Chapter 114 – The Oldest

Finding Ashina after we left the Academy wasn't difficult, thanks to the fact that we only had to follow Kushina's voice. This time, it was just Sayuri and me visiting, since we were the ones who knew Kushina personally and why she was being trained.

"I hate this!"

"Yes, yes, you have mentioned that already; now do it again."

"I really hate this, dattebane!"

"I am aware, and we are working exactly on how to prevent it from becoming a constant issue. Now. Restart your meditation, or I will make you sit there until the moon falls off the sky."

Arriving, the first thing I saw was Kushina's eye twitching, sitting on a stone in the middle of a small training ground. Not wanting to interrupt too early, we decided to just stop and wait, enjoying the show a little bit.

"Why do I even need this training? I could be punching something instead. Can't I punch this damn fox, for example?!"

"Not yet, and you must learn this because you must learn to control your emotions before they take control of you. Even if you can see into your own being and punch it, the way you are now, you would do no damage." Ashina answered, shaking his head, "You need a calm mind to learn the advanced seals, and the way you are now... You are in danger."

The way she was grimacing, trying so hard to meditate, I had to cover my mouth, because it was way too funny. Naturally, Sayuri elbowed me because I was starting to make noise, but it was unfair... Because she was trying not to laugh, just the same. Still, my muffled snort made Kushina's head snap toward us, with wide eyes, recognizing our presence.

"RENJI! SAYURI!"

Fuck.

"There goes the lesson," Ashina murmured, shaking his head again, because Kushina was already standing, breaking into a run to get to us.

"Thank the Sage!"

"Huh? What?" I flinched at her nonsense.

"You saved me!"

"From what...? Meditation?"

"From torture!"

"Maybe a short pause will be beneficial." Ashina shrugged, coming up to us, watching Kushina try to hide behind us. "You have five minutes."

"So," of course, Kushina ignored him. "What are you doing here? Are you here to train? Please tell me you're here to train. We can spar! Or do seals! Or anything. We can dig a hole. I don't care!"

"Dig a hole? Are you looking to be buried?" I joked, but she just nodded.

"Sure! Let's do that!"

"You are really bored, aren't you?" Sayuri giggled, making her groan and pull on her red hair.

"I have been forced to learn to meditate nonstop! Day and night, it's BOOOOORING!"

"You haven't managed to meditate one minute yet." Ashina countered, making her flinch and start to pout.

"Seven minutes... You said it last time... That I did seven minutes... WHICH IS A LOT, DATTEBANE!"

"Are you sure about that?" I laughed, but then she glared at me, and the only reason she stayed quiet was that she wanted to use me to escape this torturous training. "Geez... You're terrible at this."

"You try it! I'm not like Minny, okay?!"

"Who?" Sayuri and I asked.

"Minato." She stared at us with a flat look. "Who else?"

"..." I was about to start laughing, but Sayuri nudged me once again, making me gulp down everything, but storing that cute little name in the back of my mind.

"Let's get to business, though," Ashina cut in just then. "You aren't here accidentally."

"Yes," I said, pulling Jin's copied evaluation sheet from my pouch. "We found someone interesting in the Academy, and we came to ask for an expert's opinion about it."

"You're doing Academy work now?" Kushina asked sarcastically, "Were you demoted?"

"I got promoted to a Jōnin." I snorted, making her grin evilly.

"Yeah, yeah, suuuuure..."

"Most students were what we expected," Sayuri continued in the meantime, explaining to Ashina, "A few of them could benefit from specialized instruction, but this one? His taijutsu is poor, his ninjutsu is nonexistent, same with his genjutsu..."

"How did he get in the Academy then?" Kushina asked, also trying to look at the paper in Ashina's hands.

"And you want me to see him?" The old man asked, feeling both curious and skeptical.

"Yep." We nodded, watching as his gaze reached the important part.

"Oh?" He looked at me, and I simply nodded.

"Yesterday I demonstrated this," I added, pulling out the marked kunai.

"Show-off." Kushina snorted.

"Morale-building." I retorted, throwing her an unimpressed look. "The kid looked at the formula for maybe half a minute, and he said exactly what you just read."

"Interesting," Ashina murmured, rubbing his beard. "Who taught him? Do we know that?"

"Apparently nobody." Sayuri answered, "Our colleague, Sora, is currently looking into his family line, but what he found initially... he's just a regular boy, born into the village. His parents were never a shinobi."

"That's... Rare." Ashina stared at us again, fondling his beard even more. "But, especially in cases like this, one observation isn't enough."

"Agreed." I nodded at once. "That's why we are here. I want someone who actually knows what they're looking at to test him. The Academy has no proper teachers whose focus is on seals. It is not even part of the curriculum. I don't think we can measure something like this. Which..."

"...Is part of our report." Sayuri added as I gently nudged her, so it wasn't just me taking credit, "We will suggest to the Council that they look into it and introduce seals into the basic shinobi education. You are now part of our village, and when your people start going into the Academy, they need good teachers."

"I am on board with the idea," Ashina said as he handed the paper back. "I can send someone who will be perfect not only for the post, but he is also good with children."

"Who?" Kushina asked, curious.

"Masanori."

"..." Kushina immediately made a face. "Oh."

"Who is that?" I asked, looking back and forth between the two.

"He's..." Kushina struggled to find the words. "Old."

"Careful," Ashina stared at her. "He is the most experienced when it comes to this. He taught more Uzumaki than I and the rest of my council put together."

"Excuse me, but what?" I asked, raising a hand. "Doesn't that mean he is ancient?!"

"Yes, it does mean that, dattebane!" Kushina yelped, making Ashina shrug.

"Uzumaki Masanori is one of our senior seal-masters. He served on Uzushio's council before me and was the previous leader's confidant."

"..." I was flabbergasted... someone older than Ashina? The fuck? Is that even possible?

"He oversaw our sealing examinations for almost a hundred years."

"Excuse me," My eyebrows rose automatically. "How old is he?"

"He is going to be 132 soon," Ashina answered, while I remained speechless... Damn. What could I say? Nothing. "If that boy understood even part of what you're describing without formal instruction, Masanori will recognize whether it was luck or not."

"Perfect." I gulped, wiping my mouth and forcefully closing it. "When can we expect him?"

"Tomorrow morning," Ashina said, nodding and smiling a little. "I'll arrange it."

"Okay." Kushina raised her hand. "I'll come too!"

"No."

"Why?!" She stomped loudly, making the ground shake as she turned toward Ashina.

"You have training to do."

"I can train there!"

"And you won't; we both know that."

"I can train to emotionally control myself around children!" She tried. "That's still training, no?!"

"I'd like to see you try." I laughed, making her stomp again, only missing my leg because I was fast enough to pull it away.

"Renjiro," She glared at me, whispering through gritted teeth and a fake smile, "You're not helping, dattebane..."

"I don't want to," I whispered back, dodging another stomp.

"..." Ashina considered her for another moment, but in the end, to all of our surprise, he just shrugged. "You may go."

"Huh?" Kushina blinked, almost tripping over nothing. "What?"

"On one condition." The old man said, pointing a finger at her. "You go back to meditate right now and sit for one full hour, without speaking a word."

...

....

.....

The next morning, the wider staff and especially the kids inside Academy had no idea we were there, which was intentionally arranged as such by the Uzumakis. Meeting the ancient one was also completely different from what I expected. He wasn't like Ashina at all, more like Kushina, in a good way. He looked maybe about 80, if I had to guess, but acted like someone who was barely 20 and laughed happily when he met us. He walked before us all, shook hands, told me he'd seen me fight in the battle over Uzushio, and spoke VERY animatedly about how he'd gained a few more years from all that excitement. Which I thought would have an opposite effect on an old man, but... what do I know?

Anyway, we entered through a side entrance before classes began, and Sora was already there, sitting in a chair, apparently asleep.

"Morning." He said just as we all filed in. So he wasn't asleep... Okay. "I looked up the kid's background, and his family line traces back to the Senju era. They were always a regular, local family who helped build Konoha. That's all. Their only connection to shinobi like us is that they moved in when the village was completed, but never produced any."

"So he is your colleague? Huh. Another weirdo." Kushina whispered, watching Sora, who refused to open his eyes until just now.

"Yep." I nodded.

"Says the main one," Masanori said, chuckling, making Kushina twitch an eyebrow but hold back whatever came to mind. Ouch... He wasn't playing around, eh?

"Hm?" Sora flinched at the unfamiliar voices, opening his eyes wider as he noticed the Uzumaki elder. "Good morning...?"

"Good indeed!" Masanori nodded. "I like going to school; it makes me remember how it was when I was a kiddo, running around, carefree of the world's problems, stomping on the backs of my peers who were too weak to contain my spirit."

"Huh?" We all asked in sync, turning towards him. If... If Kushina has time to grow old... will she be like this, too?

"Good morning," Shinno-sensei joined us shortly afterward, prompting Masanori to repeat the same greeting, but sensei remained unperturbed. "Everything is prepared."

"I hope that they know nothing?" The old man asked, rubbing his stubble.

"No. We made sure."

"Perfect."

"What exactly are we doing?" I asked, because apparently, this was something that Masanori himself submitted, setting it up before even informing us.

"Just a written examination." He waved a hand. "Don't worry about it!"

"Sounds cruel." Sora shrugged. "I always hated them."

"..." Shinno-sensei said nothing, simply giving him a look that made Sora flinch as he realized his old teacher was still frightening, even if he couldn't punish him.

Because nobody told us what the test was about, I watched curiously from our hidden observation room with my Sharingan on, as the test was administered during the second period. All students in Jin's year took it, so it was not just Jin... Probably an asssement to find others, too, huh? Good thinking. It was also not exciting at all... Quite boring, if I say so myself: watching rows of children bent over a set of papers, looking around with confused faces. Maybe it could have been a bit funny, but... Even that became boring after a while.

"He's different," Masanori spoke up suddenly, about twenty minutes later, and I glanced at Jin at once.

"You can tell?" Kushina asked, furrowing her brows, "I can't."

"The others are barely writing," Sora chimed in. "Look at his hand and compare it to the others."

True enough: while many of the others constantly looked around, wrote a few lines, then scratched their heads, Jin stayed wholly focused on the paper. Even if he furrowed his brows, he was still constantly scribbling something down. Through my Sharingan, I managed to catch things they were writing down, and I realized that the test wasn't about some formula... Not openly, that is. However, one was hidden within it, like an actual seal would form if you were smart enough... and Jin had noticed the clues.

In the end, we waited forty-five minutes for the test to end and for all the papers to be collected. It was time to grade, and to my surprise, the old man didn't start with Jin's paper; he went in order, actually grading everyone's work.

"The first gets three percent."

"Three?" We all asked, hearing him hum and reach for another already.

"He got his name right, and that is already something." He laughed, looking super cheerful, announcing all the percentages, clapping when someone got above ten.

"Yo..." Sora looked at me, whispering. "Is he... You know...?"

"Mad? I have no fucking idea." I answered, without having any answer at all.

"Ahahahahaha!" Masanori suddenly laughed so loudly that it made us all jump, while he was waving a blank form. "At least this one knew he isn't getting anything right on this paper... I love it! Full marks!"

"Just because he left it empty?" Sayuri asked, gawking, turning to Kushina, who was just as stumped.

"Duh." Masanori nodded. "They didn't put down their names either... So they wouldn't be identified. They only forgot that we will know who was the only one who didn't write down their name, but I appreciate the thought process."

"..."

It was best to just shut up and let him work. I guess. Uzumakis are scary... And while I was thinking that, the man in question fell silent and became way too focused. Huh... Is it finally Jin's paper? We had to wait about fifteen minutes before he finally looked up and rubbed his eyes.

"Sixty-five percent." He said, tapping his finger on the paper, sounding serious for the first time in... Well, since this morning. "The boy is good. His explanations and calculations are weird, very much so, because he has no proper training. He doesn't have the names or the vocabulary to explain what things mean, but he noticed the hidden formula in the questionnaire. He managed to extrapolate parts of it from the wording alone, which is incredible. Of course he messed up the reconstruction, so I could deduct points for that, but... I won't. This is a very promising start; his mind is very much attuned to pattern recognition. We could train him."

"Then we should," I nodded, feeling excited. "We need specialists!"

"That we do." Masanori agreed, suddenly looking at me with a smile. "You will accompany him."

"Excuse me?" I flinched, and Kushina stifled a laugh, looking back and forth between us and pointing at my shocked face.

"Ashina told me you still haven't mastered putting down your own seals. Tsk-tsk, Renji-kun, that won't do. While I teach this young boy the basics of seals... You are going to learn to place down your Hiraishin marks. I was told to not let you go home or fool around with your girlfriend until you make it work."