Chapter 124: Baiting a Toad?

Jiraiya had no idea what just happened. In his opinion, Yuna should, as a shinobi of Konoha, be loyal to Konoha. Yet that clearly wasn’t the case. What he found even more surprising, however, was that Hiruzen apparently was fine with that. No, he wasn’t just fine with it, he even expected it and even promoted her to the rank of jonin, despite Yuna saying that she would disobey Hiruzen’s orders and even fight him to the death if necessary. Jiraiya realized that a lot of things happened in Konoha while he wasn’t here and that he certainly needed to inquire what exactly was going on.

Ino and Shikamaru had rather similar opinions. Truth be told, the thought of not being loyal to Konoha didn’t even exist in their minds. Even Shikamaru, who spent a lot of time simply contemplating things, never once thought about something like this.

Naruto, Hinata, and Anko, on the other hand, weren’t surprised about that. All three of them had, to some extent, negative experiences with Konoha. Naruto, due to having Kurama sealed inside him, Hinata, because of the Hyuga clan, and Anko because she was Orochimaru’s student for a while.

Just as Hiruzen had guessed, they would abandon Konoha without a second thought if the situation escalated. The only factor that might cause some trouble with that is Ino, the only person in the group that was truly loyal to Konoha and whose parents lived here. That, however, was a situation that would be addressed if it was actually necessary.

Worst case scenario, Yuna would just have to kidnap her “against her will”. Like this, Ino wouldn’t betray Konoha and could still be together with Naruto. Although it would be slightly troublesome to find an explanation as to why Ino could occasionally escape her kidnappers for a few weeks and spent some time with her parents, just to be kidnapped again after a few weeks. Yuna, however, had the confidence to bullshit her way through something like that.

Hiruzen could feel that the atmosphere was getting rather strange, so he decided to push the conversation forward.

“Anyway, these are all the promotions for this time’s chunin exam. Everyone except for Jiraiya and Yuna is dismissed.”

As soon as Yuna, Hiruzen and Jiraiya were the only people left in the room, Hiruzen looked at Yuna with expectant eyes.

“I assume Anko told you about our deal?”

“Hehe, of course. Since that is what she promised, I will, naturally, follow the arrangements.”

While a happy smile appeared on Hiruzen’s face, Jiraiya couldn’t help but be suspicious.

‘Is this why sensei allowed Yuna to become a jonin despite what she said? Was sensei really someone that could be bribed so easily?’

While Jiraiya’s thoughts were drifting in a weird direction, Yuna took out a scroll and tossed it towards Hiruzen, who caught it with a greedy smile on his face.

“This is the real thing. For now, it is sealed inside that scroll and can be taken out after injecting chakra into the scroll. Just take it out at a proper time.”

Then, Yuna tossed a book towards Hiruzen, which was caught easily.

“This is the normal version with a little gimmick on the back.”

Hiruzen raised an eyebrow and looked at the back of the book to find a small seal engraved into it. He injected a bit of chakra into it, but no visible changes happened.

“Hehe, look at the title of the book.”

Hiruzen turned the book around in confusion, but when he saw the title, his eyes widened in surprise. Instead of the previous title: “The Fox tangles with the Snake” the title of the book turned into “The History of Konoha”. He quickly opened it and noticed that even the individual pages have been changed.

He injected chakra into the seal again and noticed to his astonishment, that the book turned back into its original form.

‘This is amazing, with this I can read this whenever I want. Even when someone enters the room, I can just change it in an instant.’

If at a later date someone would ask Hiruzen what he thought about this seal, he would, without the slightest bit of shame, proclaim that his first thought was, that this could revolutionize the way Konoha’s shinobi could send and receive secret messages.

Jiraiya on the other hand looked at the book in Hiruzen’s hand and was completely spellbound.

“*Gulp* Sensei, is that what I think it is?”

A huge smile appeared on Hiruzen’s face. This was, after all, the reason he told Jiraiya to stay behind instead of leaving the room with everyone else: Hiruzen wanted to boast about the treasure he would receive. Like a rich man currently drinking the most luxurious of wines, he looked at Jiraiya like he was a poor man that could only drink the cheapest of wines.

“I AM the Hokage, after all. It is only natural that I get some good stuff in advance.”

After hearing that, Jiraiya, for a single moment, actually thought that becoming Hokage wouldn’t be that bad, but quickly dismissed that thought.

‘He got his copy a few days early, so what? I will just wait for a little and get my own copy after a while.’

Hiruzen could easily read Jiraiya’s thoughts and sneered at him with disdain clearly visible on his face.

“Hehe, you don’t really think a mere early copy is all I got, right?”

Jiraiya couldn’t help but shiver a little when he heard that and saw how Hiruzen was looking at him.

‘What else could there be? Even if he received both books it wouldn’t matter that much.’

Hiruzen became even more arrogant when he saw Jiraiya’s confusion. If he wasn’t laying in a bed right now, his nose would be so high up that he would be looking at the ceiling.

“Hehe, what I got is: Both of the yet-to-be-released books. Both of them are signed by Rose-sensei herself and both of them have dedications to me in Rose-sensei’s handwriting.”

When Jiraiya heard that, he visibly staggered backward and clutched his heart. Greed was clearly visible in his eyes as he considered actually becoming the next Hokage.

‘Is that really true? If I can become the Hokage I can get my hands on stuff like that? I want it! NO! Calm down Jiraiya, if you actually became Hokage, there is no way you could continue your research. That’s right, those books are great, but no matter how great they are, the real thing is still better. Peeking…*cough* researching is the best!’

“Hehe, this was a pretty good try sensei, but at the end of the day, I still don’t want to become the next Hokage. There is no way I would stop peek…*cough*… stop my spy network. It is, after all, very important to Konoha!”

Although what Jiraiya said was rather noble, the perverted look on his face clearly gave a different message.

Hiruzen clicked his tongue in annoyance after realizing that his attempt to make Jiraiya the next Hokage failed.

‘I need to get rid of this job. If I have to endure Yuna for much longer I will die of stress. Guess the only choice left is Tsunade. Good thing I pretended to be weak in front of the council members. They should easily agree to get a new Hokage. And then I can finally enjoy my retirement, hehe.’

Yuna, meanwhile, could only look at the two perverts in front of her and shake her head.

‘Seriously, all they have in the head are acts of depravity. How shameful.’

[THAT IS NOT SOMETHING YOU ARE ELIGIBLE TO COMPLAIN ABOUT!!!]