A month passed in the blink of an eye.
Sato Fan’s life settled into a fixed rhythm.
He woke up at seven in the morning, finished breakfast, and headed out to train, arriving at the warehouse by 7:50 AM.
He would open the doors, ventilate the space, boil water, and flip through the ledgers.
At exactly eight o’clock, his workday began.
He had long since mastered the warehouse tasks; once he became proficient, he could finish everything in half a day.
He spent the remaining time training.
Shadow Clones became his most capable assistants.
Every morning upon arriving at the warehouse, the first thing he did wasn’t opening the ledgers, but rather forming six hand signs in under a second, evenly splitting his Chakra into two streams.
With a poof and a cloud of white smoke, a Shadow Clone stood before him, looking exactly like him, down to the last wrinkle in his clothes.
“Inventory Area A,” the original said.
“Got it,” the Shadow Clone replied, turning toward the Kunai shelves.
Sato Fan himself sat at the desk, opened the general ledger, and began processing the incoming and outgoing warehouse vouchers.
With the two of them working together, their efficiency was more than double that of one person.
At first, their coordination was a bit clumsy.
When a Shadow Clone dispelled, its memories and fatigue would return to the original.
Sato Fan had grown accustomed to this sensation—the information flooded in like a tide, and he needed to process it quickly, recording what was useful and filtering out the rest.
Over the course of the month, he figured out some patterns.
A Shadow Clone could last for forty minutes at most before automatically disappearing.
If he had the Shadow Clone perform physical labor, like moving boxes or counting shelves, its duration would shorten to about thirty minutes.
If it just stood still, it could last nearly an hour.
So, he adjusted his strategy: he let the Shadow Clone do the most physically demanding work first while the original handled the paperwork.
Once the Shadow Clone vanished, the original would finish up.
Efficiency improved, and free time opened up.
Every day around two in the afternoon, the warehouse work for the day was basically over.
Sato Fan would lock the warehouse door and walk to the empty lot behind it to practice the Body Flicker Technique.
The instructions on the sealing scroll Old Tanaka left him were crystal clear.
Body Flicker Technique, hand sign sequence: Snake-Ram-Monkey.
The principle was to release a sudden burst of Chakra from the soles of the feet, granting the user ultra-high-speed movement for a very short duration.
The difficulty lay in the timing of the Chakra burst and directional control.
Sato Fan had been practicing for over half a month.
On the first day, he couldn’t even stand steadily; every time he burst his Chakra, he would trip forward.
The second day was a bit better; at least he could control himself enough not to fall, but the distance he dashed was only three or four steps.
By the third day, he could dash seven or eight steps, but he couldn’t control the direction, often veering left or right, once nearly crashing into the perimeter wall.
Every night at home, he went over the hand sign sequence in his head, and while lying in bed, he would practice the movements under the covers, only stopping when his fingers grew sore.
On the seventh day, he finally succeeded once.
Hand signs, Chakra burst—it felt as if a spring had pushed against the soles of his feet, and he shot forward over ten meters in an instant.
He came to a steady stop and looked back at his starting position, his heart racing.
He’d done it.
Although the distance was short and the speed wasn’t particularly fast, it was at least a complete Body Flicker Technique.
A sentence was written on Old Tanaka’s scroll: “The standard for basic mastery of the Body Flicker Technique is being able to use it three times in a row during combat without making a mistake.
You are still far from basic mastery.”
Sato Fan was not discouraged.
He continued to practice.
Two hours every afternoon, rain or shine.
On rainy days, he practiced inside the warehouse, using the aisles between the shelves as a runway for sprints.
On sunny days, he practiced in the empty lot, drawing a straight line between the walls and requiring himself to land on the line every time.
By the twentieth day, he could use the Body Flicker Technique twice in a row without error.
He would dash out once and immediately form the hand signs again upon landing for the second dash.
He could control the direction of both, with any error being within half a step.
By the thirtieth day, he finally managed it three times.
He stood in the empty lot, gasping for breath.
Three consecutive Body Flicker Techniques had exhausted most of his Chakra; his calves felt weak, and his knees were shaking slightly.
But he had done it.
The “basic mastery” Old Tanaka spoke of—it had taken him a full month, but he had achieved it.
He sat down against the wall, took a sip of water, and watched the clouds drifting slowly across the sky.
His mind began to calculate something else.
It was the end of the month.
The warehouse’s accounting cycle operated on a monthly basis.
On the last day of each month, all incoming and outgoing records, damage reports, and inventory checklists had to be organized and summarized into a monthly report to be submitted to Section Chief Yamada for review. This chapter was taken from novelping.com without permission.
This was Sato Fan’s first time preparing the monthly report independently.
When Old Tanaka was there, he had done the reports while Sato Fan just watched and learned.
Now that Old Tanaka was gone, he had to handle the accounts alone.
Furthermore, he intended to tamper with these accounts.
Over the past month, he had been recording the incoming and outgoing data every day and observing inventory changes.
He knew exactly which items were requested often, which were rarely taken, and which were never touched.
He selected the first batch of materials for his “operation”: standard-issue Kunai, shuriken, and food pills.
These three items had a high damage allowance and low turnover rate, making discrepancies hard to notice.
Standard-issue Kunai: ninety-two were reported as damaged this month.
He wrote ninety-two on the report, but only sixty-two were actually damaged.
He placed the extra thirty Kunai into an empty box he had prepared, labeled it “Pending Disposal,” and stacked it in the innermost corner of the warehouse.
There were dozens of boxes of genuine scrap materials piled there; one more or one less box wouldn’t be noticed at all.
shuriken: sixty-eight were reported as damaged this month.
Only forty-eight were actually damaged, so he over-reported by twenty.
The twenty shuriken were packed into several cloth bags and stuffed into the same “Pending Disposal” box.
food pills: two hundred and forty were reported as damaged this month.
Only about one hundred and eighty had actually expired, so he over-reported by sixty.
The sixty food pills were divided into three small bags and also stuffed into that box.
This was the extent of his operation for the first month.
It wasn’t much, but it wasn’t a small amount either, totaling three thousand nine hundred Ryo.
His monthly salary was only five thousand Ryo.
This immediately added nearly another month’s worth of income.
Sato Fan cross-checked the damage reports and inventory records three times, confirming that every number matched.
Then, he began drafting the monthly report.
He had long since memorized the report format.
The cover read: “Konoha Logistics Department Weapon Warehouse monthly report.”
He filled it out item by item.
He bound the report and placed it on the top right corner of his desk, then leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling.
His heart was racing slightly.
It wasn’t from physical exhaustion, but from nerves.
If Yamada were to ask just one more question, like “Where are these damaged Kunai?”, he would have to take him into the warehouse to search.
Inside that “Pending Disposal” box, besides the actual scrap, were the things he had hidden.
But would Yamada ask?
Sato Fan recalled the times Yamada had visited the warehouse over the past month.
He had come twice in total.
The first time was at the beginning of the month; he stood at the door and asked, “Can you handle things alone now that Old Tanaka is gone?” When he said yes, Yamada turned and left.
The second time was in the middle of the month; he came to pick up a report from the previous month and left immediately without even entering the warehouse.
Yamada didn’t care about the specific numbers in the warehouse.
He managed the entire Materials Section, with several warehouses under him—grain, medicine, general goods—and he had to sign off on every single one.
Where would he find the time to check them one by one?
Even so, Sato Fan was still nervous.
He read through the report from beginning to end once more, confirming there were no typos, calculation errors, or omissions.
Then he stood up, tucked the report under his arm, locked the warehouse door, and headed toward the Hokage Building.
The Logistics Materials Section, where Yamada’s office was located, was at the end of the second-floor corridor.
When Sato Fan knocked on the door, his heart skipped a few more beats.
“Come in.”
Yamada’s voice sounded as lazy as ever.
Sato Fan pushed the door open and entered.
Yamada was sitting behind his desk, which was covered in a pile of documents; he held a teacup and was reading something.
Seeing Sato Fan enter, he set down the teacup and leaned back in his chair.
“Is the monthly report ready?” Yamada asked.
“Yes.” Sato Fan handed over the report.
“The incoming and outgoing records, inventory count, and damage details for this month are all inside.”
Yamada took the report, flipped open the cover, and glanced at the inventory summary on the first page.
His gaze swept from top to bottom, lingered for a few seconds, and then he turned to the second page.
He scanned it again and turned to the third.
Three pages of paper took less than a minute.
Then he closed the report and placed it on the desk.
“The numbers look fine,” Yamada said.
“The accounts are quite clear.”
Sato Fan felt a wave of relief in his heart, but his expression remained neutral. Get faster updates on g.com.
“Have the damaged items been put away?” Yamada asked.
“They are all in the disposal area at the very back of the warehouse, marked with ‘Pending Disposal’ labels, waiting for the end-of-month processing.”
Yamada nodded, picked up a pen, and signed his name in the Section Chief signature box on the last page, then pushed the report back.
“Alright, take it back.
Carry on next month.”
“Yes, sir.”
Sato Fan picked up the report and turned to walk out of the office.
The moment the door closed behind him, he stood in the corridor and took a deep breath.
A small patch of his shirt on his back was soaked with sweat.
He walked down the corridor toward the stairs, his pace slightly faster than usual.
As he passed the front desk, the female Ninja wearing glasses looked up at him, but he ignored her and went straight downstairs.
When he stepped out of the Hokage Building, the sunlight hit his face perfectly.
Sato Fan stood on the steps, tucked the report under his arm, and looked up at the sky.
The sky was very blue, with a few white clouds drifting lazily, looking no different than usual.
But for him, today was different.
He had done something he had never done before.
No one had noticed.
Committing embezzlement for the first time in his life was exhilarating!
Back at the warehouse, he put the report back into his desk drawer and walked to the innermost corner of the warehouse.
Dozens of “Pending Disposal” boxes were piled there, covered in a layer of dust.
He found the box where he had hidden his things and opened the lid.
Thirty standard-issue Kunai were neatly stacked in the box.
Their iron-gray blades reflected the cold light of the lamps.
Twenty shuriken, packed in cloth bags, were piled next to the Kunai.
Sixty food pills, divided into three small bags, were pressed at the very bottom of the box.
These things weren’t his yet.
They were still listed on the warehouse books, just categorized as “damaged.” During the “unified processing” at the end of the month, these “scrap materials” would be sent to the recycling station.
But he wouldn’t let them be sent away.
He would move them from the disposal area to another place—a place only he knew.
He closed the lid of the box and stood up.
Three thousand nine hundred Ryo a month.
That would be forty-six thousand eight hundred Ryo a year.
In four years, it would be nearly one hundred and ninety thousand Ryo.
This was just the beginning; he hadn’t dared to take more for fear of being discovered, otherwise, he could have doubled it.
Once he mastered the Body Flicker Technique and learned the Mud Wall, and once he understood the warehouse operations even better, he could increase the scale of his operations.
He could report a few more Kunai as damaged, and he could start working with explosive tags, though he didn’t dare touch the sealing scrolls for now.
He wasn’t in a hurry.
He had plenty of time.
Sato Fan walked back to the office, pulled his chair to the window, and sat down.
The window was open a crack, and a cool breeze blew in from outside, carrying the scent of the approaching autumn.
He pulled Old Tanaka’s combat notes from his pocket and flipped to a page in the middle.
It read: “A Ninja’s life is cheap.
But if you prepare a little more than others, your chances of living a few years longer are a bit higher.”
He read the sentence twice, then closed the notebook and put it back in his pocket.
Outside the window, the sun began to set in the west.
The light in the warehouse grew soft, and the Kunai and shuriken on the shelves reflected the orange-red glow.
Sato Fan stood up and walked to the empty lot.
He was going to practice the Body Flicker Technique for a while longer.
Chakra burst, a spring-like push from his soles, and he shot out with a whoosh.
A distance of over ten meters was covered in the blink of an eye.
Landing, turning, forming hand signs again.
The second dash.
Landing again, third set of hand signs.
The third dash.
Three consecutive times, no stuttering, no veering.
He came to a steady stop in front of the perimeter wall, less than half a step from the base.
He turned around and looked at the straight line he had dashed along.
There was nothing in the empty lot but a trail of his footprints.