"I hope you learned something from this."

Biwa-sensei craned his neck around to give me the most bombastic side-eye as I clung to his back.

"You hope I learned something from this?" he repeated, incensed. "I hope you learned something. That being to shut your kami-damned mouth for once!"

Yep, he was big mad.

"Not sure where you got that impression," I said, blithely. "I got positive reinforcement every step of the way. Every word I uttered paid dividends."

"What the fuck is a dividend?" he asked, tiredly. I blinked, far more exhausted than he was.

"Ah, doesn't matter," I sighed, feeling the rawness in my throat. "What exactly do you take issue with? The fight or Hanzo? Because the first was to psych him out, which I'd say worked pretty damn well."

That was well and truly apparent. I would also bet all my fūinjutsu material that he was internally giggling and kicking his feet into the air during my little speech at the end, where I called out Konoha on its bullshit.

Gonna be honest; I'm not really sure what came over me, just then. I guess Minato's ideology struck a nerve. My old world was full of those hypocrite idealists—their voices were some of the loudest. They'd be the first to condemn the system for its flaws, but they couldn't be bothered to do a quick Google search to even educate themselves on the topic, much less articulate or advocate for a meaningful alternative. Like, seriously. Propose a realistic solution or shut the fuck up.

Biwa-sensei snorted at the reminder. "Hanzo."

"Well, that one you really shouldn't be upset about," I said. "The whole original point of this mission was to introduce us on the world stage, right? Who better to have as a witness than Hanzo the fucking Salamander?"

"You don't play games with men like Hanzo," he stressed.

"What are you talking about?" I asked. "Everyone likes games. That's one of the few things all humans have in common, no matter where you come from or what you believe in. We eat, we sleep, we shit, we breathe. And we all hate being bored. You just need a proper sense of timing, and a sense of what certain people enjoy. Hanzo watched that fight all the way through without stopping us. If he fully wanted to prevent conflict on his soil, he wouldn't have even let us throw a single punch. He wanted to take our measure. And I didn't want to disappoint him."

Once again, I had taken Biwa-sensei completely off guard. I chuckled softly. "I know I seem brash, but I do think things through."

To a point. Of course, my explanation, in this instance, was misleading. I knew enough about Hanzo's true personality from Naruto to feel secure in my actions. If I didn't, I definitely would have kept my mouth shut.

Biwa-sensei sighed, no doubt hating he'd gotten such a smart aleck as a student.

"Well? What exactly, pray tell, was I supposed to learn from your fight?" he asked, giving up on reprimanding me.

"That the world isn't going to wait for me," I said, wearily. "I might be advanced for my age, but I'm a big frog in a small pond. There are people just as talented as I am. I'm not like them." I jerked my head at Iwao and Daigo, walking a ways ahead of us. "I don't have the luxury of growing at a more natural pace. That kid I fought…he's just as good as me. He could easily surpass me if I don't shape up. I need to be challenged, pushed harder."

"You think I'm not pushing you hard enough?" he asked, his voice genuinely perplexed. He was no doubt remembering how frequently I had collapsed during our training break last month, too exhausted to stand.

"You're pushing my body plenty hard," I said. "And you're pushing my instincts. I'm not trying to undersell how important those things are. But you're not pushing my brain. Don't get me wrong; it's plenty active. That's why my Kaimon and Kyūmon stats are keeping pace. However, it's not really being pumped up with new shit."

Biwa-sensei shifted his grip under my legs.

"You clearly have something in mind with this," he said. "Spit it out."

I took a deep breath. "I like the Merit system—hey, fucking let me talk! I do! I think it's a great system. I actually enjoy using it. Earning Merits from missions, shopping around the archives, strategizing over what I should take. It makes learning jutsu feel far more rewarding. If there wasn't a fucking war on the horizon, I wouldn't even be bringing this up at all. But you gotta understand. Fūinjutsu is what sets me apart. It is the reason I was able to draw with that guy. Hamamoto-sama doesn't have time to teach me, and frankly I'm not fully sure I want to learn from him anyway. All he has to work with is scrapings of knowledge stolen from other people, and I'm never going to surpass Konoha by chasing their coattails. However, and I know this might be a little difficult for you to understand, the best way for me to develop new Fūinjutsu by far is by learning ninjutsu."

That ability is what gave me the edge in my fight against Minato. Without my ninjutsu mimicking seals, he would have killed me the very first time he fired off his original wind jutsu. And even beyond directly translating ninjutsu into seal form, they still taught me a lot about chakra interactions, shape manipulation, everything. It was like learning what flavor profiles complement one another, instead of mindlessly replicating recipes you find on the internet.

"I'm not asking for free reign of all the archives," I stated. "I'm not asking for anything flashy, or even offensive. I want B-rank utility jutsu. Things I can learn from and integrate into my seals. I made a crack about it when we left for Fugatoro, but I was dead serious. I could do incredible things with the Weighted and Lightened Boulder Techniques. Seriously. Even Jiraya might not have been able to save him if I had those."

Sensei was silent, and I shook my head.

"Besides. I shouldn't have to rely on you to feed me answers in times of crisis. If you didn't give me a fire jutsu in the nick of time, I might have died. That's not gonna fly. You won't always be there."

It didn't escape my notice—or sensei's notice, I'm sure—that Minato had done the same damn thing I did, despite not having figured out that he could copy jutsu Uchiha style on his own. Jiraya had given him the hand seals to a new jutsu, and he possessed the skill to pull it off perfectly on his first attempt. No doubt, now that I had given him the idea, he would be using my trick to grow more rapidly from here on out.

"I'll think about it," Biwa-sensei said gruffly after a long minute. "What else?"

"I want dedicated time set aside for me to work with Date-shishou again," I rattled off. "I learned a lot from him in the academy, and I'll learn even more now that I have a greater knowledge base. Again, learning how to modify and create new ninjutsu will both increase my combat ability and help my fūinjutsu advance."

It also burned my pride that Minato had an original ninjutsu to his name while I didn't. My only fully original technique was fūinjutsu.

"That could probably be arranged," sensei said. "He certainly likes you enough to agree. What else?"

"Just one last thing." Which hopefully wouldn't offend his sensibilities quite as much. "I need a variance. Article fifty-eight, clause C. Preferably a title two, but I'll settle for a title one."

He definitely wasn't expecting me to rattle off legal jargon.

"I have no idea what that means," he confessed, which I expected.

"It will essentially allow me to purchase more fūinjutsu supplies—ink specifically—than the average consumer," I told him. "Fūinjutsu ink is hard to source, so people are limited on how much they can purchase for personal use. However, especially after today, my stocks are running on fumes."

Truthfully, I was already working with a lot more than I should be. Since I was professionally attached to Kazuhiro's Sky Division, I handled the creation of their fūinjutsu arsenal, using the resources granted to them by Iwagakure. The amount of which well surpassed what an individual could get ahold of. They were audited frequently to make sure their resources weren't being "misplaced," so I had to keep a detailed log of what I created, which would be compared to their standing armory and another log of what the division used that was managed by Kazuhiro.

However, in all fūinjutsu creation, there was a built-in margin of error. It was inevitable for any traditional method of writing seals to incur a degree of wasted ink, which would compound over time. Whether it be from ink drying on the brush or in the well, or from more overt mistakes that would need to be discarded. The auditors weren't going to clap anyone in irons for botching a seal every once in a while.

(Though if it kept happening, they would start asking serious questions.)

That margin of error presented an opportunity. Because, with my method of seal creation, there really wasn't any waste. Which meant I could skim that allotted extra off the top and pocket it for personal use. Those amounts added up, especially once Kazuhiro submitted his treatise on aerial tactics (that I ghost-wrote), which featured explosives heavily. Once it was proven effective in the field, our ink ration was significantly increased. That their missions now edged in on what was the Explosion Corps' professional domain was just icing on the cake.

(Kazuhiro didn't know I was doing this. Wanted him to keep some plausible deniability and all that.)

"I don't know enough about the subject to say if that's reasonable or not," Biwa-sensei said. "But I suppose I'd rather those resources go to you than someone just wanting to turn a profit off of some standard exploding tags."

He lowered his voice further.

"I don't know if Hamamoto-san has told you this or not. But most fūinjutsu we've encountered are classified by Iwagakure as foreign bloodline techniques."

"Foreign bloodline techniques?" I repeated with a frown. "Why?"

"Because we've completely and utterly given up on trying to understand how they work, or how to replicate them," he said, bluntly. "And so has just about everyone else. They are secrets that transcend our understanding. It was assumed that we couldn't learn them, so they were classified as bloodline techniques, which, when encountered, our shinobi are supposed to deal with in certain ways."

Generally, when encountering enemy bloodlines, the technical response was to eliminate any person who possessed them, and destroy any texts detailing their use. Destroy, not bring back to Iwa.

"That's foolish," I scoffed, annoyed by the revelation. "We have people who can use fūinjutsu. Not many, but still."

"Maybe so. But like you said, those people have been trying to copy the Uzumaki. We thought we might be able to make some progress finally, using what we won from Uzu, but even with detailed notes, so much of it seems far out of reach."

He paused for a moment.

"Imai. When you said you understand fūinjutsu, what did you mean?"

I licked some blood off my lips. "Gomen, sensei. I can't just go revealing S-class secrets like that."

Biwa-sensei didn't seem upset at that. Actually, from how his muscles relaxed ever so slightly, I got the sense that he was relieved.

"Then the Tsuchikage and Hamamoto-san know."

I nodded, though he probably couldn't see since I was on his back. "It was something I discovered with Machi Aimi, who you met at my birthday. Almost immediately after, she was pulled from the academy and taken as his apprentice. I took a different path."

He grunted. "Then I don't foresee any objections to your request. We're all tired of chasing Konoha's coattails."

- - - { ワナビー } - - -

So Biwa-sensei said, but I hadn't heard so much as a whisper about any of my requests being filled. Two weeks had gone by, and I was feeling antsy. Returning to Iwagakure after that mission felt surreal; it was like two entirely segregated concepts in my mind had been smooshed together.

Meeting Jiraya and Minato was incredible. Even if we were on opposite sides, it truly drove home that this was real. I wasn't just in a fantasy world with a funky magic system, I was in Naruto. Until now, I hadn't encountered anyone who had more than half an hour of cumulative screen time. And that person I had only shared a single, brief conversation with. I had no idea that was about to change.

My day started as normal. I woke up early, went to training. Biwa-sensei put us through the ringer, and during the breaks he gave us I struggled through some of the homework Aimi gave me. The seal was coming along, though I was really beginning to dread its implementation. I would straight up need to have surgery, and I needed to be awake during it to direct my chakra properly. Thank god I could be under a genjutsu that blocked physical sensation.

But I digress. It was an entirely ordinary day, by my standards, until Biwa-sensei brought us to the Tsuchikage's Palace.

"A little late for a mission, isn't it?" I probed. Besides that, it was poor form to take a mission when you're physically exhausted, unless there was really no other choice.

"We're not here for a mission," Biwa-sensei revealed, his face a mask. "We're here because, try as I might, I can't put this off any longer. We better just get it over with."

"Get what over with, sensei?" Daigo asked, guardedly, his hatred of surprises overpowering his distaste of speaking in general. I was more curious about our surroundings. I hadn't been nearly this high up in the Tsuchikage's palace before. It almost seemed like we were heading to the very top of the highest tower. And there were Red Ogres everywhere, though they let us pass with nary a glance.

Biwa-sensei sighed. "A tradition. Something a sensei is supposed to do once they receive a genin team."

There sure were a fuckton of guards, especially when we reached a giant, ornate door. Though it was hardwood, it had been reinforced with decorative—but still very functional—iron bars. It looked sturdy enough to take an artillery shell. Busting down the walls surrounding it might be easier.

"Kamizuru-sama," a tallish jonin greeted, and I squinted up at him. He looked familiar, for some reason—he was incredibly muscular, like Biwa-sensei, and his face was oddly square and bore dark facial hair shaved into a chinstrap. I imagine that straight women would think him a catch, despite his mildly off-putting head shape.

"Kitsuchi-san," Biwa-sensei greeted in turn. "Are they here?"

The other jonin must have been quite familiar with Biwa-sensei, because his lips quirked into a wry grin.

"I think you know the answer to that already," he said. "They were expecting you nearly an hour ago."

Oooh, yikes. Yeah, Sensei really didn't want to be here. But Kitsuchi…where had I heard that name? He wasn't an extremely prolific shinobi in Iwa—I hadn't memorized his details since I transmigrated here. I was pretty sure that I knew his name from Before, which meant he had some plot relevance.

"I hope they didn't wait on our account," sensei grumbled.

"Unfortunately, in this instance, you aren't so lucky," Kitsuchi said, and Biwa-sensei tched.

"Fine, then. Let's get this over with."

As no less than six shinobi put in great effort to open the doors, Kitsuchi turned an appraising eye upon us.

"So this is your team, eh?" he said. "I've heard about you three. Especially you." He met my gaze. "You've caused my Kouhai more than a little grief. Yoshiro called you his problem child. I'm surprised a runt like you gave him so much trouble."

He wasn't seriously insulting me. This was just how people from Iwa spoke to one another.

"Is that so?" I mused. "Well, I'm surprised he has a single friend at all. Besides, he's been just as great a pain in my ass, so it evens out."

Kitsuchi chuckled. "I suggest you temper the language. The Great Lady doesn't appreciate uncouthness."

I didn't have time to wonder who the Great Lady was before he stepped to the side, and perspective revealed a symbol stitched into the shoulder of his single, red sleeve. The dots connected instantly, and my eyes widened as I remembered exactly who this was.

Kitsuchi. Father of Kurotsuchi, the Yondaime Tsuchikage. Son-in-law of the Sandaime.

Fuck. Biwa-sensei just made us late for a meeting with the Tsuchikage.

It was apparent from my teammates' suddenly pale faces that they put the puzzle together as fast as I had. We were late. To a meeting with the Tsuchikage. If this was an official thing, that would not happen. We were meeting him in an unofficial capacity, likely as the students of his son, rather than as subordinates.

"Sensei?" I said to him, softly.

"What?" he replied.

"I hate you."

He didn't dignify that with a response as he swept past us, leading the way as if he lived here. Which he probably did. Kitsuchi fell in step behind Daigo, who's steps were beyond robotic.

The royal living quarters were just what I would expect. Beautiful tapestries hung on the walls, artful statues stood on plinths. There were no plaques, but I imagined that they were gifts (or peace offerings). There were quite a few bonsai too, all perfectly manicured. I think Ōnoki had an addiction. The only thing this place seemed to lack was windows. Guess they were too much of a security risk.

Then, far too soon, we encountered people. The Tsuchikage, of course, and an older woman who I could only assume to be his wife. She was a traditional beauty with dark but graying hair, who wore a semi-formal yukata. She had very little muscle definition; I didn't think she trained her body at all. She wasn't a kunoichi, and probably never had been.

The two of them seemed to be entertaining themselves separately as they waited. The Tsuchikage with some pruning shears and a small cultivation that seemed to be grown from a sprig of pine, and his wife with a book. They both looked up as we arrived.

"You're late."

Those two words, spoken dispassionately by the Tsuchikage, stabbed me through the gut.

"And filthy," the Great Lady said with a frown, which was almost worse. "This is how you present yourselves before the High Diplomat, the Minister of Trade? Not to mention the Tsuchikage?"

As Iwao and Daigo hurriedly prostrated themselves, apologizing as best as they could without throwing Biwa-sensei under the bus (as much as he deserved it, such an action wouldn't be proper given his station), I stayed silent, eyes narrowed at the Tsuchikage's wife. Because, though she wasn't a ninja, I could tell at a glance that this woman was sharp. She had to be, if she was in such positions of prominence. No one in this situation would think we were actually at fault in this situation. She would know what her son was like.

I saw a glint of cruel humor, of satisfaction in her eyes as my teammates made fools of themselves, and came to a conclusion.

She's fucking with us.

"Gomennasai," I apologized, interrupting Iwao's rambling with utter sincerity on my face as I channeled my inner Kakashi. "There was a traveling circus you see, and some troublemaker decided to release all the animals at once onto the street. It was utter chaos. It was my duty as an Iwa kunoichi to protect our people from the stampeding beasts, shielding them with my own body when I needed to. Before they could cause further property damage, I corralled them with my earth jutsu back into their pens. Unfortunately, the lion didn't go down easily. It was valuable, you see, so the ringleader begged me not to harm it. I had to subdue it with my might alone."

I paused before throwing in, for good measure, "then I ran across an old woman struggling to carry her groceries home from the market. I couldn't just leave her, so I lifted her burden and escorted her to her residence. Then, once I was finished, I found another, then another, then another. By the time I was finally able to make it here, if you can believe it, I'd escorted twelve old women to their homes. But I'd do it all again to see the looks of tearful appreciation on each of their faces," I finished, shaking my head wistfully.

The room was silent as everyone—the two royal Kamizuru and the guards filtering in behind us—digested all that. Then—

"My goodness," the Great Lady Kamizuru simpered, a dainty hand covering the beginnings of a grin on her face. "What an incredible effort towards the betterment of our people. I can hardly fault you for being such an upstanding young lady."

She turned to look at Iwao and Daigo, who were staring at me in utter bafflement. "And what about your teammates? What trials did they take, which left them so filthy?"

"Oh, them?" I said, entirely blasé. "They didn't do anything but watch. They're just slobs."

I don't know why they looked so betrayed, since every bit of that was so obviously a lie. But my reply was so unexpected that the Great Lady couldn't restrain a bark of surprised laughter.

"Oh, I like you, child," she said, her eyes dancing in the firelight of the impressive chandelier above them. "However, I don't let anyone unwashed at my dinner table. It's unhygienic."

Her eyes slid to her son's, who seemed to be avoiding eye-contact. "Biwa. I thought I taught you to be more courteous than this."

"I can't compromise the training of those entrusted to my care for frivolities," he said, stiffly.

Unlike my teammates, I didn't quite care about Biwa-sensei's station.

"Ne, Sensei did his best," I…defended, trying to mimic the wicked glint in his mother's eye. "He gave us many extended breaks, which is uncharacteristic of him. No doubt he was trying to make our day less strenuous. Sure, it may have been more effective to allow us time to bathe after training, but men think in strange ways sometimes."

I patted his arm condescendingly, and I could tell from his eye twitch that it took all of his self-control not to swat my hand away.

"Very true," the Great Lady said, nodding sagely. "In matters of delicacy we must often do the thinking for them. I feel relieved to be able to leave my son in your care. Please continue to support him in matters he is too thick-headed to grasp. Like respect, and politeness."

At the insinuation that I was the one taking care of him, Biwa-sensei practically had a seizure.

"Of course," I said, magnanimously. "I hope one day he can learn to rely on me. If he had done so today, we would not be late, and we would not be dirty."

"I'm sure," she replied. "But for now, Kitsuchi will show you to the bath, and we will have clean clothes sent to you. Please enjoy them, and return refreshed."

"Is that truly necessary, mother?" Biwa-sensei protested. "It is already late. I'm sure you two are hungry."

"Luckily, we anticipated something like this," the Tsuchikage interrupted, seeming just as amused by our exchange as his wife. "We had a very late lunch. As a matter of fact, I could use the extra time to build back my appetite."

"Arigato," I said. "In that case, we will take our time. With how busy he is, I'm sure you don't get much opportunity to enjoy your son's company."

Just had to drive the knife deeper. Maybe Biwa-sensei would think twice about messing with us like this again. Or maybe training tomorrow would just be twice as brutal.

Whatever. For the look on Sensei's face, it would be worth it.

"You have such considerate students," the Great Lady beamed. "Please enjoy the baths. We will await your return."

- - - { ワナビー } - - -

AN: Kasaiki did not, in fact, learn to shut her kami-damned mouth lol.

A rare Thursday update appears! I learned very quickly that my plan to continue Sunday uploads was unrealistic. I'm just going to post inconsistently, as often as I can manage for the time being. Monday I close on the house, and then we start the moving process. We have two months before our lease us up, which is probably a good thing because there's so much that needs to be done. It's ready to move in, but I'm sure there's some minor renovations to take care of, which will be a lot easier to do before all our junk is there. Plus my fiance and I still work full time, so that's gonna happen during the weekend, aka my prime writing time.

I'll do my best. Thank you for your patience.

About the last chapter. The more I think about it, the less I'm pleased with the Kyuubi part. I was trying to channel the aspect of Kurama that we saw before Naruto befriended him. Back them, the kyuubi was kind of a seductor, trying to convince Naruto to call on his power and lose control. In my part, Kurama was trying to convince Minato to let him kill him after crushing his dreams because that would bring him amusement, but he felt honor bound to let him live otherwise. Additionally, he saw Minato personally as somewhat of a threat, due to his ties to Kushina. That was my intention, but I don't think I succeeded. Ah, well. Something to revisit in the rewrite that I swear is going to happen eventually.

Some people in the comments were confused about why the Kyubi felt like he owed Minato. The chakra suppression cuffs kept Kushina from using Kurama's chakra. Even though he hated Kushina and didn't care about her happiness or life, the Kyuubi doesn't want to be taken to Kumo. He knows he's just going to be resealed, and his new host would probably be worse because, even though Kushina's seal is actively torturing him, he views her as a known factor that he has a more than decent chance of corrupting. She lost her entire clan and home. She's understandably incredibly angry at everyone and everything. If there's anyone mentally unstable enough to let him out if pushed too far, it's her. Which is why he saw Minato as a slight threat. Through Kushina's eyes, he saw that Minato was trying to ground her, to be a tie to the living, rather than those already dead. He continues to seek her out and befriend her, despite how hard she pushes him away. The Kyuubi knows that, if Minato succeeds, he will have a harder time getting her to snap.

Tldr, the Kyuubi views Kushina as an easily bribable warden, and his ticket to freedom.

I don't have a Ptrn. If you've gotten just five bucks of enjoyment out of this story, please consider buying my original work on amazon (information in my bio). Between the two sites this fic is posted on, I have over 2500 readers. If even half of you choose to support me in this fashion, I would have considerable bargaining power when it comes to getting future books published. More publishing deals means I can quit my day job, which translates into more time for fanfiction. It's a one time thing, and you even get more of my writing out of it.

See you when I see you!