(Please Keep Reading!! Thanks to Not Selling Oranges for the 100-coin tip~)
Day eight of the mission.
Team Eleven finally delivered the client's group safely—without further incident—to a town within the Land of Hot Water.
The streets were lively, filled with all kinds of passersby. Since the Land of Hot Water had no active conflict with Kumogakure, the region was relatively peaceful.
The climate here was also different from the Land of Iron—there was a lot of mist both during the day and at night, and the temperature was still on the low side. Even wearing coats, it felt a little chilly—around seven or eight degrees Celsius.
This town was effectively the hot-spring capital of the Land of Hot Water. Business in hot springs was booming. After surviving the ambush by the Cloud ninja, Mizutani Shōto finally revealed his true financial power—he invited Baixing's entire team to enjoy one full day and night at his hot spring resort, all expenses covered.
That single all-access hot spring ticket was worth at least two to three hundred thousand ryō in Land of Hot Water currency—around one hundred thousand ryō in Land of Fire money.
Baixing was honestly tempted to resell it, find an inn for the night, and leave early the next morning.
—One of the ninja rules: traveling at night is basically asking to die, especially during wartime.
"Nope!"
Uchiha Mikoto and Yakushi Nono crossed their arms into an X simultaneously, refusing outright.
Might Dai, after hearing the ticket was worth one hundred thousand ryō, also briefly considered selling it.
"So troublesome… how about you guys enjoy it, and we sell it?" Baixing suggested tentatively.
"Absolutely not! Absolutely not!" Mikoto protested loudly.
"This is our last C-rank mission, Sensei Baixing! How can you be so cruel?! Wahhh~!"
Peh!
Nono complained internally. It's the last C-rank mission as a team, not in general.
Why did both Sensei and Mikoto love saying such unlucky things?
At this point, almost no one believed that Mikoto would fail the upcoming chūnin exams.
And so, the four of them spent an entire day and night enjoying top-tier luxury service at Mizutani's hot spring resort—professional scrubbing, all kinds of Land of Hot Water delicacies, private hot spring rooms…
On the eleventh day, after the escort mission was officially completed, the Mizutani merchant took the initiative to add another twenty thousand ryō to the reward. Along with a thank-you letter several thousand words long, he had everything delivered to Konohagakure, straight onto the Hokage's desk.
"Cloud ninja…"
"Baixing, you really gave me a surprise," Sarutobi Hiruzen murmured.
In the ninja world, intelligence was notoriously easy to leak. In the Land of Waves mission, even Zabuza's group had deduced Team Seven's route purely from travel information.
So Hiruzen didn't suspect a leak from within the village. He was simply puzzled—had some criminal organization suddenly decided to spend big money hiring Cloud ninja?
Regardless, this mission was no longer an ordinary one. Upgrading it to a B-rank mission was entirely justified.
What Hiruzen couldn't figure out was how Baixing's team had defeated that Cloud ninja squad—and whether there had been a jōnin among them. All of that would require questioning Baixing, the team leader.
That said, he could already go ahead and register Baixing's team for the chūnin exams.
One day before the first stage of the chūnin exams.
The main gate of the village.
After completing entry procedures and stepping back onto Konoha's streets, the three members of Team Eleven felt like their bodies no longer belonged to them.
Baixing, on the other hand, looked completely relaxed. If he hadn't deliberately slowed down to match their pace, he would've returned days earlier.
"Registration for the chūnin exams is already closed. I'll pull some strings and get you signed up," Baixing said casually.
"Also, there's still time today. Go home and rest well. Don't forget—tomorrow, go to the Ninja Academy conference building for the first exam."
"That's all."
He completely ignored the resentful looks from Mikoto and Nono behind him.
During the nighttime travel, Baixing hadn't given the two girls a break from training—even sneaking in some technique-stealing on the side, picking up two different C-rank elemental jutsu.
As for Might Dai—
With his chakra reserves, just keeping up with the travel had nearly exhausted him. Any extra training would've caused unnecessary bodily damage.
Still, Dai had now basically reached the chakra control level expected of a normal genin—
Tree climbing.
In the original story, Naruto and Sasuke—children of destiny with bloodlines, cheat codes, absurd chakra growth, and later buffs from the Sage of Six Paths—still needed several days of nonstop training to master it.
Someone like Dai, whose chakra talent was worse than an average genin if you excluded the Eight Gates…
Tree climbing was a major hurdle.
Hokage Building.
After Baixing finished his report, Hiruzen's pupils shrank slightly upon hearing about the dual-blade Lightning Release ninja.
From Baixing's account, he believed the enemies were most likely chūnin. But according to intel Hiruzen remembered, there was a Kumogakure jōnin who, during missions involving Cloud ninja, referred to himself as "Thunder Lion."
"Ahem."
"You sold those two blades?!"
Hiruzen stared at Baixing with a Are you messing with me? expression.
Baixing nodded honestly, his tone calm.
"Those blades were spoils of war, but since they belonged to Cloud ninja, I sold them immediately in a nearby Land of Iron town to avoid being tracked."
Sold them…
Hiruzen covered his face.
Sometimes Baixing was incredibly meticulous—too meticulous. So meticulous that it made it impossible to confirm whether the enemy squad had included a jōnin.
"Normally, a mission team must be led by a higher-ranked ninja to properly command the others," Hiruzen said bluntly, piercing through Baixing's lie.
"So, Baixing."
"The ninja you killed wasn't a chūnin."
"At the very least, he was a special jōnin."
Baixing immediately launched into award-winning acting. His body trembled slightly, a flash of joy crossing his eyes before quickly sinking into gloom.
"Even so, I still hope I can pass the chūnin exams properly tomorrow."
"Actually," Hiruzen said slowly,
"You're already a fully qualified chūnin, Baixing."
He tried earnestly to persuade him to let go of his fixation.
Baixing refused without hesitation.
"Sorry, Hokage-sama. I can't take shortcuts."
"If a ninja can't maintain stable performance throughout a normal exam, then he's not a qualified chūnin."
"Such a chūnin would only endanger teammates—whether on the battlefield or during high-level missions."
Hearing this, Hiruzen couldn't help but ask,
"Then do you think Dai can become a chūnin?"
Baixing shook his head.
"It's hard enough for him to even be a genin."
"Then why did you—"
"Because of issues with his previous team, he never had the courage to take the chūnin exams. I just did what a teacher should do."
That answer ended the discussion.
Even if Baixing never became a so-called genius ninja, Hiruzen now fully acknowledged him as a perfect inheritor of the Will of Fire—someone who could become an excellent ninja instructor. Teaching at the Academy someday might suit him perfectly.
"This time, your mission reward is raised to 120,000 ryō. It will be recorded as a B-rank mission in your file…"
Inside the Hokage's office, Hiruzen and Baixing went through the entire mission process. He also reminded him that the chūnin exam location tomorrow would be the same as always, and the teams would remain unchanged.
After Baixing left, Hiruzen was about to return to work—
When his son arrived.
"What?! A B-rank mission?! Why does he deserve that?!"
Sarutobi Shinnosuke exploded.
"That was obviously Uchiha Mikoto, the genius, carrying the team! What does Baixing have to do with it?!"
Hiruzen took a drag from his pipe, exhaling smoke slowly. Looking at his still-immature eldest son, he thought quietly—
If only Baixing were my son.
"Shinnosuke, don't think becoming a jōnin makes you invincible. You still have a lot to learn about being a ninja."
"Learn? From a genin who trips during the second stage of the chūnin exams' survival test?"
"..."
"Baixing is just unstable during exams, but in missions he's flawless—"
"Then why don't you just promote him to chūnin? Or even jōnin?"
"..."
A string of pointed questions left Hiruzen silent—twice.
"Genius often need their quirks to fully express their talent," Hiruzen finally said.
"I can't forcibly restrain him. That could destroy his will to move forward."
Then Shinnosuke spoke of how, despite completing countless missions, he had never once received praise from his father—yet now Hiruzen praised an outsider, an orphan, a mere genin.
At last, he asked the question buried deep in his heart.
"Father… am I your son?"
"Or is Baixing?"
Sarutobi Hiruzen:
"..."
His third silence.
—Do you know how many jōnin slots there are?
—How many sixteen-year-olds become jōnin?
—How many freshly graduated genin get multiple jōnin assigned every time they take a B-rank mission?
—How many ninja can yell at the Hokage inside the Hokage's office?
—How many—
None of that reached Baixing, who had already returned home.
What concerned him now was how to perform tomorrow.
"The matter of the five elements… only the three of them know for now."
He'd made them swear secrecy—planning to reveal it dramatically after becoming a chūnin.
The result?
Two sets of eye-rolls from Mikoto and Nono, along with heartfelt wishes that he'd never pass the chūnin exams in his lifetime.
"Alright then."
"Time to train."
Baixing walked to the corner of his living room, where a custom black-framed, full-body floor mirror stood.
The mirror perfectly reflected the black-haired youth's tall, slender figure and handsome face.
Raising one hand, he formed a seal.
"Transformation Technique!"
◇ I'll be dropping one bonus chapters for every 10 reviews. comment
◇ One bonus chapter will be released for every 100 Power Stones.
◇ You can read 60 chapter ahead on P@treon if you're interested: patreon.com/CanonBreaker