The atmosphere in the office turned heavy.
Hiruzen Sarutobi's old, bony fingers tapped the solid wooden desk again and again as he looked up at his disciple, who suddenly felt a little unfamiliar to him.
Just a few days ago, she had still been a pale little thing. In the blink of an eye, she had become taller than him. Her former soft, gentle air was gone, replaced by a depth as heavy as an abyss.
The mysterious gray light that had blanketed everything, the winds of change rising from Konoha and spreading through the ninja world, the Great Toad Sage's prophecy. At this point, all of it seemed clear.
Konome Taketori was, without question, the central figure behind the coming upheaval of the shinobi world.
"You're not the type to invite trouble for no reason. Tell me what you really want."
Hiruzen stared straight into the black eyes behind her mask, his gaze sharp enough to cut.
He understood his disciple's temperament very well. He knew full well that her volunteering to handle the visiting shinobi from the other villages was definitely not an act of goodwill.
What exactly she wanted to do, and what sort of transformation she would bring to the ninja world, was not something he particularly cared about. Half his body was already in the grave. Even if the world changed beyond recognition, he likely would not live long enough to fully witness it.
The only thing that truly mattered to him was whether her actions would threaten Konoha's peace.
"The one leading Kirigakure's exam team is Ao."
At the mention of that name, a cold smile curved Konome Taketori's lips.
Just as her power had reached completion, her enemy had delivered himself to her doorstep. Was there any luck greater than that?
Ao?
Hearing the name, Hiruzen paused for a moment. After thinking it over, he remembered exactly who that man was.
Ao of Kirigakure. A veteran elite jonin.
He had made his name during the Third Great Ninja War after killing a Hyuga main branch ninja and stealing a Byakugan, a bloodline the Hyuga clan had protected for a thousand years without ever losing.
The outside world called him the White Eye Killer.
Whoever had come up with that title had been viciously clever. It advertised Ao's possession of the Byakugan and his prowess as an assassin, while also slapping both Konoha and the Hyuga clan across the face.
Ao had risen to prominence by stepping on Konoha's dignity.
Because of that, he had earned a place on Konoha's golden bounty list. Combined with the black market reward, the price on his head had long surpassed one hundred million ryo.
The moment Hiruzen connected Ao's name with Konome Taketori's history, he finally understood why she had insisted on taking this assignment.
"But the Five Nation Joint Exam is about to begin. If you make a move on him now…"
"Teacher."
Konome Taketori cut him off in a low voice. Looking straight at his aged face, she said each word with absolute clarity.
"On this matter, there is no room for discussion."
The moment those words fell, the room became deathly silent.
Hiruzen and Konome Taketori locked eyes in open confrontation. To the side, Jiraiya, who had been happily spectating up until now, kept darting his gaze between them.
The scene gave him an overwhelming sense of déjà vu.
It looked just like the old arguments that used to happen in this office all the time, except now the cold, shadowy old man had been replaced by a tall, mysterious woman.
Who exactly was she?
That gray light had been her doing?
Was she the Child of Prophecy?
When had old man Sarutobi taken in another disciple?
Then what about him? Hadn't he been the one meant to guide the Child of Prophecy's future path?
Had the Great Toad Sage's prophecy been wrong?
Countless questions spun in Jiraiya's head. He wanted to ask, but the suffocating tension in the room was obviously not the right moment for it. So he could only hold it all in. Above his head, emotional motes bubbled up one after another like boiling water in a steamer.
Tap.
After staring at Konome Taketori for a long time, Hiruzen said nothing. He simply took a pull from his pipe, then exhaled before the smoke had even reached his lungs.
He truly did not want to fall out with her over a single fugitive from Kirigakure.
Ao had stolen the Byakugan of Hyuga Amaki. Konome Taketori wanted revenge for her mother. By any reasonable standard, that was only natural.
But the Five Nation Joint Exam was right around the corner. Ao was here as the lead instructor of Kirigakure's team. If she attacked him now, what would the other villages think?
Who would ever dare join a Chunin Exam hosted by Konoha again?
On one side was Konoha's reputation, painstakingly built over decades.
On the other was the disciple who had lived at his side for years.
His indecisive nature took over once again. He simply could not choose.
No wonder Danzo had always said Hiruzen Sarutobi was unfit to be Hokage.
Konome Taketori could not help thinking that her other teacher had not been entirely wrong. Letting someone as cautious and compromising as Hiruzen wield political power was truly frustrating.
Whether he stopped her or supported her, either choice would at least have been a clear stand.
Only this wavering hesitation was disappointing.
A gray light flickered through her eyes.
Creak.
Without the slightest warning, a stone platform suddenly rose from the floor of the office, startling both Hiruzen and Jiraiya.
Their eyes snapped toward it.
It was a standard cylinder, made of gray-white concrete with spiral-patterned steel rods as thick as a grown man's thumb embedded inside.
It had not risen slowly like an ordinary earth-style technique. Instead, it shot upward like a spring compressed to its limit and released in an instant. Once it reached the right height, it stopped immediately.
From extreme motion to perfect stillness in a blink, it felt less like it had risen and more like it had simply appeared there out of nowhere.
The effect was both dangerous and deeply unsettling.
Clack.
Konome Taketori planted her elbow on the desk and spread her pale fingers open like flower petals.
"If you really can't decide, then let's settle this the ninja way."
She looked at him calmly.
"Arm wrestling."
What an absurdly childish way to decide it.
Jiraiya screamed the thought in silence.
He still did not fully understand why this mysterious woman wanted to move against Ao, but it was obviously a serious political issue. It could damage Konoha's reputation and possibly even provoke a diplomatic crisis. If mishandled, it might spark a war.
How could they decide something like that with arm wrestling?
"Fine."
Ignoring the horrified expression on Jiraiya's face, Hiruzen thought for a moment, then smiled and stepped forward to stand opposite Konome Taketori. He placed his elbow on the desk as well.
One hand was pale and delicate.
The other was old, lean, and solid.
The moment their hands locked, terrifying waves of chakra began to churn in the air.
"W-wait a second!"
After being nothing but background scenery for half the scene, the toad sage Jiraiya finally stomped his foot and threw both arms up, cutting in.
"Who are you?"
Even though she knew perfectly well who he was, Konome Taketori still feigned ignorance and asked calmly.
Hiruzen was just about to explain Jiraiya's identity when that single question seemed to trigger some invisible routine.
Jiraiya threw one arm forward and one back, his wooden sandals planted dramatically, and launched straight into his self-introduction.
"There's nothing to hide. I am one of the Three Legendary Sannin, unmatched in all directions, the White-Haired Toad Sage, the handsome man who can silence even crying children…"
Crack, crack.
As he rattled it off like a stage performer, he struck a bizarre pose that looked straight out of some dramatic manga.
Then, swelling with pride, he declared:
"Jiraiya-sama, that's me!"
A breeze drifted in through the window, stirring Jiraiya's silver ponytail.
The atmosphere in the office somehow became even more silent than before.
Konome Taketori turned to look at the bizarre hermit sage. She could not help feeling that oddballs like Hashirama, Naruto, and Jiraiya felt wildly out of place in such a blood-soaked world.
And yet all three of them were absurdly powerful, and all were highly suited to Sage Mode.
Could it be that shinobi with a childlike heart found it easier to enter a state of oneness with heaven and earth?
Beside her, Hiruzen had originally intended to introduce Jiraiya properly, but after seeing that performance, he quietly swallowed the words.
No matter what, he absolutely could not let Konome Taketori know that Jiraiya was his disciple too.
It was simply too embarrassing.
"Oh. So you're one of teacher's disciples too. I saw your file in the archives."
Konome Taketori had no intention of acknowledging him as her senior brother. She glanced at Hiruzen, whose old face had turned faintly red, then asked directly:
"So? What is it you want?"
"Of course I have something to say!"
Jiraiya straightened proudly, finally dropping the clown act and speaking in a serious tone.
"I don't know what the two of you are arguing about, but making a move on a visiting foreign ninja is obviously an extremely serious political issue. How can you settle it with something as childish as arm wrestling?"
You really aren't Hokage material.
Konome Taketori sighed inwardly.
Did he think she and Hiruzen were unaware that this method was ridiculous? If they had chosen to settle it this way, then there was naturally a reason.
She understood herself very clearly. Her character was not particularly noble. She had done her fair share of killing, looting, and bloodshed.
The only trait remotely worth praising was that she was at least fair when it came to grudges and repayment.
Whatever Hiruzen's reason for taking her in had originally been no longer mattered.
A gentleman is judged by his deeds, not by his heart.
At the very least, he had never wronged her. Instead, he had taught her diligently for years and helped her treat the bloodline disease of the Shikotsumyaku.
She accepted that debt.
But a debt was still just a debt.
Her hatred for Kirigakure and Ao, the grudge with the Hyuga main family, and her future plans involving the tailed beasts meant that sooner or later, she and Hiruzen were destined to stand on opposite sides.
With her current strength, there was almost no one left in the ninja world who could truly stop her.
Yet when it came to people like Guy and Hiruzen, those who had genuinely helped her, she did not want to settle things through naked violence.
She had never even used Kotoamatsukami on those closest to her.
That was one of the very few boundaries she still kept.
So when she saw Hiruzen wavering, she had deliberately proposed arm wrestling as the solution.
Both of them were taijutsu-oriented shinobi. One clash of hands would be enough to understand each other's depth.
No bloodshed.
No bitterness.
But from this moment on, Konoha's right to decide would no longer remain equally split between them.
The winner of this match would become the true voice of Konoha's future.
For someone like Hiruzen, a dove by nature, this was precisely the outcome he wanted most.
He had understood her intent the moment she proposed it, which was why he had accepted such an absurd contest.
"Ignore him."
Faced with his disciple's challenge, Hiruzen's eyes brimmed with confidence.
The solution she had offered suited him perfectly.
Konoha's reputation and stability mattered, yes.
But it was equally important that Konome Taketori not leave Konoha because of irreconcilable conflict.
If he won in a contest of pure physical strength, then everything could still be smoothed over.
As for the possibility of losing?
He did not believe it for a second.
In a pure contest of arm strength, taijutsu was the field he trusted most.
And if he really did lose, then that would simply mean the gap between them had already grown too wide.
If the student had truly surpassed the master, then what was wrong with entrusting Konoha's future to someone stronger?
After all, had that not been the reason he had nurtured her in the first place?
To leave behind a pillar strong enough to support Konoha once he and Danzo had become too old and weak.
With that thought, Hiruzen's resolve only hardened. His fingers, thickened from years of staff training, locked firmly over her jade-like hand.
"Jiraiya, you'll be the referee."
"This… fine!"
Seeing that old man Sarutobi had made up his mind, Jiraiya could only lower his head in resignation. He took a step between them, hand raised like a blade to give the signal.
Looking at their clasped hands, one large and one small, he thought the result already looked obvious.
"Three!"
The moment Jiraiya called out, Hiruzen exploded with chakra.
The muscles in his dry arm swelled instantly, stretching the sleeve of his close-fitting shirt tight.
The air in the office became suffocatingly tense.
In contrast, Konome Taketori's hand remained slender and soft as willow branches.
Jiraiya shook his head. He almost felt sorry for her.
His teacher had no bloodline limit, and unlike Tsunade, he did not rely on strength-enhancing taijutsu.
But he had inherited the legacy of the monkey clan and eaten the peaches of Mount Huaguo. His raw strength was enough to compete with the Nine-Tails.
Back when Jiraiya had entered Sage Mode and gained tenfold power, he still had not been able to match his teacher.
Even though Hiruzen was old now and no longer as strong as he once had been, this little girl still had no chance of beating him in pure strength.
"Two!"
Jiraiya's voice carried a note of excitement now.
It had been years since he had seen his teacher unleash his physical power. Just thinking of that unmatched strength filled him with anticipation.
Crack, crack.
Hiruzen's expression grew even more serious. A frosty sound seemed to travel through his arm as earth-style chakra spread from his upper arm down into his wrist and hand.
For human beings, strength came from two things.
First, raw muscle power.
Second, the sturdiness of the body itself. Those with naturally denser bones were often capable of greater force.
He knew full well that Konome Taketori possessed the Shikotsumyaku. She was certainly not as fragile as she looked.
To ensure victory, he reinforced his flesh and bones with earth-style chakra, raising his body's hardness another level.
As one of the very few truly all-round shinobi in the world, he had mastered the five elemental natures, taijutsu, and sealing techniques alike.
But the field in which he trusted himself most was still earth-style and taijutsu.
This was his full power.
"One!"
Seeing that Hiruzen was fully prepared, Jiraiya kindly waited a beat longer.
When he saw that Konome Taketori still had not done anything at all, he finally called the last number with genuine regret.
Slash.
His hand chopped downward to start the match.
At once, Hiruzen's back arched like a bear's, and the muscles in his arm bulged even further.
Jiraiya could practically already see what would happen a second later.
Hiruzen would slam the girl's hand down onto the stone platform.
Was this the Great Toad Sage's prophecy at work?
His mind wandered for just a moment, and he was already about to declare the winner when he realized that the two locked arms had not moved even the slightest bit.
Creak, creak.
Their elbows pressed so hard into the reinforced platform that the steel and concrete groaned.
Hiruzen's entire body shook with effort, every muscle standing out from the force he was exerting.
And across from him, Konome Taketori simply held out her arm in perfect calm.
She had not used any technique to strengthen herself.
She had not flared her chakra.
She did not even look like she was trying very hard.
Jiraiya's eyes widened in disbelief.
Konome Taketori's effortless composure stood in stark contrast to Hiruzen's straining, trembling body.
Sarutobi-sensei had lost in a contest of pure strength.
Even though she had not yet forced Hiruzen's arm all the way down, as a fair referee with a keen eye, Jiraiya already knew the result.
The winner of this arm-wrestling match was obvious.
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