A/N:
because someone asked, the 'Save Point' function doesn't allow Renma to bypass death - he has to manually activate it. like, if he wanted to reset to a certain point - which won't happen very often and won't be very far in the past (like, 3 days max, though usually more like a few hours) - he'd have to think of 'Save Point' and confirm. if he, for whatever reason, was killed before confirmation (or even opening the save point), he'd stay dead. this doesn't, however, mean that saving is useless. i have at least one major plot point when it comes to saving, and i already said that this is an underpowered gaming ability, so there's not gonna be any cheating death or resetting to the beginning so he can be super OP, or whatever.
also: if you can think of any interactions he should have with certain people or just general suggestions, feel free to lmk and i might try to implement them
anyways, the next chapter will have the exams and start up the academy arc *and* the genuine introduction of at least one canon character, so hope you're ready for that :P
Wearing a mask was… odd at first, though more so because it was connected to an undershirt than anything else. After living through part of a mask-enforced pandemic, though, it wasn't particularly difficult to get used to, and other than the odd looks I received every now and then, everything was normal after a while.
Except.
"Reading," Kenta said moments after appearing within my sensing range, looking sour. I turned towards the boy, and my confusion must've shown on my face immediately, because he scowled and elaborated. "That's what I failed in the entrance exam."
"...Why are you telling me this?" I asked, because not only was it entirely out of character for him, but our relationship hadn't changed since his challenge, and I was still 'hated' by him.
His scowl deepened, and after a backwards glance in the direction of a small group of caretakers, he seemed to force himself to look at me. "You're always reading. And," he said, expression twisting into one of further distaste, "...When I asked for help, they told me to come to you."
… Well, this is weird.
"Uh… well," I let out awkwardly, "What, exactly, is your problem?" Kenta gave me a look as if to ask if I was an idiot, and I reiterated my question. " With the reading sections, I mean. Do you need help figuring out how to phrase your answers? Comprehension? Reading in general?"
Kenta pursed his lips, looking as if replying physically pained him. "The last thing."
"...Right," I replied, glancing to the side and picking up a book that had been gathering dust on my dresser. After taking a brief glance at the cover, I handed it over, and Kenta took it with a frown. "Try reading the summary."
The boy's grip on the book tightened, but reluctantly, he flipped over the book and began to read aloud. Slowly. And… not very well at all.
I frowned, watching his expression as it became increasingly frustrated, and listening to each stumble and pause before he finally became annoyed enough to throw the book on my bed.
"This is stupid," he said angrily, looking as if he'd blow up any second. "I'm not going to stick around just so you can mock me."
"I'm not trying to mock you," I replied, suppressing a sigh. "I'm just trying to figure out—" I paused and, after a moment, straightened. "Dyslexia."
Kenta's eyes flickered with confusion.
"Dyslexia - it's a learning disorder," I replied absently, going over Kenta's difficulties. "It… might be your problem." Or maybe a vision issue, though it seemed more unlikely since he didn't seem to have a problem with anything else. "Does it seem like the words or letters… jump around when you're trying to read? Or do any letters look 'unfinished,' or too similar to one another, or something along those lines?"
The boy simply stared, looking at me with an inscrutable expression. "...Right, well," I said somewhat hesitantly, "I'm not a doctor, so I can't diagnose you, but… if those are your problems, I think the treatments should be similar enough, for whatever your issue is, to at least help you somewhat."
Kenta narrowed his eyes. "Are you implying that there's something wrong with me?"
I withheld an exasperated sigh. "No, this isn't an uncommon thing. I am trying to help, believe it or not." Kenta pursed his lips, and I continued. "If you don't trust me enough, you could probably go to the nurse - they'd probably know better than I do," I said, hoping that I was right in assuming that someone - likely Yamanakas - would have made at least some type of note on certain learning difficulties. "Otherwise, reading words and sounds aloud would probably help some, and you might want to follow what you're reading with a finger or separate the lines with a straightedge so there's less of a chance of jumbling words up. I know there's also some multisensory thing, but again, you'd be better off going to a professional for that."
Kenta remained silent for several moments before letting out an aggravated sigh. "Fine," he muttered. " Fine ." He looked me over and clenched his fists to his side. "You better not be messing with me."
"I'm not," I promised.
He kept his gaze on me for another several seconds before finally turning around, only pausing momentarily before leaving without another word.
+15 reputation with Kenta Takahashi
I glanced at the notification, letting out a slight huff. Without another word from him, at least.
"Kill me now," I muttered, my masked chin pressed against the dirt. My muscles were sore, my heart was beating too fast for my liking, my sweat was practically acting as a second layer of skin, and everything was terrible.
Exercise , I thought with a scowl. What a horrible thing .
…That probably wasn't a good line of thought for someone who wanted to be a shinobi, considering the absolutely inhuman feats they performed on the regular. But at the same time, I was forcing myself to train without chakra enhancement - both to strengthen my muscles and because I'd rather not accidentally explode myself, thankyouverymuch - and while that might not be so bad normally, I had to exercise a lot to ensure that I wouldn't be horribly behind the clan kids when I got to the academy.
At the moment, I wouldn't be surprised if the majority of the other civilian kids would beat me. Granted, I doubted I'd fail the exams unless I did something criminally stupid, since, while desgined to weed out weaker kids, there's no way they could be that difficult - other civilian kids who'd never actually trained were able to pass, after all. Still, I wasn't too keen on being shown up by literally everyone except the dead lasts (and maybe Shikamaru, if he was feeling especially lazy), and the only way to ensure that I wouldn't be in the back of the pack was, unfortunately, actually pushing myself.
(On another, more positive note, I did manage to confirm some of my timeline suspicions. It was hard to tell from the forested park, but after going a little out of the way, I managed to catch sight of the Hokage Mountain, which had four Hokages, meaning that the Kyuubi thing already happened at some point. My best guess was that I was in either Naruto's generation or Lee's, since Itachi's was too close to the war, and I was being optimistic for once and was hoping I wouldn't be thrown in a class full of unknowns.)
Anyways.
With two months to go until the academy entrance exams, I was primarily focusing on getting my physical conditioning up to par. Playing with chakra was more enticing, but while first years weren't expected to use chakra, they were expected to not drop dead when they had to do more than 5 sit-ups in a row. Truly a travesty.
Speaking of the exams: from what I could gather, they incorporated basic reading and writing skills - usually by having prospective academy students read a passage and responding to a few basic questions in relation to said passage - basic math, and some sort of physical test that seemed to change at least slightly every year, with the only commonality being that they were relatively uncomplicated, seeming to rely on strength and/or endurance instead of something like flexibility or accuracy.
I figured that, as long as I read a few of the history books in the orphanage, I'd be good to go for the academic portions, at the very least. The physical portion would be more difficult since, while reading about exercise helped with theory , it wouldn't help me genuinely improve - hence why I was forcing myself to do some type of exercise at least once per day, no matter how miserable it made me.
After a few more minutes of moping, I pushed myself up with a heavy sigh and braced myself for further, oncoming pain.
At least, I thought with a grimace as I settled into position, there's no peppy fitness instructors to inadvertently mock me while I fail.
There were new caretakers in the orphanage.
That wasn't anything particularly alarming, since trainee-caretakers and volunteers would crop up every once and a while, but it was certainly suspicious . I'd noticed, after looking back through some older memories, that during a certain time of year, just a few more volunteers and trainees showed up than usual.
It wasn't anything especially noticeable if you weren't looking for it, but when you were , it was hard not to see just how odd it was that there were suddenly more people willing to work out three to four months before the New Year, only for the number to start dropping as soon as late-December hit.
This could, of course, mean that there was a simple pattern to how they did things, but while a similar trial-period ending time could be excused, it wasn't like there was a sudden flood of orphans - which was a sentence I never thought I'd ever think - at a specific time of year, so an excess of caretakers just… didn't make a whole lot of sense.
Or, it didn't until one of the last days of November and my age group was corralled into an oddly clear room where the fucking Hokage - and two visible guards with very vaguely familiar chakra signatures, having apparently been disguised as two of many caretakers who'd shown up about a month back - was waiting for us.
Hindsight is twenty-twenty , I thought a bit hysterically, wiping away the majority of my ROOT-centered worries as I sat down next to one of my many awed-looking peers.
The man, I noticed as we waited for everyone to get settled, was almost unnerving to look at, in an odd sort of way. He looked grandfatherly, and by all means should've comforted me - like I assumed it did for all of the other kids - but the fact that I couldn't pick out anything from his expression was the more prominent thing to focus on, for me.
I couldn't sense emotions or anything, but being a stay-in-the-background sort of person did have its advantages, and I'd gotten pretty good at figuring out personalities and, for lack of a better word, 'vibes' of a person without ever even talking to them. When I looked at the Hokage, though, all I could see was that grandfatherly persona he was showing off, and while it should've made it seem more genuine, the fact that there were no faults - and the fact that I knew that the man was not , in fact, just a kind old man - made it seem artificial.
In general, he was the epitome of a misleading person. Anyone who took a look at the man - whether it be just a passing glance or a studying look - would likely see his short stature, wrinkled skin, and kind smile and dismiss him immediately. Even those who knew he was anything more would still be hard-pressed to see him as big of a threat as he actually was, likely to dismiss him as an old man stuck in his time even if he was more powerful than the average shinobi.
It was kind of terrifying, actually. He wasn't as powerful as most of the other Hokages, sure, but he was still a force to be reckoned with, and could be even scarier than those stronger than him with how he wielded his brains with his brawn.
Of course, he had to go and absolutely ruin his genius Professor thing with a string of bad decisions - most involving Danzou, in some way or another - but being able to keep up the charade was still pretty impressive on its own.
"Good morning, children," the man began once everyone - except the caretakers, who stood against the side walls - was seated, "I hope you're all doing as well as I am."
It was a good opening. It didn't reveal anything, it was rather neutral while still bringing others' opinions into it, and it was generally pleasant.
And it was clearly orchestrated, despite how utterly simple it was.
His tone, enunciation, and his choice of words, while seemingly careless and benign, immediately commanded attention. He spoke kindly yet firmly, and his voice carried over the entire crowd despite the excited whispers that broke out between the children.
Sage , I hoped I'd never have to be in a position where I'd even have to plan out my greetings . No wonder the man wanted to get rid of the hat.
"As you may know," he continued, "A little over a month from now, all of you will have the chance to join our village's shinobi academy." Join , not take the exams for , I noted as Sarutobi's gaze swept over the crowd, lips curling up into a small smile as the kids seemed to bounce in their seats. "Now, who here plans to become a shinobi?"
I doubted anyone was surprised when just about every kid's hand rocketed upwards and loud shouts of 'Me!' began echoing throughout the room.
Sarutobi hummed, smiling slightly as he stroked his goatee. "And does anyone mind sharing just why they'd like to become a shinobi?"
A small chunk of hands dropped - a group I was part of - and some wavered hesitantly, but most lingered in the air. After a few seconds, Sarutobi gestured towards a black-haired boy in the middle of the group, nodding when the boy pointed at himself to confirm who the movement was directed towards.
"And what's your name, young man?" the man asked.
"Takeo!" the boy, who I remembered to be one of the more hyper kids at the orphanage, announced loudly.
"That's a very fine name," Sarutobi replied, and Takeo grinned. "And why would you like to be a shinobi, Takeo-kun?"
The boy beamed, throwing his arms in the air. "To learn cool jutsus!"
The Hokage chuckled, and a good amount of the other children murmured - or shouted, in a decent amount of cases - their agreement. "Well, I suppose that's fair enough, Takeo-kun. As long as you're careful, I'm sure you can learn lots of interesting jutsus." ' And if you make it far enough, ' was left unsaid.
Unaware of the unspoken words, the children cheered, and several exclaimed about the jutsus they'd heard and read about and, in some cases, saw on one of their outings within the village.
"Right then," the Hokage said with a smile, catching everyone's attention once again. "Would anyone else like to share?"
After a quick glance over the crowd, Sarutobi chose another boy, this time near the front and with dark brown hair.
"Do you mind sharing your name as well?" the man asked, and the children's hands fell.
"My name's Asahi, Hokage-sama!" the boy replied politely, though with clear excitement.
"Nice to meet you, Asahi-kun," Sarutobi said with a slightly amused(?) smile. "And why would you like to become a shinobi?"
Asahi didn't spare a moment before shouting back his response. "To protect Konoha!"
Another obvious answer. One likely inspired by the many shinobi books that could be found just about anywhere, or maybe through overheard conversations from caretakers or civilians.
"That's a very good answer, Asahi-kun," Sarutobi praised, and the boy beamed . "Now," he said, addressing the rest of the crowd, "While all shinobi have their own reasons for starting their chosen career, they all have something in common; each and every one of our shinobi wishes to protect Konoha." His gaze swept the crowd once more. "Do any of you understand why that is?"
"Because it's our home?" someone from the crowd asked.
"That's part of it," Sarutobi agreed not unkindly, "But there's a more specific answer than that."
Confused murmuring echoed around the room for several moments before a brown-haired girl hesitantly raised her hand.
Sarutobi smiled, eyes falling upon the brunette. "And who are you, young one?"
"U-um… Hanae, Hokage-sama," she replied, looking faintly red.
"Hello, Hanae-chan," Sarutobi greeted, using a slightly softer tone than he had for the two boys. "Why do you think we protect Konoha?"
Hanae took a deep breath before speaking. "Um… I heard there was a will or something, I think…," she answered, looking uncertain.
Sarutobi's eyes crinkled at the corners as his smile widened. "That's right, Hanae-chan," he said, and the girl flushed, though looked decently pleased. "Our shinobi follow what's called the 'Will of Fire.' Now," he continued, "I don't expect that any of you know what that is, let alone know what it means, but if you become one of Konoha's shinobi, you'll learn with time. Do understand, though, that the 'Will of Fire' might mean something different to everyone."
The man paused, looking over the crowd once more. "The main idea, though, is that it's what gives Konoha and its people the strength and willpower to persevere; it's what allows our shinobi to continue fighting against all odds; it's brought to and from our home, within battles, within meetings, and even within simple, peaceful places like the orphanage you all reside in. Most importantly, though," gaze sharpening and tone becoming firmer as if to highlight the importance of his next statement, "It represents the hopes and dreams of the previous generations being passed onto the next, and what we do to ensure that the children of the future can burn brighter than those of the past."
After a moment of silence, the man relaxed his shoulders, re-adopting his grandfatherly smile even as his enunciation remained firm and clear. " That is the 'Will of Fire.'"
I couldn't help but let out a huff of laughter at the dramatic moment - especially since the whole speech seemed to be a bit of a waste, when it was used on literal five and six-year-olds - though it was lost in the crowd's resounding cheers, shared between children and caretakers alike.
Admittedly, the entire affair was incredibly impressive. Manipulative as all hell, yes, but impressive nonetheless and, in the end, a great plan to get preschoolers to sign up to be killers.
This was, of course, highly depressing and even more concerning. Unfortunately, it wasn't anything I could really do anything about. Overthrowing an entire government system - which was implemented throughout the entire world - wasn't really a job for one person to take - much less someone who was so inexperienced when it came to politics. Maybe something to try to 'fix' in the future, if I actually made it to my second decade of life - which was a thought that really just highlighted the problem, and one that I did not want to think too much about - but for now, my biggest concern was managing to make it into the academy, and after that, it would get increasingly messy from there. Something I did not look forward to, as much as the prospect of learning cool new shinobi things intrigued me.
Skill Level Up!
Sensing (Passive) - LVL2 (0.00% EXP)
'As a sensor, the player can determine the location of a target through their chakra signature as long as they're within the player's range and - depending on the target's level - not suppressing their chakra.'
Sensing range: 7.5 meters
+Minor Perk: Lie Detection
My eyes flicked towards the sudden burst of chakra at the very edge of my senses - which came from the jutsus that the two visible ANBU had begun throwing around as a demonstration - before returning to the new notification.
I'd been keeping track of the sensing ability, though it had been progressing as slowly as ever. I imagined it was because all I was sensing was civilian chakra systems, which was more of a background thing than anything else. The opportunity to sense genuine jutsu - which actually required my attention and gave me a better idea on what chakra was supposed to feel like when in use - had likely allowed the skill to gain a good chunk of EXP, which would've taken months to gather if I'd simply gone about my day-to-day life as I had been.
There wasn't too big of a difference between level one and two, but I was hoping that as the skill would be compounded in a way, or at least leveled more easily once I actually started working with (and around) chakra.
As for the other thing…
'Lie detection help.'
Lie Detection (Passive): The player will be able to discern whether or not someone is telling a lie as long as their chakra can be felt.
…Well, that would probably be helpful. I figured that, in a society centered around murder and espionage - and wasn't that a cheerful thought? - there would be plenty of lying, and it'd be pretty useful if I knew whether or not someone was attempting to pull the wool over my eyes, or something along those lines.
Loud cheering broke me from my thoughts, and I glanced up to see Sarutobi chuckling as the ANBU leapt back into place.
"I'm glad you enjoyed Iguana and Eagle's demonstration," the man said, looking vaguely amused. "Unfortunately, though, that marks the end of this presentation." Groans and protests rang throughout the room, and Sarutobi put his hand up, quieting them. "Now, now, I'm sure we'll all meet again some day - especially if you decide to join the academy, as I hope some of you do." He looked over everyone, rising from his seat. "I'd like to extend my thanks to all of you, along with your lovely caretakers, for allowing me to visit and speak with you all, and I hope to see you all at the beginning of the year ceremony, if you wish to attend. And maybe, you'll be able to tell me about your opinions on the 'Will of Fire' in the future."
Sarutobi offered a smile and, with a tip of his hat, he and the ANBU disappeared in a flurry of leaves.
I watched as the illusionary leaves fluttered downwards, lips quirked slightly upwards. I have to learn that, I thought. It was mainly because it generally seemed like a pretty useful jutsu to have in my repertoire - since, despite not being especially high-ranked, it was a good way to get around, and it wasn't like there wasn't the opportunity to make it into something greater like Shisui had managed to do - but I had to admit, the idea of just disappearing from conversations was pretty amusing and it was another reason - not a particularly good one, but a reason nonetheless - to learn the jutsu.
…Though I should probably be thinking about learning how to properly control my chakra before jutsus came into the picture, so I didn't end up blowing myself up or something equally as horrifying.
Unfortunately, I'd already resolved to wait on chakra exercises until I could run at least one lap around the open area of the park without taking any breaks along the way. Truly, it was terrible to be at least somewhat responsible.
A/N:
okay, so, if you couldn't tell, Renma is a decently cynical person
this will *not* be a hokage-bashing fic, but as of right now, Renma is a bit iffy towards him, since he knows what he let some people (danzou, orochimaru, etc.) get away with, but doesn't know the guy very well *himself*
and apologies for any possible mess ups with the dyslexia thing. i researched dyslexia for a good while, and i know that there's probably a difference between english and japanese dyslexia, but there's not as many specifics you can find with the latter
please let me know if anything should be fixed; i was thinking about not adding the point at all, but i'd already done the research and writing and aaagh
again, really sorry if anything is wrong, feel free to call me out - and i don't mean in a yelling at me sort of way, please - if you want to correct me
anyways
thanks for reading!