeded in calming Hiruko down before leading him back.
“Sorry to keep you waiting.” He smiled at Orochimaru.
“Come on.
Let’s grab something to eat.” Orochimaru blinked.
He’s…
this friendly?
We just met, and he’s already inviting me to dinner?
Hiruko casually threw an arm around Orochimaru’s shoulders.
“This guy’s actually a pretty good cook.
Later, make sure you eat as much as you can.” Akira proudly lifted his chin, puffed out his chest, and swaggered ahead with an exaggerated, overconfident stride.
The sight made Orochimaru chuckle.
The three of them returned to Akira’s house, shared a simple meal of knife-cut noodles, and slowly grew closer over dinner.